80% of U.S. gives federal HIX roll-out negative rating

Following the Oct. 1 launch of the Affordable Care Act’s exchanges, nearly half (48%) of Americans nationwide say the federal government did a “poor” job of implementing the law. Thirty-two percent gave it an “only fair” rating. Just 2% viewed the troubled federal roll-out as “excellent,” and 12% rated it as “good.” The remaining 6% “don’t know.”

In the Kaiser Health Tracking Poll, conducted Oct. 17-23, and released Friday, state exchanges fared slightly better, with 29% of those surveyed saying the launch was “poor” and 34% rating it as “only fair.” Nearly one in five (18%) rated the state exchange launches as “good,” 4% “excellent” and 14% “don’t know.”

The dissatisfaction of the roll-out breaks down along party lines. Overall, 69% of Republicans say ACA implementation on both the federal and state level was “poor.” Just 26% of Democrats held this view, according to Kaiser.

As enrollment kicked off in October, the number of ACA-related advertisements seen by the public — in particular those explaining how to sign up for coverage — experienced a large increase, Kaiser found. Fifty-nine percent polled saw some type of ad or commercial about the ACA in the last 30 days, rising from 43% in September.

Kaiser says this is the first time since tracking the ACA that the number of people who saw an ad about how to obtain coverage is equal to the number who saw ads for and against the law (38% each).

Further, 55% said they now know enough about the law to understand how it will impact them, up from 47% in September. Yet, another 44% still believe they don’t have enough information to understand the law’s impact. Among the uninsured, 55% say they lack the information to understand its impact on them.

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Healthcare reform
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