Health
Republican Voters Support Medicaid but Want Work Requirements, Poll Finds
As Congressional Republicans weigh major cuts to Medicaid, most voters do not want to see the public health plan’s funding dialed back, according to a poll released Friday by KFF, a nonpartisan health research firm.
Just 17 percent of respondents said they supported cuts to Medicaid, the government health insurance program that covers more than 70 million people. Forty percent said they wanted to keep spending unchanged, and 42 percent said they would like it increased.
But at the same time, the poll found significant support for certain policies that would limit the program, such as requiring enrollees to work. More than 60 percent of voters — and 47 percent of Democrats — supported a work requirement, the poll found.
That change, which has been championed by some congressional Republicans, is estimated to cut about $100 billion from Medicaid, as those who were unemployed — or could not file the paperwork showing they had a job — would no longer be covered. The program’s cost was $584 billion in 2024, or about 8 percent of total federal spending.
The poll also illustrated Medicaid’s wide reach, with just over half of respondents saying that either they or a family member had at one point had Medicaid coverage. There was nearly universal agreement that Medicaid mattered to voters’ local communities, with 98 percent of Democrats and 94 percent of Republicans saying they thought it was somewhat or very important.
Republicans in Congress are considering several changes to Medicaid as they look for ways to pay for President Trump’s tax cuts. Last month, the House passed a budget that, if approved by the Senate and signed by the president, could trim as much as $880 billion from the program over the next decade. That could happen with work requirements, caps on federal spending for the program, or reducing the share of costs the federal government pays.
Although poll respondents were generally in favor of work requirements, they held misconceptions about the policy: Sixty-two percent of voters thought that most Medicaid enrollees are unemployed, when in fact a vast majority have jobs.
Republican voters also expressed an openness to cutting funding for the Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansion. Right now, the federal government pays 90 percent of the costs for participants in the expansion, who tend to be healthy adults. That is a higher share than what it covers for other enrollees, such as children or disabled people.
Sixty-four percent of Republican voters — and 40 percent of voters overall — said they would support reducing the federal government’s contribution to Medicaid expansion. House Republicans continue to weigh this option, even though Speaker Mike Johnson said last week it was not on the table.
Voters’ opinions on reducing Medicaid expansion funding seemed malleable, however, in the face of additional information.
When respondents were given more information about the policy, including the fact that millions could lose coverage, Republican support fell to 43 percent. But being told that the change would cut federal spending by about $600 billion increased support to 73 percent.
The polling looks similar to what Americans felt during the Affordable Care Act repeal debate in 2017, when Republicans failed to roll back the law in large part because of political opposition to Medicaid cuts. Back then, 70 percent of voters supported work requirements and 36 percent favored cutting Medicaid expansion funding.
“Medicaid is a very popular program among a wide swath of the public including Republicans,” said Mollyann Brodie, KFF’s executive director of survey research.
But, she added, “opinions could be quickly moved in the context of debate where people learn more information and feel their coverage is threatened.”
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People who quit smoking may reduce their risk of developing dementia later in life, according to new research.
A team of researchers at a university in China analyzed data from more than 32,000 adults over a 25-year period and found that former smokers had a lower risk of dementia compared to people who continued smoking.
The findings were published in the journal Neurology.
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During the study period, researchers documented 5,868 cases of dementia.
Participants who quit smoking during the study had a significantly lower risk of developing dementia than current smokers. Their risk was similar to people who had quit smoking before the study began and those who had never smoked.
New research suggests that quitting smoking may lower the chance of developing dementia later in life. (iStock)
The researchers also found that dementia risk continued to decline the longer a person remained smoke-free, approaching that of never-smokers after about seven years.
The benefits appeared strongest among people who gained little or no weight after quitting.
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“Our findings suggest that quitting smoking may support long-term brain health, but they also highlight that what happens after quitting matters,” lead researcher Hui Chen said in a statement.
The reduction in dementia risk was most pronounced among people who experienced little or no weight gain after they stopped smoking. (iStock)
Zaid Fadul, a Harvard-trained physician and chief medical officer of Bespoke Concierge MD who was not involved in the research, said the findings add to growing evidence that quitting smoking can help protect long-term brain health.
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“The key takeaway is that the brain appears to benefit from smoking cessation at virtually any stage,” Fadul told Fox News Digital.
“Smoking contributes to chronic inflammation, oxidative stress, and damage to blood vessels that supply the brain, all of which are associated with cognitive decline and dementia risk.”
Fadul said the findings should encourage smokers who may feel it is too late to quit.
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“Importantly, it is rarely ‘too late’ to quit,” he said.
