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KFF Health Tracking Poll: MAHA and the Midterms

Chemical food additive and pesticide concerns associated with the Make America Health Again (MAHA) movement are shared broadly across the public. But when it comes to voters, health care costs are a higher priority and bigger motivator, even among MAHA supporters, a new KFF Health Tracking Poll finds. When asked to identify their most important health priority for government to address, far more MAHA-supporting voters identify lowering the cost of health care (42%) than other issues more closely associated with the movement.

Affordable care act

ACA Marketplace Survey Feature Image - Website

Cost Concerns and Coverage Changes: A Follow-Up Survey of ACA Marketplace Enrollees

This KFF survey is a follow-up survey of adults who had ACA Marketplace insurance in 2025. The survey examines the cost concerns and coverage changes of Marketplace enrollees following the end of the enhanced premium tax credits and finds that half of returning enrollees say their health care costs are “a lot higher” and most expect to cut back on basic household expenses to afford coverage.

Health System Tracker

What Are the Recent Trends in Employer-Based Health Coverage? Employer-sponsored health insurance is the largest source of health coverage for people under 65, but its reach is uneven.

How Does U.S. Life Expectancy Compare to Other Countries? The life expectancy gap between the U.S. and peer countries decreased from 4.1 years in 2023 to 3.7 years in 2024 as U.S. mortality dropped.

How Does Cost Affect Access to Health Care? In 2024, about 1 in 6 adults reported delaying or not getting healthcare due to cost, including medical or mental health care.

How Does Health Spending in the U.S. Compare to Other Countries? While the U.S. still spends the most in total dollars, eight OECD nations had a higher percentage increase in per-person health spending in 2024.

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  • Testimony: What would strengthen Medicaid Long-Term Services and Supports?

    Issue Brief

    On August 1, 2013, Diane Rowland, Executive Vice President of the Kaiser Family Foundation and Executive Director of the Foundation's Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, testified before the Federal Commission on Long-Term Care about ways in which the Medicaid program could be strengthened to better support low-income individuals with long-term services and supports needs.

  • What do we know about the burden of disease in the United States?

    Feature

    This slideshow examines disease burden in the United States and comparable countries as measured by Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs), which take into account years of life lost due to premature death and years of productive life lost to poor health or disability. Although the U.S. disease burden rate dropped 14 percent between 1990 and 2010. comparable countries saw an average decrease of 18 percent. In the United States, mental health and musculoskeletal disorders are…

  • How to Think About Higher Growth in Health-Care Spending

    From Drew Altman

    In this column for The Wall Street Journal's Think Tank, Drew Altman explains that just as we should not have expected historically low rates of health spending increases to continue, we should not dramatize a return to higher rates in coming years.

  • A Look at People Who Have Persistently High Spending on Health Care

    Issue Brief

    This analysis looks at the amounts and types of health spending for people with employer-based health insurance who have continuing high health care spending. It finds that, among people with three consecutive years of coverage from a large employer, just 1.3 percent of enrollees accounted for almost 20 percent of overall spending in 2017. This group – people in the top five percent of spending in each of the three years from 2015 to 2017…

  • A Small Group of Patients Account for a Whole Lot of Spending

    From Drew Altman

    You have heard about the 5% of the population responsible for 50% of spending. Meet the 1.3%--persistent high spenders with very complex medical needs responsible for 20%. Drew Altman discusses this and possible ways to help them, read the Axios column.

  • The Real Cost of Health Care: Interactive Calculator Estimates Both Direct and Hidden Household Spending

    News Release

    A new interactive tool from KFF estimates total household health spending for individuals and families in the U.S., including costs that are often less visible to consumers. Users can generate scenarios based on family size, income level, insurance source, and health status. In addition to estimating direct costs like deductibles and copayments, the tool highlights indirect spending on health care, such as state and federal taxes paid to fund public programs like Medicare and Medicaid,…

  • Household Health Spending Calculator

    Interactive

    This interactive tool, updated with 2022 data, helps users understand health care costs vary by family size, income, insurance, and health status. Use the dropdown menus to explore scenarios and trends in household health spending.

  • Analysis Finds that Medications for Hepatitis C and HIV/AIDS Are the Costliest Group of Outpatient Prescription Drugs for Medicaid, While Diabetes Drugs Have Posted the Sharpest Rise in Costs 

    News Release

    Antiviral medications, including those that treat hepatitis C and HIV/AIDS, cost the Medicaid program more money (before rebates) than any other group of outpatient prescription drugs for each year from 2014 to 2017, according to a new KFF analysis. The analysis of utilization and spending trends finds that antivirals accounted for more than 13 percent of the $63.6 billion in Medicaid outpatient drug spending pre-rebates in 2017 -- a level disproportionate to their utilization and…

  • Deductible Relief Day: How Rising Deductibles are Affecting People with Employer Coverage

    Issue Brief

    This analysis examines how health insurance deductibles are affecting consumers with employer-sponsored insurance. Deductibles have risen in recent years and become an increasingly prominent feature of job-based health plans. "Deductible Relief Day" refers to the date by which average spending for people with employer-sponsored health insurance is sufficient to satisfy the average deductible.