I feel like it's partly made to avoid people abusing the system.
In France for example a lot of people go to the doctor for the most ridiculous things because 1: it's free (at least at the individual level) and 2: it's an easy way to get a sick leave (sick leaves have been exploding in the last few years). Same with emergency rooms, people don't know what an emergency is, they just use them as walk in clinic.
Every time someone goes to the doc for a small headache or a common cold, just for the doc to tell them "well, just wait it'll go away, here have some aspirin", it cost something like $30-100 to the whole system.
Is it though? As far as I remember, to visit a doctor you had to pay €25 out of your pocket at the moment of the visit, 70% of which would be refunded by your health insurance at a later point (under the state system, and potentially more if you're paying for the additional private insurance or "mutuelle".
Cannot comment on France, but [0] is a german wikipedia article about a counterpart we had in germany. From 2004 til 2012, you had to pay 10€ to the first doctor you visited in a quarter.
Not a great system and we thankfully got rid of it again.
Doctor visit are never free in France you always pay 1€ which is deducted from future reimbursements.
Also you still have to pay 70% of the 25€ unless you have additional private insurance.
In France for example a lot of people go to the doctor for the most ridiculous things because 1: it's free (at least at the individual level) and 2: it's an easy way to get a sick leave (sick leaves have been exploding in the last few years). Same with emergency rooms, people don't know what an emergency is, they just use them as walk in clinic.
Every time someone goes to the doc for a small headache or a common cold, just for the doc to tell them "well, just wait it'll go away, here have some aspirin", it cost something like $30-100 to the whole system.