Public Health

In this research article released online by The Journal of Health Policy, Politics and Law, KFF’s Elizabeth Hamel, Alex Montero and Mollyann Brodie reflect on 30 years of public opinion data to offer perspectives on how the public accesses, evaluates, and uses health information, and what recent trends may suggest…

There were gains in coverage across most racial and ethnic groups between 2019 and 2023 after several years of rising uninsured rates during the first Trump administration. The coverage gains between 2019 and 2023 were largely driven by increases in Medicaid coverage, reflecting policies to stabilize and expand access to affordable coverage that were implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This policy watch examines the impact of federal staff cuts and HHS restructuring on the nation’s HIV response.

In this Monitor, we explore how ongoing misinformation about the safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines may affect the acceptance of new vaccine recommendations. First, we examine the false and misleading claims underlying the Kansas Attorney General’s lawsuit against Pfizer. We also discuss the CDC’s most recent vaccine.

This Monitor highlights April KFF Tracking Poll findings on perceptions about measles and explores the unsubstantiated promotion of budesonide and clarithromycin as treatments. It also covers misrepresentations of syringe programs and how prompting strategies can boost the accuracy of AI chatbots on health questions.

With health officials reporting 800 measles cases in multiple states already this year, most of the public – and most parents – report hearing at least one false claim about measles or the vaccine for it, and many of them aren’t sure what to believe, the latest KFF Tracking Poll…

This poll looks at awareness and concern over the outbreak of measles in the U.S. and finds that a growing share of adults is encountering false claims about the measles vaccines, but many are uncertain whether these claims are true or false. Parents who lean toward believing the false claims are less likely to say they keep their children up to date on routine vaccinations.

Nearly half of adults say that they will “definitely” or “probably” get the newly recommended COVID-19 vaccine, though most parents are not planning to get the shot for their children, according to the latest KFF COVID-19 Vaccine Monitor poll. Among all adults, 23% say they will definitely get the new…

This issue brief gives an overview of the main systems used by the federal government to track vaccine safety and adverse events following vaccinations. The brief reviews the history of federal vaccine safety systems, describes the key systems and their strengths and limitations, and also discusses how vaccine safety issues have become the subject of more scrutiny under the Trump administration.

As the 113th Congress is sworn in, and President Barack Obama begins his second term of office, a comprehensive new Kaiser Family Foundation/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation/Harvard School of Public Health survey queried the public about their priorities for, and views on, a wide range of health and health policy issues.…