Mac OSX What is the difference between /etc/hosts and /private/etc/hosts

They are the same file, /etc map to /private/etc

$ cd /
$ pwd
$ ls -lsa
8 lrwxr-xr-x@  1 root    wheel    11 Aug 20 07:11 etc -> private/etc

References

1. What’s the “Private” directory in OS X for