Patients with serious illnesses insured on the basic plan would end up financing a disproportionate share of their health care on their own, the antithesis of the Bismarck model, critics say.

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Xu Xiaonian, an economics professor at the China-Europe International Business School, was even more strident in his remarks, saying China's state-capitalist model was in fact pioneered by Otto Von Bismarck, the 19th-century statesman credited with uniting Germany.

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