Designing a health care system inevitably requires choosing between or mixing public and private approaches, particularly in terms of financing. I am confident that Greek citizens would benefit from the introduction of a Greek public universal health care system that covers population “needs” and leaves funding for, and coverage of, population “wants” to an adequately regulated private health insurance market.
If we reach consensus on this concept of a two-tier health care system, the next step will be to agree upon the differentiation of “needs” versus “wants”. Of course, we should not forget that private insurance markets are characterised by information asymmetry as buyers (consumers) know much more about their risks than sellers (insurance companies) do.