Americans support the right to affordable health care

March 1, 2018|Internal Medicine News

Despite the rhetorical winds blowing out of Washington, 92% of Americans believe that they have the right to affordable health care, according to a recent survey by the Commonwealth Fund.

Political affiliation, it turns out, does not appear to determine support for such a right. Democrats aged 19-64 years voiced their support to the tune of 99% in favor of a right to affordable care, compared with 82% of Republicans and 92% of independents, the Commonwealth Fund said in a survey brief released March 1.

All other population subsets included in the survey also gave strong support to the right to affordable care: 96% of those below 250% of the poverty level and 88% of those at or above 250% of the poverty level; 89% of men and 95% of women; 90% of whites and 97% of blacks and Hispanics; and 91% of those in the Midwest and South, 92% in the East, and 93% of those in the Northeast, the Commonwealth Fund reported.

“This survey’s finding that strong majorities of U.S. adults, regardless of party affiliation, believe that all Americans should have a right to affordable health care suggests there may be popular support for a discussion over our preferred path,” the report’s authors wrote.