Years ago, the public overwhelmingly wanted the government to be very involved in the nation's health care, believing it was their duty to provide coverage for all residents.
That was before the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
A new Gallup poll reveals the majority of Americans — 52 percent — say it's not the federal government's responsibility to ensure that all Americans have health care coverage, the third consecutive year the public has held that view.
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Prior to the start of Barack Obama's presidency in 2009, a majority of Americans consistently took the opposite view.
Contrastly, Gallup found that 45 percent of Americans say health care is the government's responsibility, up slightly from last year.
Gallup first asked this question in 2000, when 59 percent of Americans said it was the federal government's responsibility to make sure all Americans have health care. That sentiment peaked at 69 percent in 2006.
Not surprisingly the percentage of those who do or do not want the government involved in health care mirrors PPACA's approval rating: 79 percent of those who approve of PPACA also say it is the government's responsibility to ensure universal health care, while 76 percent of those who disapprove of PPACA say the opposite.
Gallup said PPACA most definitely changed the public's opinion on the idea that the government should be responsible for health care.
"Given that Obama campaigned on a pledge to expand the government's role in ensuring health care coverage for Americans, and then pushed for and obtained passage of the landmark [PPACA] in 2010, these tangible manifestations of a larger government role in health care most likely created a significant backlash, particularly among Republicans and independents," Gallup said.
"[PPACA] proponents have pointed out that Americans favor a number of the act's provisions when tested in isolation, and that the act has already lowered the nation's uninsured rate. Yet, a majority of Americans continue to say they disapprove of it, even as the [PPACA] is making progress toward its stated goal of expanding health insurance coverage. That more than half of Americans think it is not the government's role to make sure Americans have health care coverage suggests that opposition to the [PPACA] may be centered more on its philosophical underpinnings, rather than on the specifics of its actual provisions and outcomes."
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