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From Drew Altman

Drew Altman is president and chief executive officer of KFF, a position he has held for more than 30 years since founding the modern-day KFF organization in the 1990s. He is a leading expert on national health policy issues and an innovator in health journalism and the nonprofit field.

View full bio | Read Dr. Altman's Beyond the Data columns

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President’s Message

“KFF is an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. We have three major program areas: KFF Policy; KFF Polling; and KFF Health News (formerly Kaiser Health News), which conducts specialized public health information campaigns. Learn more about the organization. 

What’s unique about KFF, however, can’t be found in any description of our programs because we’re more than a sum of our parts. KFF is a one-of-a-kind information organization. Not a policy research organization. Not a polling organization. And not a news organization. But rather, a unique combination of all three. That’s the vision behind KFF, and it's this combination that allows us to leverage our combined expertise and assets to play our national role on health policy.” Read more

Beyond the Data

In his “Beyond the Data” columns, Drew Altman discusses what the data, polls, and journalism produced by KFF mean for policy and for people.

“…voters’ concerns about health care costs are having a moment, and will continue to do so through 2028, because voters see them as a dimension of their worries about the cost of living, which is their dominant concern right now.” — Drew Altman, KFF Founding President and CEO

A Guide to the Role of Health in the Midterms

In a new column, President and CEO Dr. Drew Altman says health care costs are playing a significant role in the midterms as one dimension of voters’ concerns about cost of living, and explains why pollsters, analysts, and candidates should look at it that way, and not as a separate voting issue. He writes, “The ‘issue’ that matters most in this election is cost of living and the cost of health care is a central element of it for voters.”

View All Beyond the Data Columns

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  • Mixed Prospects for Vaccinating Children

    From Drew Altman

    In this Axios column, Drew Altman examines the data about what parents say they will do once their children ages 5-11 become eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine, and why it will take some time and a concerted outreach effort to match adult vaccination rates.

  • How Full FDA Approval Could Spur Vaccination

    From Drew Altman

    In this Axios column, Drew Altman says full FDA approval of COVID-19 vaccines can provide a big boost to vaccination efforts if treated as an opportunity for updated messaging from government officials at all levels and public health experts and new actions from employers.

  • The Sleeper Health Cost Policy

    From Drew Altman

    In this Axios column, Drew Altman unpacks President Biden’s recent executive order on promoting competition, exploring its significance for new efforts to control health costs by addressing consolidation in the health care industry.

  • Why Drug Price Negotiation Has Staying Power

    From Drew Altman

    In this Axios column, Drew Altman looks beyond Medicare to what’s at stake for employers and workers in the debate about the government negotiating drug prices.

  • Persistent Vaccine Myths

    From Drew Altman

    With news that the country has now vaccinated half of its population with at least one dose, This Drew Altman Axios column highlights the persistent COVID-19 vaccine myths that are believed by a substantial portion of the unvaccinated population and discusses the options to address vaccine misinformation.