Harvard poll examines American's views on "socialized medicine

4/17/08The phrase "socialized medicine" is no longer as distasteful as it once was, but people are still split along party lines as to if it's a good idea for the country, according to a poll conducted by the Harvard Opinion Research Program at the Harvard School of Public Health and Harris Interactive last month.

About 70 percent of Democrats said the country would be better off under socialized medicine, while roughly the same percentage of Republicans said it would make things worse.

"There's a huge polarization between Republicans and Democrats about the term socialized medicine and health care in America. When issues are this polarized it's hard to find a significant midpoint for compromise," said Robert J. Blendon, professor of health policy and political analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Forty-three percent of independent voters were in favor of socialized medicine, while 39 percent were opposed, according to the poll of 1,030 voters conducted in February of this year.

The term "socialized medicine" has been used in health care reform debates since 1948.

"We were interested to see what Americans thought 60 years after it was first used about the issue," said Blendon.

The poll reports that the majority of people know what socialized medicine means.

Seventy percent said they understood the phrase "very well" or "somewhat well" and believe that it means, "the government makes sure everyone has health insurance."

Of that 70 percent, 45 percent said socialized medicine would make the country better, while 39 percent said it would make things worse.

Age was found to be another factor in people's opinions about socialized medicine.

People under the age 34 were more likely to view socialized medicine positively. Fifty-five percent said they believed it would help the country, while about 70 percent of people age 65 and over were opposed.

"Socialized is added to the word medicine for a reason and that's to scare up the images of everyone getting exactly the same and exactly the same being not very much," said Dr. Lee Hargraves, associate professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

The Harvard poll tested how this traditionally controversial phrase is interpreted by Americans," he said.

John McDonough, executive director of Health Care For All said he thinks the term socialized medicine is polarizing and unhelpful. "It divides rather than unites people around solutions," he said.

It's a significant political finding that "for most people the term socialized medicine has come to mean the government's efforts to get everyone insurance," Blendon said.

"People don't think that they're in the doctors office with the government telling physicians which needle to stick in," he said.

Blendon and Hargraves both said the poll may give insight into how the public will respond to the way Republicans and Democrats frame health care issues.

Democratic presidential candidates Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama have both said their goal is universal coverage and this means they want all Americans to have some sort of insurance plan; it doesn't have to be public.

But according the Steve Poftak, director of the Shamie Center for Better Government at the Pioneer Institute, politicians walk a fine line proposing this kind of nationwide program.

"Our current system is obviously far from perfect, but nationalizing it would not be an effective solution," he said.

But Blendon said, "The younger people, however, could change things significantly."

"I think socialized medicine will be synonymous with universal healthcare to the next generation," he said.

Other findings included that some people said America already has socialized programs. About 60 percent said the Medicare is a form of socialized medicine.

Insurance coverage plays a role as well. Fifty-seven percent of uninsured Americans think socialized medicine would make things better. Insured Americans were split down the middle, 44 percent for and 41 percent against.

"Most people see Medicare as socialized medicine and they don't see anything wrong with it. It's just a government program that pays mom and dad's bills, " said Blendon.

"Some people who have health insurance don't think it's a good idea because they don't need it," but, he added "the numbers of uninsured Americans continue to grow," said Hargraves.