“While earlier cessation offers the greatest benefit, the body and brain begin recovering soon after smoking stops.”
Experts say it is almost never too late to quit smoking, as the body and brain start to recover soon after a person stops, although quitting earlier provides the greatest health benefits. (iStock)
Improvements in circulation, reduced inflammation and better cardiovascular health can help preserve cognitive function later in life, according to Fadul.
“Every year without tobacco is a step toward lowering future dementia risk and improving overall health,” he said.
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While the findings were encouraging, the study does have limitations.
Researchers identified an association between quitting smoking and a lower risk of dementia, but the study was not designed to prove that ending smoking directly prevents the condition.
Other health, lifestyle and environmental factors may have also influenced participants’ outcomes.
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Fox News Digital reached out to the researchers for further comment.
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Adult patients experienced significant relief from pain and anxiety after just five minutes of in-person prayer, as found in a randomized controlled trial.
The study, led by researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Department of Family and Community Medicine, compared the effects of direct prayer to the effects of listening to music, revealing that prayer provided greater and more sustained relief for both symptoms.
“Prayer is powerful and beneficial on many levels,” Jesse Bradley, pastor of Grace Community Church in Washington, told Fox News Digital.
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According to statistics cited in the study, prayer is the most used form of complementary medicine in the United States, relied on by 43% of Americans.
The researchers focused on a practice known as proximal intercessory prayer (PIP), which is defined as in-person, face-to-face prayer directed toward another individual’s well-being.
The researchers tracked changes in the participants’ self-reported pain and anxiety levels at multiple intervals: immediately after the five-minute session, at two weeks and at six weeks. (iStock)
The research team recruited 180 adult patients from a family medicine waiting room, according to a press release. All participants had previously reported experiencing moderate to severe pain, anxiety or both.
Following their standard medical appointments, the patients were randomly assigned to one of two groups: the prayer group, in which participants received five minutes of in-person Christian prayer delivered by a trained volunteer, and the music group, where they spent five minutes listening to music.
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The researchers then tracked changes in the participants’ self-reported pain and anxiety levels at multiple intervals: immediately after the five-minute session, at two weeks and at six weeks.
“It was very well-received,” Katherine Jacobson, MD, assistant professor of family and community medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, told Fox News Digital. She noted that 97% of participants said they were “neutral or supportive” when asked about having this kind of prayer available as part of their medical visits.
An expert described the transformative power of prayer through “healing and comfort,” and shared that he himself once went through a long, painful recovery process. (iStock)
The study, which was published in The Annals of Family Medicine, revealed that while patients in both groups showed improvements, those in the prayer group reported substantially greater relief.
Bradley, who was not involved in the study, described the transformative power of prayer through “healing and comfort,” and shared that he himself once went through a long, painful recovery process.
“Daily prayer was essential in my healing journey,” he shared.
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For pain reduction, the individuals who received in-person prayer experienced greater drops in pain intensity immediately following the session. This superior level of relief remained evident during the two-week follow-up compared to the music group, the researchers found.
For anxiety reduction, the benefits of prayer were even longer-lasting. The prayer recipients reported significantly greater reductions in anxiety immediately after the session, and these positive effects remained statistically significant at both the two-week and six-week checkpoints.
The prayer recipients reported significantly greater reductions in anxiety immediately after the session, and these positive effects remained statistically significant at both the two-week and six-week checkpoints. (iStock)
“We expected that patients who expected prayer to work would benefit more, but that wasn’t what we found,” Jacobson said.
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“Religious affiliation, religious intensity and expectancy of healing did not predict who improved,” he went on. “Benefits appeared across a wide range of patients, including those not of the Christian faith and those who did not expect the intervention to help them.”
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The study had some limitations, the researchers acknowledged, primarily that it could not prove that prayer itself caused the improvements.
The team also noted that patients receiving prayer had human contact, while the music control group did not. The eye contact and gentle laying of hands from the prayer volunteers may have had an impact, as that type of contact is known to reduce pain.
The researchers suggested that PIP could serve as a low-cost, non-pharmacologic and effective complement to standard medical care. (iStock)
The authors hope to conduct future studies with a control group that receives interpersonal contact but no prayer.
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“For physicians and health systems, the study supports continuing to ask patients about spiritual care preferences as part of whole-person care, and considering whether trained Christian volunteer prayer practitioners could be integrated into outpatient settings for interested patients,” Jacobson said.
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The researchers suggest that PIP could serve as a low-cost, non-pharmacologic and effective complement to standard medical care.
Rather than replacing traditional treatments, the authors indicate that this type of brief, faith-based intervention could be integrated into primary care settings to help manage pain and anxiety.
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