Poll: Americans split over healthcare law

PRINCETON, N.J., March 22 (UPI) -- U.S. residents remain split on the healthcare law a year after President Obama signed the legislation into law, a Gallup poll released Tuesday indicates.

Forty-six percent of respondents said the healthcare reform law was a good thing while 44 percent said it was bad, poll results said.

Thirty-nine percent of those surveyed said they thought the law will improve U.S. medical care while 44 percent said medical care would worsen, results showed. Small percentages said the law won't change anything or offered no opinion, the Princeton, N.J., polling agency said.

Twenty-five percent of respondents say the law will improve their own medical care while 39 percent said it would worsen it, Gallup said. Thirty-one percent said the law will not make any difference.

Nearly eight in 10 Democrats said the law's passage was a good thing, while more than seven in 10 Republicans say its passage was bad, Gallup said. Independents leaned toward saying passage was bad. Reactions to the impact of the law on medical care in the United States showed similar results.

Results are based on nationwide telephone interviews conducted with 1,038 adults Friday and Saturday. The margin of error is 4 percentage points.