What Happened To Health Care Reform In The Presidential Campaign?

Main Category: Public Health
Also Included In: Medicare / Medicaid / SCHIP;  Health Insurance / Medical Insurance
Article Date: 07 Oct 2008 - 8:00 PDT

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With the Wall Street meltdown and bailout plan dominating headlines for the past weeks, America's troubled health care system has fallen off the media radar of election campaign coverage. But according to the nonpartisan survey research and civic engagement organization Public Agenda, the public still wants the candidates to talk about how they plan to reform the nation's health care system, and be specific about how their plans may have to change in light of the current federal constraints.

Some of the big questions the public is asking: Is it finally time for a single-payer national health insurance system? Is increased competition in the health care market place a better solution? Is the best thing just to extend the reach of the current system to help those without insurance purchase it? What are the overall costs to the nation of any plan?

Public Agenda's issue guide "Health Care: Your Money or Your Life," part of the Voter's Survival Kit at www.PublicAgenda.org, is in the hands of citizens across America, who are using its frameworks to weigh how the candidates' positions line up with the choices outlined in it. While the presidential candidates offer varying solutions to fix the health care system, they often avoid specifics about the pros and cons of their approaches. Public Agenda's Voter's Survival Kit makes these tradeoffs explicit.

The issue guides highlight fundamental facts voters need to know and explains more about the choices the country faces in down-to-earth, easily understandable terms, on the following topics:

- The Economy
- Iraq and Beyond
- Climate Change
- Health Care
- Immigration
- Taxes, Spending and Debt

Public Agenda has presented citizen issue guides focused on key election topics in every Presidential campaign season since 1996. The 2004 election guides were downloaded by hundreds of thousands of users. With 2.6 million visitors last year, PublicAgenda.org is the site journalists, policymakers, educators and average citizens who want nonpartisan, balanced information with thorough discussion of the pros and cons go for help to clarify the issues.

Public Agenda