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Real trade-offs are involved in moving toward single-payer health care ...

... and we'd better be sure that we deal with facts and not rhetoric before we make a decision.

Single-payer advocates in Delaware and nationwide are fond of citing Medicare and Medicaid as more efficient that private health insurance in terms of administrative costs.

But the New York Times persists in reporting on the dirty little secret that in some critical categories a single-payer system delivers sub-standard care:

A nationwide study has found that the uninsured and those covered by Medicaid are more likely than those with private insurance to receive a diagnosis of cancer in late stages, often diminishing their chances of survival.


It is critical to remember, as we debate the future of health care, that there are three critical factors to any health care system: access, costs, and quality.

You can't deal with any of these in isolation.

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