{"id":48827,"date":"2014-10-06T12:30:09","date_gmt":"2014-10-06T17:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/2014\/10\/06\/most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s\/"},"modified":"2024-04-14T04:10:20","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T09:10:20","slug":"most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s\/","title":{"rendered":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S."},"content":{"rendered":"

Survey Report<\/h2>\n\n

As the Ebola outbreak in Africa continues, and two patients receive treatment in the U.S., most Americans have at least a fair amount of confidence in the government\u2019s ability to prevent a major outbreak of Ebola in the U.S. In addition, relatively few are concerned that they or a family member will be exposed to the virus.<\/p>\n\n

\"So<\/a><\/figure>\n\n

The new national survey by the Pew Research Center, conducted Oct. 2-5 among 1,007 adults, finds that 20% say they have a \u201cgreat deal\u201d of confidence in the federal government to prevent a major outbreak of Ebola in the U.S., while another 38% say they have a \u201cfair amount\u201d of confidence. Fewer than half express \u201cnot too much confidence\u201d (24%) or \u201cno confidence at all\u201d (17%) in the government to prevent a major Ebola outbreak.<\/p>\n\n

So far, the Ebola virus has not led to widespread concern about personal health: Just 11% are very worried that they or someone in their family will be exposed to the virus, while another 21% are somewhat worried. Two-thirds say they are either not too (37%) or not at all worried (30%) about contracting Ebola.<\/p>\n\n

Public concern over the possibility of contracting the Ebola virus is lower than for other recent public health threats. In August 2009, 45% were worried about the possibility of being exposed to swine flu, and in November 2005, 38% worried about contracting bird flu.<\/p>\n\n

Republicans Less Confident in Gov\u2019t Ability to Prevent Ebola Outbreak<\/h3>\n\n

Republicans are much more skeptical than Democrats and independents about the government\u2019s ability to prevent a major Ebola outbreak in the U.S.<\/p>\n\n

\"Shifting<\/a><\/figure>\n\n

By more than two-to-one, more Democrats say they have a great deal or fair amount of confidence in the government to deal with Ebola (69%) than not much or no confidence at all (28%). Independents also are confident in the government\u2019s ability to prevent an Ebola outbreak in the U.S. (56% vs. 42%). Republicans are divided: About as many say they have little or no confidence (51%) in the federal government to prevent a major Ebola outbreak as say they have a great deal or fair amount of confidence (48%).<\/p>\n\n

In November 2005, amid concerns over an outbreak of bird flu, Republicans were far more confident than Democrats in the government\u2019s ability to prevent a major outbreak. At that time, shortly after the Bush administration was widely criticized for its response to Hurricane Katrina, 74% of Republicans and just 35% of Democrats expressed confidence in the government\u2019s ability to deal with a possible bird flu outbreak.<\/p>\n\n

Blacks, Hispanics More Concerned about Exposure to Ebola<\/h3>\n\n
\"Ebola<\/a><\/figure>\n\n

Nearly half of blacks (47%) and 39% of Hispanics say they are very or somewhat worried about being exposed to the Ebola virus. By contrast, just 27% of whites are worried about getting the virus.<\/p>\n\n

Women (37%) are somewhat more concerned than men (27%) that they or someone in their family will be exposed to Ebola.<\/p>\n\n

