Survey: 56% of Physicians Support Single Payer
Post by Lawrence Pareles

Merritt Hawkins is a physician recruitment firm. They did a study of physicians on 8/3/17, and the results were published in Newsweek of 9/19/17.  The study found that 56% of American doctors they polled, were strongly or moderately in favor of a Single Payer healthcare plan here. The study was emailed to 70,000 physicians, and they received 1,033 responses. It has a margin of error of +/- 3%. They were asked if they support a plan like Bernie Sanders’ bill before the US Senate.

  • 42% of the physicians “strongly support” this SP plan
  • 14% of the doctors were “somewhat supportive”
  • 33% “strongly oppose” a SP plan
  • 6% were “somewhat opposed”

Compared to a similar study from 2008, support had increased by 14%, from 42% who strongly or mildly supported a SP plan.

Doctors reported that “a SP plan let’s them focus on their actual job and spend more time caring for patients, and less time navigating the existing insurance based system.”

This survey gave me some important discussion points and reassurance that doctors are fed up with the current crumbling insurance system and will support Single Payer.

The American Medical Association does not currently have a position for or against SP.  Interestingly, the AMSA – the American Medical Students Association, a subset of the AMA – recently came out in strong support of Single Payer, and in their statement strongly urged the overall AMA to endorse SP.

In addition, Physicians for a National Health Program has 20,000 physician members who strongly support Single Payer.