and how to ensure allocated funds are used effectively, efficiently and equitably. There are many arguments on both sides of the issue of public versus private health financing policies: Claims that publicly funded healthcare improves the quality and efficiency of personal health care delivery: Government spending on health is essential for the accessibility and sustainability of healthcare services and programmes. For those people who would otherwise go without care due to lack of financial means, any quality care is an improvement. Since people perceive universal healthcare as free (if there is no insurance premium or co-payment), they are more likely to seek preventive care which may reduce the disease burden and overall healthcare costs in the long run. Single-payer systems reduce wastefulness by removing the middle man, i.e. private insurance companies, thus reducing the amount of bureaucracy. In particular, reducing the amount of paperwork that medical professionals have to deal with for insurance claims processing allows them to concentrate more on treating patients. Claims that privately funded healthcare leads to greater quality and efficiencies in personal health care: Perceptions that publicly funded healthcare is free can lead to overuse of medical services, and hence raise overall costs compared to private health financing. Privately funded medicine leads to greater quality and efficiencies through increased access to and reduced waiting times for specialized health care services and technologies. Limiting the allocation of public funds for personal healthcare does not curtail the ability of uninsured citizens to pay for their healthcare as out-of-pocket expenses. Public funds can be better rationalized to provide emergency care services regardless of insured status or ability to pay, such as with the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act in the United States. Privately funded and operated healthcare reduces the requirement for governments to increase taxes to cover healthcare costs, which may be compounded by the inefficiencies among government agencies due to their greater bureaucracy. Other health policy areas Health policy options extend beyond the financing and delivery of personal health care, to domains such as medical research and health workforce planning, both domestically and internationally. Medical research policy Medical research can be both the basis for defining evidence-based health policy, and the subject of health policy itself, particularly in terms of its sources of funding. Those in favor of government policies for publicly funded medical research posit that removing profit as a motive will increase the rate