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Volume 12 Number 133 News: Reform Proposals Health care concerns are polling high early in the 2008 presidential election season, but it is still too early to say if any reform will come of it, according to a panel of health policy pollsters who spoke July 10. "Our issue (health care) really does seem to be rising in the public's mind, and we can say that with some confidence," Drew Altman, president and chief executive officer of the Kaiser Family Foundation, an organization focused on health policy research, said, adding that "a lot of things need to happen" before it leads to any kind of reform on the national level. The discussion was held by the Alliance for Health Reform, and moderated by Ed Howard, the group's executive vice president. "Is Charlie Brown going to get to kick the football this time, or are we going to punt away another chance to fix health care?" Howard asked the speakers. Along with Altman, Republican pollster Gary Ferguson with the American Viewpoint and Democratic pollster Mark Mellman with the Mellman Group spoke to the group of journalists, policy advocates, and health care workers. Altman said health care is polling higher than any other domestic topic American voters want to hear about. This is similar to what was happening in 1992, he said. That year saw Bill Clinton get elected, followed by a push by his administration to overhaul health care with an eye toward universal coverage. The attempt failed, and since then health care has not polled as high as it is now, Altman said. "We may be at the opening of the next great debate," he said, saying the first was in the early 1990s. However, in the past, there has been a disconnect between what voters tell pollsters before an election and what they tell them at exit poll booths, Altman said. This suggests that voters do not make their decisions based on health care, despite high polling numbers before hand, he said. "We're going to have to be able to say health mattered to have momentum going into 2009," he said. The main factor driving the high polling numbers, he said, is the emphasis presidential candidates are putting on it, especially Democratic candidates vying for the nomination. Mellman said in the past, Democrats have been able to pick up votes by rallying for health care reform, especially in 1992. But his polls show that "while people don't like the system, they do like their coverage," he said. "The losses from change loom larger in the public's mind than the benefits of change," he said. This poses a difficult prospect for Democrats, who advocate more government regulation of health care: "At some state of the campaign, the discussion will go from what the middle class will get to what the middle class has to pay." Two Categories Ferguson said the parties fit into two categories when it comes to health care reform: Democrats pushing for "universal health care of some sort" and Republicans placing more focus on markets and personal choice. Either way, Ferguson said tackling health care reform will be a difficult task for the next president. The roadblocks to reforming health care are many, Ferugson said. Americans remain skeptical of a government-run system, he said, and his polling shows health care is competing with three other issues that 70 percent or more voters deem "'very important": the war in Iraq, the economy, and terrorism. Also, questions about the specifics of the plans, including cost and bureaucratic control, "will all come to bear." Lastly, he said, the legislative process "is damaging to any real reform." "The environment is clearly poised for a discussion about health care," he said. "Reform? That's not as clear." View the panel discussion.
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