While the vast majority of the Affordable Care Act rules governing how insurance benefits are to be made available to consumers are now in effect, few Americans are aware of this fact, according to newly released polling data from the Kaiser Family Foundation.
As of Jan. 1, the major provisions of the ACA went into motion. However, when respondents were asked about their knowledge of this, nearly two-thirds - 62 percent - said they were under the impression that only some of the law's mandates had been put into place. Just one in five indicated correctly that most of the requirements had been enacted.
Despite the amount of news coverage the health reform law has received, Americans' awareness of the health law has remained relatively static for the past several months. In a separate poll performed by Gallup, 68 percent of participants said they were well-versed with the ACA, on par with where the level was during the summer.
"This watershed legislation that will change the face of the U.S. healthcare system, for better or worse, remains somewhat of a mystery for a significant portion of the nation," said Andrew Dugan, analyst for Gallup.