Costs, Evidence, Context and Values: Journalists' and Policy Experts' Recommendations for U.S. Health Policy Coverage

Abstract

Health policy plays a critical role in determining a state's or nation's overall population health, and health system change has been a priority for a majority of Americans for at least a decade. News coverage can influence health policy development, but little research has examined the quality of that coverage, in part because no consensus exists regarding what information health policy stories should include. This paper describes a series of in-depth interviews with eight health policy experts and 12 experienced journalists who have covered health policy. While rejecting the notion of strict quality criteria that could be applied to all health policy stories, the interviewees agreed on several factors that would improve health policy coverage. They recommended that health policy stories should include information about financial costs to consumers, evidence that a policy will have its intended effect, historical context for the policy, and "relatable hooks" that help consumers understand which groups a policy will affect and how. In addition, the interviewees stressed the importance of building policy coverage on trustworthy sources representing multiple viewpoints and the need to recognize how audience members' values influence their acceptance and interpretation of evidence. These findings provide an important foundation for future research examining the impact of health policy reporting on both public opinion and public policy development.