5 facts about Black Americans and health care
More Black Americans say health outcomes for Black people in the United States have improved over the past 20 years than say outcomes have worsened.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
More Black Americans say health outcomes for Black people in the United States have improved over the past 20 years than say outcomes have worsened.
More than half of U.S. adults (56%) said that widespread use of brain chips to enhance cognitive function would be a bad idea for society.
About nine-in-ten (88%) Americans say, overall, the benefits of childhood vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella outweigh the risks, identical to the share who said this before the coronavirus outbreak. U.S. adults are less confident in COVID-19 vaccines: Fewer than half rate them as having high health benefits and a low risk of side effects.
Seven-in-ten Hispanic Americans say they’ve seen a doctor or other health care provider in the past year, compared with 82% among Americans overall.
There is significant discomfort among Americans with the idea of AI being used in their own health care. Yet many see promise for AI to help issues of bias in medical care.
Trust in scientists and medical scientists has fallen below pre-pandemic levels, with 29% of U.S. adults saying they have a great deal of confidence in medical scientists to act in the best interests of the public. This is down from 40% in November 2020 and 35% in January 2019, before COVID-19 emerged. Other prominent groups – including the military, police officers and public school principals – have also seen their ratings decline.
As has often been the case on policy questions about how to deal with the pandemic, partisans are far apart in their views on mask mandates.
Americans offer a lackluster evaluation of how the country has balanced priorities during the coronavirus outbreak. Fewer than half say the country has given the right amount of priority to the needs of K-12 students, public health or quality of life.
Americans are increasingly critical of the response to COVID-19 from elected officeholders and public health officials. Positive ratings of public health officials, such as those at the CDC, have fallen 10 points since August. And 60% of U.S. adults say they’ve felt confused as a result of changes to recommendations on how to slow the spread of COVID-19.
Overall, 46% of Americans say the statement “public health officials were unprepared for the outbreak” describes their views extremely or very well, including similar shares of Republicans and Democrats.
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