Updated outlooks on healthcare

With the recent healthcare drama unfolding as the prospects of a bill are claiming to soon be passed, people are still concerned with the end result. In the Gallup poll, 39% of those polled said that their support for healthcare will depend on the details that are laid out in the bill that is to be passed. 33% will oppose it and 25% will support it. In addition, the poll also states that they would prefer to see Congress deal with healthcare reform on a gradual basis over several years, versus trying to pass a comprehensive reform plan this year. Also, an addittional recent poll from Gallup states that most Americans are likely to say that their healthcare costs, coverage, insurance requirements, and quality of care will get worse rather than better if the healthcare bill is passed this year. Only to confirm this notion, Gallup conducted an addittional poll that presented the same opinion. In September of 2009, 42% of those polled said that they thought that the cost of healthcare for them and their family would get worse. Now, when polled in October, that number has risen to 49%. This shows that peoples concern has grown over the past couple of months. It is unknown whether it is due to media speculation, education, rough economic times, etc. However, this shows that healthcare is not an issue that is resting in peoples minds. As stated in the previous poll, "Americans who are undecided on healthcare legislation predict it is more likely to make their own situation worse rather than better--especially in terms of cost." Nevertheless, more closure will occur when a bill is passed or when revised methods are made public to lax public concern or to motivate the public to take a stand against the bill.

http://www.gallup.com/video/123812/Americans-Own-Care-Worsening-Healthcare-Bill.aspx
http://www.gallup.com/poll/123782/In-U.S.-39-Say-View-Healthcare-Depends-Details.aspx

Mandatory Healthcare

Of all the new ideas on how to reform healthcare, the one that has been troubling people a lot is mandatory healthcare coverage. This is the notion that if an individual does not have healthcare, then they may have to pay a fine and or a tax. Polling the nations published a poll that was conducted by ABC news asking whether or not those polled would support or oppose a law requiring the all Americans have health insurance, either getting it from work or buying it on their own. Of those polled, 51% supported this bill, 47% opposed the bill and 2% of those polled had no opinion. However, another poll that was posted on the Polling the nations database was conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation. This poll asked whether or not those polled had employers who offered health insurance. Of those polled, 34% said yes, 60% said no and 6% did not know.

The second poll may show why the first poll was so close in numbers in regards to those who agreed and those who disagreed with making it mandatory that those without healthcare pay a fine/tax. Those who may have agreed with that argument, may work at a job that provides its employees with healthcare coverage and those that said no, might have said no not just because they did not have jobs, but possibly because they had already established themselves in their job and it still did not offer healthcare.

The notion of wanting everyone to have healthcare is logical. However, some do not want the government to pay for it. Also, some employers do not want to cover all of their employees because of costs so thats why they want those without healthcare to front the costs themselves. Yet is it right for the legislators to mandate something that forces an individual to attain healthcare coverage even if they feel as if they do not want it. And is it right for the individual to have to pay an addittional fine on top of other expenses for not having healthcare? It can arguably be said that if passed, the government will be segregating a portion of the population and treat them unfairly by making them pay an additional fine for something that the they do not want to purchase. Regardless, this is what makes the healthcare topic so controversial. All of its details are hard to equally implement.

Should you be a citizen to recieve governement healthcare?

Due to recent highlights in the current media coverage, it would seem apparent that healthcare reform will be passed soon. According to foxnews.com, President Obama said that "healthcare reform will absolutely be passed by the end of the year." However, amongst growing concerns of government run healthcare, if passed, is whether or not those who are not U.S. citizens will be covered under the new reform bill. According to Milners database, polling the nations, a question asked in the Ramussen reports about whether or not those polled thought that people should have to show proof of citizenship before recieving government subsidies from healthcare. 83% of those polled said yes, 12% said no, and 5% were not sure. However, the growing defecit is a reoccurring complaint amongst the public. Yet, checking everyone to make sure that they are a legal citizen might proove to be problematic financially. Either way, the lack of money that is present with our state and federal systems will proove to be of major concern if President Obama comes through on his promise of having healthcare reform passed by the end of 2009.

Ideas on how healthcare polling emerged

Since I have not sufficiently researched this topic, its hard to know exactly how healthcare polling emerged. However, as I get further into my Issue History paper, I will know more about the issue. Some things I can guess about is that healthcare is relatively new (late 1800s, early 1900s). The reason for this assumption is that healthcare did not become that advance until that time frame. However, since more technically advance healthcare has emerged, individuals are living longer which makes it more important that individuals have health insurance. People are able to survive things that people use to die from; diabtetes, colds, fever, etc. This is all because of advancements in medication, much of which can be bought over the counter.

