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Health Care Problems and Potential to Remain the Same, Only More So
Regional presentations of a ten-year forecast for health and health care
To recognize its 25th anniversary as a national philanthropy, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) commissioned the Institute for the Future (IFTF) to forecast the future of health and health care in America, from 1997 to 2010.
The purpose of the forecast, which was conducted from 1997 to 1999, was to provide RWJF grantee organizations and RWJF with a description of the critical factors influencing health and health care in the first decade of the 21st century.
Founded in 1968, the Institute for the Future is a nonprofit California-based firm that specializes in plotting and analyzing trends and their consequences in a variety of sectors.
Key Findings
The Institute's final report, Health and Health Care 2010: The Forecast, The Challenge, includes the following predictions:
- There will be no significant legislative overhaul of the health-care system, particularly regarding the poor and uninsured.
- There will be more regulation of health plan activity and medical records privacy laws.
- By 2010, the average life expectancy will be up to 86 years of age for a woman and 76 years for a man.
- America will be more ethnically diverse, with white Americans making up 64 percent of the population in 2010, down from 74 percent in the late 1990s.
- Although 55 percent of the population age 25 years or older will have the equivalent of one year of college in 2010 (up from approximately 35 percent in 1985), income disparity — a critical factor in determining health — will increase slightly.
Funding
RWJF supported this project through three grants totaling $4,853,809.