Polls: Many don’t know, don’t care about health care case
Two polls from well-respected research institutes show many Americans don’t know much about the health care fight in Washington, don’t care about it – or thought the Supreme Court ruled in another direction.
The polls were done independently by the Pew Research Center and the Kaiser Family Foundation, but they have similar results that show a big chunk of the electorate disengaged from the health care reform issue.
Both polls were done after the Supreme Court upheld most of President Barack Obama’s health reform plan on Thursday.
The Pew study showed that despite widespread publicity about the case, just 55 percent of the public knew the Supreme Court upheld most of the health care law. The other 45 percent said they thought the court rejected most of the law (15 percent) or they didn’t know what the court did (30 percent).
Only 37 percent of people under 30 years of age knew what the health care decision was, even though the story was four days old when the survey ended.
That poll was conducted from June 28 to July 1.
The Kaiser study was conducted for three days, from Thursday through Saturday, and it found that only 59 percent of those polled knew that the Supreme Court had issued a ruling upholding the law.
Another 18 percent thought the court hadn’t acted yet, while 17 percent just didn’t know about the case.
Both polls found the public equally divided on the issue, based on party affiliation. The Kaiser study found independent voters equally split.
One telling sign was also in the Kaiser study, where 56 percent wanted opponents of the Affordable Care Act to stop trying to block it and move on to other national problems.
The Pew survey also said despite a large number of people seemingly disengaged from the issue, health care was still the biggest news story in June, and the second biggest so far in 2012. (The biggest news story of 2012 was soaring gasoline prices in March.)
The poll also showed little public interest or awareness in the Eric Holder case.
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