Around 91% of Americans worried about increasing health care costs
An additional 83% of respondents are worried about what the nation as a whole spends on health care.
As the New Year approaches with new health care premiums, many Americans are noticing a spike in prices – and it’s not sitting well with them. According to a poll conducted by the Kaiser Family Fund this month, a full 91% of people are concerned about growing health care prices for individuals. An additional 83% of respondents are worried about what the nation as a whole spends on health care, with 72% concerned about government spending on Medicare and Medicaid. Around 69% worry about what employers are paying for health insurance, per the report.
The concerns arise as soaring inflation in all sectors has created a hot-button political debate. In the KFF polls, the public ranked the economy as the number one concern for the country, with 37% of KFF survey respondents saying it should be the government’s biggest concern. Meanwhile, health care concerns were also ranked highly, with 9% of the public saying that affordability issues should be first on the docket.
Of the 91% of survey respondents who said they were worried about individual health care costs, about 60% said they were very concerned about prices while 31% said they were somewhat concerned. Likewise, while 82% of Americans worried about national health care spending, around 48% counted themselves as very concerned.
In addition to polling the public about their broader political concerns, the KFF surveys asked about specific policy changes. They found that 95% of Americans say they support the passage of a health care cost transparency bill, and 60% of those surveyed saying the passage of such a bill should be a top health care priority.
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Moreover, a majority of those surveyed said they support provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act centered around reducing health care costs. Support extended across party lines, with 54% of Republicans as well as 90% of Democrats supporting extended ACA health care subsidies, for example.
Increased funding for vaccine outreach and mental health services was also supported by many of those surveyed, according to the KFF report.