One thing I hope to discuss in my Issue paper is what finally made public polling on healthcare important. Why did they start asking questions about healthcare? It would be apparent that the reason that healthcare questions in polling has evolved is beacuse of the technical advances and rising costs of individuals healthcare. However, i want to get more exact answers on these questions.

It is apparent that the recent media coverage on healthcare has drastically increased in the past year more so than at any other point in my lifetime. Obamas new healthcare plan has gathered much of the medias attention and has consumed much of the public polling. Nevertheless, I want to look to see if there has been any issue on healthcare that has caused as much turmoil as the plan that Obama wants to pass.

In my paper I want to discover these differing trends and relate it back to the overall issue on healthcare. If healthcare debate has been a reocurring theme, I also want to compare and contrast trends to see why we cannot get it right.

People not willing to give up private insurance

According to a Rasmussen report, 63% of those polled said that it is more important that nobody is forced to change their health insurance plan than making sure that people have a 'public option' available to them. Only 29% of those polled disagree. In addittion, the report goes on to say that if the public option plan passed, then 53% of those that are insured would have to change their health insurance plan if the public option plan passes. Also, the report continues on to say that 54% of those polled agree that there needs to be changes in healthcare but only 41% support the plan that is being proposed by President Obama.

This data only reconfirms what has been previously discussed in past blogs. Health care reform is needed, but the reform that the President want to put into action, is not what the public wants. This presents a major problem. The reason for this could be peoples misunderstanding of what the President is proposing, or peoples just blatant distaste for the plan. Maybe a law should just be passed that regulates the private insurance companies, but that does not include the public option. Maybe then, a common ground could be reached between the public, Congress and the President.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/october_2009/fear_of_losing_private_health_insurance_trumps_public_option

% of uninsured steadily rising

I thought it may be appropriate to touch base with some current statistics on healthcare versus different polling techniques. The Gallup organization just conducted a poll this October that reported that the number of adults that were uninsured has currently risen in the past month from 13.9% to 16.6%. This could be a direct result of the economy. Because individuals are losing their jobs, they may also be losing their health insurance. Also, if an individual does not have a job, then they may not be able to afford a private healthcare plan. This poll shows that since the number of individuals that are uninsured is rising, then some sort of healthcare reform plan needs to be implemented.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/123509/At-16.6-Number-Uninsured-Americans-Ties-High.aspx

In direct correlation with the above conclusion, the Gallup Organization also conducted another recent poll that shows that individuals in Congress are currently, more so, leaning towards favoring the healthcare reform bill then ever before. The poll titled, "In U.S. Opposition Towards Healthcare Legislation Drops Modestly," the results show that over the past month, people are starting to slowly evolve from opposing the bill to favoring it. Those that wanted to vote for the bill rose from 38% to 40% from September to October and those that tended to vote for/lean for rose from 50% to 51% from September to October. In addition, those that opted to vote against the bill fell from 40% to 36% from September to October and those that tended to vote against/lean against dropped from 47% in September to 41% in October.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/123470/Opposition-Healthcare-Legislation-Drops-Modestly.aspx

Both polls show that health care has not moved out of the public interest spotlight and is still an evolving issue within the realm of public opinion.

Media bias

Differnt news stations, radio stations and newspapers conduct polls daily concering political issues. However, most people have begun to realize that bias is an issue that is present within these polls because some media outlets lean more left or right than others. In a new gallup poll, only 45% of Americans say that they have trust in the media reporting the news fully. 43% of those polled said that feel that the media is to liberal versus the 15% that say that the media is to conservative. In addittion, they found that, "Democrats, nonwhites and those with high school education or less place the most trust in the media followed by liberals and women aged 18-29." This speaks a lot for media reporting. They should make an important note to have their reporting be advantageous to all and not swayed in one direction or the other. Because of bias in reporting, it would almost be an accurate assumption to say that how the media words and conducts their polls is also bias. For example, on my last blog I discussed the implication of the word "choice" in regards to Obama's healthcare policy. When one media outlet included the word "choice" and one media outlet just said public option (vs. public option choice) the results of the survey varied. How a media station conducts and words their polls can reflect somewhat on their bias and what answers they hope to extract from the results.