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Bad times and big expectations

Posted by: Ella Hushagen on Apr 27, 2009

Americans are avoiding the doctor's office when they're sick, and they're struggling to pay the medical bills they get when they can't avoid seeking care any longer, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation poll released last week. The survey data reveal that over the past year,

Six in ten say they have taken ... steps to delay or skip care.... One in four Americans say someone in their household has had trouble paying medical bills.

However, such difficulties have not soured Americans on pursuing health care reform. In fact, the poll showed that,

A majority of Americans (59 percent) continue to say that economic challenges make it more important than ever to take on health care reform now.

Support for the idea of health reform is high, and it doesn't splinter when pollsters got into some of its proposed components:

[Sixty-seven] percent of Americans are favorably disposed to a public health insurance option.... [Seventy-one] percent say they support the idea of "requiring employers to offer health insurance to their workers or pay money into a government fund."

Americans are struggling in unforgiving economic times, and rightly see health reform as crucial to recovery.