Parts of Health Reform Law Gaining in Acceptance: Poll

While it remains controversial, many support key elements of the bill

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Jan 30, 2012, 09:00 ET

NORWALK, Conn., Jan. 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Americans are slowly starting to embrace some key components of the controversial health care reform act signed into law by President Barack Obama nearly two years ago, according to a new Harris Interactive/HealthDay poll released today.

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To be sure, Americans remain sharply divided over the legislation, with slightly more than one-third (36 percent) of U.S. adults saying they want the law repealed and 21 percent saying they want it to remain as is. Twenty-five percent would like to see only certain elements of the law modified.

However, support for certain components of the law seems to be slowly increasing with time. For instance, 71 percent of those polled now back the law's provision that prevents insurance companies from denying coverage to those already sick. At the end of 2010, a Harris Interactive/HealthDay poll indicated that 64 percent supported this provision.

The poll released today shows some other provisions of the health reform law gaining acceptance. They include:

Allowing children to stay on their parents' insurance plans until they turn 26 -- 57 percent in Jan. 2012 versus 55 percent in Nov. 2010.
Creating insurance exchanges where people can shop for insurance -- 59 percent versus 51 percent.
Providing tax credits to small businesses to help pay for their employees' insurance -- 70 percent versus 60 percent.
Requiring all employers with 50 or more employees to offer insurance to their employees or pay a penalty -- 53 percent versus 48 percent.
Requiring research to measure the effectiveness of different treatments -- 53 percent versus 44 percent.
Creating a new Independent Payment Advisory Board to limit the growth of Medicare spending -- 38 percent versus 32 percent.

But the most controversial aspect of the law -- the so-called individual mandate that requires all adults to have health insurance or face a fine -- remains widely unpopular, with only 19 percent of those polled supporting it, regardless of political party affiliation.

"The public is still divided, mainly on partisan lines, as to whether to implement or repeal all, parts, or none of the health care reform bill," said Harris Poll Chairman Humphrey Taylor.

The poll included 2,415 U.S. adults over age 18 surveyed online between Jan. 17-19, 2012, by Harris Interactive, one of the world's leading custom market research firms. HealthDay is a leading producer and syndicator of health news.

The complete findings of the newest joint Harris Interactive/HealthDay poll are available here. HealthDay's news report is available here. Full data on the poll and its methodology are available at Harris Interactive.

About HealthDay
HealthDay is a leading producer and syndicator of evidence-based health news for consumers and physicians and is one of the largest health news syndicators to Internet sites. Its daily consumer health news service http://consumer.healthday.com/ appears on more than 5,000 websites such as Yahoo!, MSN Health, USNews.com, Everyday Health, and government websites like Healthfinder.gov, and MedlinePlus. A daily video version of the top health news story of the day is featured on HealthDay TV, a 90-second daily news broadcast appearing on several major media and U.S. government websites.

HealthDay also produces Physician's Briefing (www.physiciansbriefing.com), a daily news service for physicians and other medical professionals. This service is licensed to hospitals, managed care organizations, media companies, and point of care providers like Epocrates.

HealthDay's custom content division produces specialized content for a variety of audiences and works with some of the larger health portals in the United States.

About Harris Interactive
Harris Interactive is one of the world's leading custom market research firms, leveraging research, technology, and business acumen to transform relevant insight into actionable foresight. Known widely for the Harris Poll and for pioneering innovative research methodologies, Harris offers expertise in a wide range of industries including health care, technology, public affairs, energy, telecommunications, financial services, insurance, media, retail, restaurant, and consumer package goods. Serving clients in more than 215 countries and territories through our North American, European, and Asian offices and a network of independent market research firms, Harris specializes in delivering research solutions that help us - and our clients - stay ahead of what's next. For more information, please visit www.harrisinteractive.com.

TABLE 1
FAVOR REPEALING, KEEPING OR CHANGING REFORM BILL
"It has been nearly two years since the healthcare reform legislation was signed into law by President
Barack Obama, much of which has not yet been implemented. Do you think the law should..."

Base: All Adults

		Party
		Rep.	Dem.	Ind.
	Total %	%	%	%
Remain in place	21	3	40	20
Be repealed	36	63	9	30
Have parts changed	24	22	27	24
Not sure	24	13	23	26