Poll shows COVID-19 concerns sharply decline as vaccines flourish

Jun. 17—Concern about COVID-19 declined sharply in the last three months, but voters remain pessimistic about the future, according to a new poll released Wednesday.

The Franklin & Marshall College poll showed only about one in 14 voters (7%) see the virus as the most important problem facing the state, compared to almost one in three (31%) in a March F&M poll.

Back then, COVID-19 was the top concern. Now, it's only ranked fourth.

Concern about government and politicians ranks first with three in 10 voters (30%) naming that as the most important problem facing the state, up a bit from March (27%).

"Lots of people now have vaccines, right? So it seems to be less of a problem," poll director Berwood Yost said. "But despite that, we just don't see an improvement on some of the economic and kind of direction of the state questions. And, you know, I just wonder if those indicators have become so tied up in people's ... partisan assessments, that it's hard to separate the two anymore."

Only about a third of state residents (35%) see the state as headed in the right direction with more than half (55%) viewing it as off on the wrong track, according to the poll.

Before the pandemic, almost three in five voters (57%) saw the state as headed in the right direction, an October 2019 F&M poll found.

A lot of the blame has fallen on Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat and for more than a year the target of repeated criticism by Republicans on a wide variety of matters, but especially his COVID-19 response.

The October 2019 poll did not ask about Wolf's job approval, but a March 2019 poll had more than half of voters (51%) saying he was doing an excellent or good job.

In the latest poll, Wolf's job approval has dropped to about two in five voters (39%) and his disapproval to about three in five voters (60%).

The economy plays a major role in voters' ongoing pessimism. Unemployment and personal finances (12%) and taxes (8%) rank second and third in answers to the most important problem facing the state question.

About one in six (17%) see themselves as financially better off than a year ago, compared to about one in nine (11%) in March, but more people see themselves as worse off, too — one in four (25%) versus about two in five (19%) .

About a quarter (24%) expect they will be worse off a year from now, up from about one in six (17%) in March.

Franklin & Marshall surveyed 444 voters between June 7 and Sunday. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 6.4 percentage points.

Contact the writer: bkrawczeniuk@timesshamrock.com; 570-348-9147; @BorysBlogTT on Twitter.