Survey: Physician Attitudes Shift To Single Payer
Chicago Medical Society, June 13, 2017
Nearly four in five Chicago area physicians are opposed to the American Health Care Act (AHCA) under consideration by the U.S. Senate as increasing numbers of physicians support a single-payer “Medicare-for-All” form of health insurance.
A survey of more than 1,000 physicians by the Chicago Medical Society about payment models indicates 77% of these doctors in Cook and its Illinois collar counties have a “generally unfavorable” view of the American Health Care Act, which was passed last month by the U.S. House of Representatives and is currently being debated in the U.S. Senate.
The AHCA, which would roll back the Medicaid expansion in 31 states, including Illinois, earned positive views from just 23.4 percent of physicians who said they were “generally favorable” about the legislation.
Rather, physicians voice support for single payer and and also support the Affordable Care Act (ACA) with some fixes. In the Chicago Medical Society survey, the ACA received a “generally favorable” view from 62.7% of Chicago area physicians and even more, or 66.8% have a “generally favorable” view of a single-payer financing health care system. Given a choice between single payer, an improved ACA and the AHCA, Chicago physicians favored a single payer approach by 2 to 1 over the ACA and by 3 to 1 over the AHCA.
87.6% of physicians think “basic health care would be available to all individuals as part of the social contract, a right similar to basic education, police and fire protection.”
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Comment:
By Don McCanne, M.D.
Once again we have a report that shows that physicians and medical students believe that health care is a human right that should be made available to all and that a single payer, improved Medicare for All is clearly the preferred model of reform. This survey also adds the findings that single payer is preferred over the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) by a margin of 2 to 1, and also preferred over the American Health Care Act (Republican Repeal and Replace) by an even larger margin – 3 to 1.
The people want Medicare for all, and physicians and other health professionals want Medicare for all. In health care, who else matters?
