Health Insurance Healthcare Reform Differences Between Universal Health Care and Socialized Medicine By Trisha Torrey Trisha Torrey Facebook LinkedIn Twitter Trisha Torrey is a patient empowerment and advocacy consultant. She has written several books about patient advocacy and how to best navigate the healthcare system. Learn about our editorial process Updated on February 27, 2020 Fact checked Verywell Health content is rigorously reviewed by a team of qualified and experienced fact checkers. Fact checkers review articles for factual accuracy, relevance, and timeliness. We rely on the most current and reputable sources, which are cited in the text and listed at the bottom of each article. Content is fact checked after it has been edited and before publication. Learn more. by Elaine Hinzey, RD Fact checked by Elaine Hinzey, RD LinkedIn Elaine Hinzey is a registered dietitian, writer, and fact-checker with nearly two decades of experience in educating clients and other healthcare professionals. Learn about our editorial process Print Politicians and pundits may toss out terms like universal health care and socialized medicine as if they were synonyms, but the terms represent fundamentally different political and economic approaches to providing for health services. PhotoAlto / Frederic Cirou / Getty Images Universal Health Care Universal health care simply means that every citizen has a realistic ability to access basic health care services. It does not mean that only the government pays for that access. In fact, most of the countries around the world that guarantee universal health care use a combination of public and private coverage. Furthermore, in most cases, the providers and facilities are privately owned services. Although healthcare providers in the United States may refuse to treat people who can't pay for their services, under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), hospital emergency rooms cannot even ask about a person's ability to pay until after the person has been medically stabilized by a healthcare provider. However, most experts do not believe that EMTALA in itself signifies "universal health care." In a strict sense, universal health care is all about access to emergency and preventive health services. Under this definition, the United States enjoys universal health care. However, the term is often constrained to reference access to health insurance—in which case, the United States does not enjoy universal health care. Single-Payer Health Care Contrast universal care with a single-payer system. In a single-payer system, everyone gets coverage that fully pays for all services and the government provides for this access. As with universal health care, even though the government pays for coverage, providers and facilities are mostly private services, not owned by the government—although some healthcare services are government-run, like the military's Tricare system or the Veterans Administration medical system. In many single-payer systems, individual citizens cannot pay out-of-pocket for extra services not otherwise guaranteed by law. Socialized Medicine Socialized medicine in its strictest sense, is a single-payer government-run and -delivered system. In a socialized medicine model, the government provides all services from your healthcare providers and providers to the hospitals and other facilities, and all payments for those services. Some looser translations of socialized medicine allow for private providers and facilities, but that practice is not usual; typically, private payment and independent for-profit providers are either discouraged or forbidden. Language Games The difference in meaning among the terms universal health care, single-payer health care and socialized medicine are clear. However, in the ongoing debate over healthcare reform, initiated by the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and persisting through the "repeal and replace" attempts of the early Trump administration, pundits have played on people's hopes and fears by carefully misusing the language. Commentators on the right conflate single-payer with "socialized medicine," a concept ill-defined in the popular imagination but linked to countries like Cuba—a socialist dictatorship—and Canada, which has notoriously long lines and relatively less patient autonomy. Commentators on the left conflate single-payer with "universal health care," suggesting that only a single-payer system can justify the much-desired "universal" label. Was this page helpful? Thanks for your feedback! Sign up for our Health Tip of the Day newsletter, and receive daily tips that will help you live your healthiest life. Sign Up You're in! Thank you, {{form.email}}, for signing up. There was an error. Please try again. What are your concerns? Other Inaccurate Hard to Understand Submit 7 Sources Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy. Bloom DE, Khoury A, Subbaraman R. The promise and peril of universal health care. Science. 2018;361(6404):eaat9644. doi:10.1126/science.aat9644 Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Emergency medical treatment & labor act (EMTALA). Harvard Health Publishing. Single payer healthcare: pluses, minuses, and what it means for you. Healtinsurance.org. Socialized medicine. Manchikanti L, Hirsch JA. Repeal and replace of affordable care: a complex, but not an impossible task. Pain Physician. (8):E1109–E1113. Martin D, Miller AP, Quesnel-Vallée A, Caron NR, Vissandjée B, Marchildon GP. Canada's universal health-care system: achieving its potential. Lancet. 2018;391(10131):1718–1735. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(18)30181-8 Kaiser Health News. Watch: defining the debate on health care coverage options.