New York Times economic columnist Paul Krugman stated to another panelist who had interjected, "Death panels would save money," to which Krugman responded:
The advisory panel which has the ability to make more or less binding judgments on saying this particular expensive treatment actually doesn't do any good medically and so we are not going to pay for it. That is actually going to save quite a lot of money. We don't know how much yet. The CBO gives it very little credit but, but most, most of the health care economists I talk to think that's going be a really, uh a really major cost saving.
In the United Kingdom and other nations where such government procedures already are in place, the survival rates for such afflictions as breast cancer or prostate cancer are lower than in the U.S. Critics say it is partly because of denial or delay of treatment.