Communications Tips, September 2011: 

The Affordable Care Act—Engaging, Educating, and Empowering Women

Top Take-Aways

1. Women, like men, aren’t paying attention to the Affordable Care Act
2. Women are key to increasing support and intensity of support for the law
3. Use a consumer frame focusing on services and provisions including: protections (no denials for pre-existing conditions); prevention (well woman focus); and non-discrimination (cost of coverage for women and men the same)
4. Shifting emphasis from a political frame to a consumer frame helps move women, bridge generations of women, and doesn’t alienate men
5. Emphasize prevention services: voters strongly support services that fall under a broad wellness and prevention frame. The most powerful message is simply the services included.
6. Inoculate against cost concerns: prevention and other elements of law helps women/families save their dollars.
7. Target specific populations of women and use appropriate comprehensive prevention messaging:  older women respond to coverage of mammograms, cancer screenings, and annual exams with no co-pays; younger women respond strongly to birth control with no co-pays.
8. Independent women, senior women, women of color are key populations to inform, persuade, and mobilize.

Strategic Recommendations

Recommended Communications Strategies—September 2011

Goal: To boost support for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to a solid majority among voters by informing, persuading and mobilizing those women most likely to increase their overall approval and intensity of support.

Topic: The health of American women and children.

Narrative: For too long our health care system has undervalued Middle Class Americans, especially women and children, in favor of the wealthy and the profits of insurance companies. We now have consumer protections and services that support families.

Proactive Strategies:

1. Inform women about the new law by using a consumer frame, rather than a political debate format, focusing on the services and provisions that support: prevention, protections, and non-discrimination elements of the ACA.
2. Use messaging that triggers values of security/peace of mind, personal decision-making/control, and respect.
3. Bring passion into the conversation with those strong supporters by highlighting the historic nature of the new law and its personal impact on women and families. This group needs to become front-line cheerleaders for ACA whose mission is to convince others to strongly support and help implement the new law.
4. Express outrage consistent with the situations and the story being told. For example, if opponents say, repeal ACA, remind people “Insurance companies are charging women more than men for the same policy” or “Those politicians are taking away the protections that sick kids now have under the new law.”
5. Target older women (60+), women of color, and women who define themselves as Independents (see cluster groups) and collaborate with organizations working with these constituencies of women.

Messaging Recommendations

1. Use messages that unite, rather than divide, older and young women. Lead with protections against no denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions; preventive services, and non-discrimination on gender pricing.

• For older women emphasize Medicare with no co-pays, as well as mammograms and cancer screening as examples of preventive care with no additional costs/no co-pays.

• For young women (under 40) mention birth control and contraceptives and prenatal care as examples of preventive services with no additional cost/no co-pay.

• For many audiences, (women and men, blue collar, and older voters) services and how these services will affect them will be the key to their support. Be personal, be specific.

2.  Develop personal stories and pitch to consumer and news-you-can-use media, bloggers, women’s magazines, etc. with specific audiences in mind.

3. Cultivate your social media networks with Facebook entries, tweets, texting and emails.

Messaging

Broad Prevention - Starting this year, all new insurance plans must cover key prevention services, like contraception, well-woman exams, and breast and cervical cancer screenings, which many women have put off or sacrificed because of the cost involved.  This will save thousands of lives every year and bring down costs because it is far more effective to prevent an unintended pregnancy and to detect cancer early.  Covering preventive care as basic health care, including family planning services, contraception, and birth control, is important to good health care for women. (88% Convincing/ 64% Very Convincing)

Secure/Congress with no co-pay - The new healthcare law will provide basic preventive health care and women's health services with no co-pay, and make health care coverage more secure by ensuring that working families cannot be denied coverage due to a pre-existing condition, or lose their coverage or be forced into bankruptcy when someone gets sick.  It will also require that members of Congress get their health care coverage from the same plans as millions of Americans. (87% Convincing/ 56% Very Convincing)

Protect Medicare - The new health care law will protect Medicare benefits for seniors and strengthen the program for future generations by aggressively cracking down on waste, fraud and abuse in Medicare, ending handouts to insurance companies, and providing free preventive care with no co-pay, including mammograms and women's health services so that we prevent costly emergency room visits and reduce health care costs in the long-run.*(92% Convincing/ 59% Very Convincing)

Questions and Answers

Strategies to Inoculate Against Attacks by the Opposition and the Counterpunch

Based on the ongoing debate over the law, we can anticipate additional attacks on the Affordable Care Act and the recent women’s health care provisions. We win when we approach the issue effectively—and it is best to have pro-active messages that inoculate before the attack is heard. While we recommend a non-political consumer frame when informing women on the law, a political fight must be taken on simultaneously.

Costs:

Attack by Opposition: Health care costs are too expensive now – adding free birth control and contraceptive will cost too much.

Response: Covering birth control as part of preventive coverage saves families $26 a month on average, helping families in these tough economic times (+11 points)

Mandate:

Attack by Opposition: Free contraceptives are another government mandate and now we have government micro-managing people's health care.

Response: Birth control is basic preventive care because it respects others to make important life decisions and gives people more options over when and whether to have child (+30 points among women and +11 points among men)).

Abortion:

Attack by Opposition: Coverage of so-called contraception services for free is a back door way to have taxpayers pay for abortion-inducing drugs.

Response: Coverage of birth control and contraception services with no co-pay helps prevent unintended pregnancies and reduces the need for abortions. (+25 points)

Or, coverage of birth control and contraception services helps and respects women to make their own personal decisions and gives them more options about when and whether to have children. (Both about +20%)