Arghh, the American public, they’re a fickled lot, captain.
In a previous post I called your attention to the Kaiser Foundation Health Tracking Poll revealing that 50 percent of respondents said they didn’t know, or couldn’t name, or that none of the candidates represented their views on health care. Well now we know why. With everybody shouting that the system is totally broken, half of the American public are sort of happy with the health care system we’ve got. At least that’s according to Gallup’s annual health care survey.
What are we going to do with these guys? Don’t they read the papers? Do they live in this country?
And listen to this:
Eighty-three percent of Americans rate the quality of health care they receive as excellent or good, while 15 percent rate the quality as poor. Seventy percent say their health care coverage is excellent or good.
I am not making this up. Ok, there’s a 3 percent error rate, but even so. Amazing.
At least they’re not happy with the cost of care. But as the pollster says a “surprisingly large number are content with the health insurance and health coverage they currently have.”
Now those in the business of actually delivering care have always had a sneaky suspicion that this level satisfaction has been there all along. But there is a fear in the current climate to come out and say it. Got to avoid seeming self serving. Now, however, the American public has now spoken the unspeakable — or at least its voice has been channeled by Gallup.
The importance of these numbers is that people will resist change if it means giving up what they now see as valuable. That will mean some kind of compromise for health care reform that makes sense. Get too ideological, and they will walk away from the deal.
