Healthcare in the Netherlands
A 2008 article in the journal "Health Affairs" suggested that the Dutch health system, which combines mandatory universal coverage with competing private health plans, could serve as a model for reform in the US. However,
an assessment of the 2006 Dutch health insurance reforms published in Duke University's "Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law" in 2008 raised concerns. The analysis found that market-based competition in healthcare may not have the advantages over more publicly based single payer models that were originally envisioned for the reforms:
Universal health care
The first move towards a national health insurance system was launched in Germany in 1883, with the Sickness Insurance Law. Industrial employers were mandated to provide injury and illness insurance for their low-wage workers, and the system was funded and administered by employees and employers through "sick funds", which were drawn from deductions in workers' wages and from employers' contributions. Other countries soon began to follow suit. In the United Kingdom, the National Insurance Act 1911 provided coverage for primary care (but not specialist or hospital care) for wage earners, covering about one third of the population. The Russian Empire established a similar system in 1912, and other industrialized countries began following suit. By the 1930s, similar systems existed in virtually all of Western and Central Europe. Japan introduced an employee health insurance law in 1927, expanding further upon it in 1935 and 1940. Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Soviet Union established a fully public and centralized health care system in 1920. However, it was not a truly universal system at that point, as rural residents were not covered.