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“...the search for a single top issue through polling questions — whether it’s health costs, or gas prices, or the cost of food — is artificial. People worry about and experience these costs together. There is no top issue, unless that issue is the catchall, ‘cost of living.’” — Drew Altman, KFF Founding President and CEO

Are Health Care Costs THE Top Issue for Voters?

In a new column, Dr. Drew Altman, Founding President and CEO, analyzes the polling on health costs as a voting issue and concludes that there is no one top voting issue. He writes: “I have come to the conclusion that the search for a single top issue through polling questions—whether it’s health costs, or gas prices, or the cost of food—is artificial. People worry about and experience these costs together. There is no top issue, unless that issue is the catchall, “cost of living.”

Health System Tracker

Small Businesses Could See Double-Digit Premium Increases in 2027, According to Insurers’ Preliminary Rate Filings

Nearly 300 insurers offering offering health coverage to small businesses reported a median proposed premium increase of 14% for next year, according to an analysis of preliminary rate filings from all 50 states and DC.

ACA Marketplace Insurers Are Proposing a Median Premium Increase of About 15% in 2027

ACA Marketplaces insurers are proposing a median premium increase of 15% in 2027, according to an updated analysis of 276 insurers with publicly available filings across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

In 2024, life expectancy in the U.S. reached an all-time high of 79 years but remained years behind the average in comparable countries

Life expectancy at birth in the U.S. increased 0.6 years from 78.4 years in 2023 to 79.0 years in 2024, its highest-ever level. However, the average life expectancy in comparable countries was about 3.7 years longer than in the U.S.

Among adults 18 - 64 with private insurance, mental health and substance use treatment accounted for 10% of all overnight stays at hospitals or other medical facilities in 2023.

Using claims data from the 2023 Merative MarketScan Commercial Claims Database, this analysis describes the most common diagnoses for inpatient treatment and total associated costs, including patients’ out-of-pocket share.

New and noteworthy

How Unaffordable is Health Care and What Can We Do About It?

Event Date:

On Tuesday, July 21, three experts joined Health Wonk Shop series moderator Larry Levitt in an hour-long discussion of health care affordability. During the discussion, panelists considered affordability from a variety of perspectives, including how to define affordability and the question of affordability for whom, how to measure it, and what can be done to address affordability and the underlying cost of health care.

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  • FAQs on Prescription Drug Importation

    Issue Brief

    These FAQs address questions related to prescription drug importation, including the current status of importation proposals, details of Florida’s importation program recently authorized by the FDA, and concerns and challenges with this approach.

  • About 1 in 6 Emergency Visits and Hospital Stays Had At Least One Out-of-Network Charge in 2017

    News Release

    In roughly 1 of every 6 emergency room visits and inpatient hospital stays in 2017, patients came home with at least one out-of-network medical bill, a new KFF analysis finds. More specifically, 18 percent of all emergency visits and 16 percent of in-network hospital stays had at least one out-of-network charge, leaving patients at risk for surprise medical bills, according to the analysis of claims data from large employer plans. The analysis also finds the…

  • Poll: Public Says Drug Companies Have More Influence in Washington than the NRA

    News Release

    Democrats Split on Whether to Fix the ACA or Push for a National Health Plan; Few Democratic Voters Say a National Health Plan is Their Top Issue for the Midterms As policymakers weigh strategies to address the high cost of prescription drugs, the latest Kaiser Health Tracking Poll finds that a large majority of the public (72%) view pharmaceutical companies as having too much influence in Washington – more than say the same about the…

  • Post-Election Survey: The Public and the Health Care Agenda for the New Administration and Congress

    Poll Finding

    This Kaiser Family Foundation-Harvard School of Public Health survey, conducted immediately after the 2000 Presidential election, finds that health care issues ranked near the top of voters priorities for spending the surplus. Medicare ranked among the top three priorities, along with education and Social Security, and ahead of paying off the national debt and cutting taxes. Education ranked first. The survey also found that voters support patients rights legislation and some action to help the…

  • Kaiser Family Foundation/Princeton Survey Research Associates Study of Media Coverage of Managed Care: January 1990 – June 1997

    Poll Finding

    An analysis of media coverage (both print and broadcast) of managed care, from January 1 1990 to June 30, 1997. The study found that early coverage focused on managed care as a business story, and later years focused more on patient care and concerns about backlash. Overall, the media was found to be neutral in its coverage of managed care, although network TV and special series in newspapers were mostly critical. TOPLINE Download CHARTPACK Download…

  • Chartpack — The Public’s Health Care Agenda for the New President and Congress

    Poll Finding

    Chartpack -- The Public's Health Care Agenda for the New President and Congress This chartpack provides the key findings from the survey of the public's attitudes regarding the health care agenda for President Obama and the new Congress in 2009. It assesses the relative priority placed on health care by the American public as part of addressing the economic recession and as a large scale reform issue. The public's priorities for health care reform and…

  • Trends in Health Care Costs and Spending

    Fact Sheet

    This fact sheet on health care costs presents key statistics about the growth, level and impact of rising U.S. health care costs. It covers spending on various medical services, sources of health spending, employer-sponsored health coverage and the impact on businesses and people. Fact Sheet (.pdf)

  • Section 6: Trends in Health Plan and Provider Relationships

    Other Post

    Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 next > Exhibit 6.1: Physician Participation in Managed Care, 1988, 1999, 2001 Physician participation in managed care increased sharply in the decade between the late 1980s and the late 1990s, but has decreased since then. The proportion of physicians with at least one managed care contract increased from 61% in 1988 to 91% in 1999, but then dropped to 88% in 2001. The…