Concern over Ebola exposure is higher among those with less education. Only about one-in-five college graduates (22%) say they are worried about being exposed to the Ebola virus. By comparison, 34% of those with some college experience and 38% of those with no more than a high school diploma say they are worried that they may contract Ebola.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Survey Report As the Ebola outbreak in Africa continues, and two patients receive treatment in the U.S., most Americans have at least a fair amount of confidence in the government\u2019s ability to prevent a major outbreak of Ebola in the U.S. In addition, relatively few are concerned that they or a family member will be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":314,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sub_headline":"Just 11% Are \u2018Very Worried\u2019 They Will Be Exposed to Virus","sub_title":"Just 11% Are \u2018Very Worried\u2019 They Will Be Exposed to Virus","_crdt_document":"","_prc_public_revisions":[],"_ppp_expiration_hours":0,"_ppp_enabled":false,"ai_generated_summary":"","relatedPosts":[],"reportMaterials":[{"key":"b0ec0b12-8925-4da1-a06b-0e590766fd28","type":"report","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/10\/10-6-14-Ebola-Release.pdf"},{"key":"ac5a5470-e7db-4193-89e8-5ba683659d4b","type":"topline","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/10\/10-6-14-Ebola-topline-for-release.pdf"}],"multiSectionReport":[{"key":"_migrate_0","postId":48839}],"package_parts__enabled":false,"package_parts":[],"_prc_fork_parent":0,"_prc_fork_status":"","_prc_active_fork":0,"datacite_doi":"","datacite_doi_citation":"","_prc_seo_qr_attachment_id":0,"spoken_article_player_enabled":true,"displayBylines":true,"footnotes":"","prc_watchers":[]},"categories":[80,105,267],"tags":[],"bylines":[],"collection":[],"datasets":[1237],"level_of_effort":[],"primary_audience":[],"information_type":[],"_post_visibility":[],"formats":[458],"_fund_pool":[],"languages":[],"regions-countries":[],"research-teams":[520],"workflow-status":[],"class_list":["post-48827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-federal-government","category-health-policy","category-medicine-health","datasets-october-2-5-2014-weekly-survey","formats-report","research-teams-politics"],"label":false,"post_parent":0,"word_count":524,"canonical_url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s\/","art_direction":{"A1":{"id":65867,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png?w=309&h=317&crop=1","width":309,"height":317,"chartArt":false},"A2":{"id":65867,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png?w=268&h=151&crop=1","width":268,"height":151,"chartArt":false},"A3":{"id":65867,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png?w=194&h=110&crop=1","width":194,"height":110,"chartArt":false},"A4":{"id":65867,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png?w=268&h=151&crop=1","width":268,"height":151,"chartArt":false},"XL":{"id":65867,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png?w=309&h=396&crop=1","width":309,"height":396,"chartArt":false},"social":{"id":65867,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2014\/10\/10-6-2014_01.png?w=309&h=396&crop=1","width":309,"height":396,"chartArt":false}},"_embeds":[],"watchers":[],"table_of_contents":[{"id":48827,"title":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S.","slug":"most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s\/","is_active":true},{"id":48839,"title":"About the Survey","slug":"about-the-survey-115","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/about-the-survey-115\/","is_active":false}],"report_materials":[{"key":"b0ec0b12-8925-4da1-a06b-0e590766fd28","type":"report","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/10\/10-6-14-Ebola-Release.pdf","label":"","icon":"","attachmentId":""},{"key":"ac5a5470-e7db-4193-89e8-5ba683659d4b","type":"topline","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/10\/10-6-14-Ebola-topline-for-release.pdf","label":"","icon":"","attachmentId":""},{"type":"dataset","id":1237,"label":"October 2-5 2014 Weekly Survey","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/dataset\/october-2-5-2014-weekly-survey\/"}],"report_pagination":{"current_post":{"id":48827,"title":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S.","slug":"most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s\/","is_active":true,"page_num":1},"next_post":{"id":48839,"title":"About the Survey","slug":"about-the-survey-115","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/about-the-survey-115\/","is_active":false,"page_num":2},"previous_post":null,"pagination_items":[{"id":48827,"title":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S.","slug":"most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/most-are-confident-in-governments-ability-to-prevent-major-ebola-outbreak-in-u-s\/","is_active":true,"page_num":1},{"id":48839,"title":"About the Survey","slug":"about-the-survey-115","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/politics\/2014\/10\/06\/about-the-survey-115\/","is_active":false,"page_num":2}]},"parent_info":{"parent_title":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S.","parent_id":48827},"materialsOrdered":[{"key":"b0ec0b12-8925-4da1-a06b-0e590766fd28","type":"report","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/10\/10-6-14-Ebola-Release.pdf","label":"","attachmentId":0,"icon":""},{"key":"ac5a5470-e7db-4193-89e8-5ba683659d4b","type":"topline","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/10\/10-6-14-Ebola-topline-for-release.pdf","label":"","attachmentId":0,"icon":""}],"chaptersOrdered":[{"key":"_migrate_0","postId":48839}],"partsOrdered":[],"partsEnabled":false,"datacite_doi":"","prc_seo_data":{"title":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S.","description":"Most Americans have at least a fair amount of confidence in the government\u2019s ability to prevent a major outbreak of Ebola in the U.S. And relatively few are concerned that they or a family member will be exposed to the virus.","og_title":"Most Are Confident in Government\u2019s Ability to Prevent Major Ebola Outbreak in U.S.","og_description":"","schema_type":"Article","noindex":false,"canonical_url":"","primary_terms":{"category":8159074},"custom_schema":[],"og_image":65867,"indexnow_submitted_at":null,"gsc_index_status":null},"prepublish_checks":{"prc-image-alt-text":{"status":"complete","message":"All images have alt text.","data":null},"prc-about-this-research":{"status":"incomplete","message":"Add an \"About this research\" details block.","data":null},"prc-paragraph-count":{"status":"complete","message":"Found 10 paragraphs.","data":{"count":10}},"prc-internal-link":{"status":"complete","message":"Found 3 internal links.","data":{"count":3}}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"relatedPostsOrdered":[],"bylinesOrdered":[],"acknowledgementsOrdered":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/314"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48827"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48827\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":125001,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48827\/revisions\/125001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"bylines","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bylines?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"collection","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/collection?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"datasets","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/datasets?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"level_of_effort","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/level_of_effort?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"primary_audience","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/primary_audience?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"information_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/information_type?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"_post_visibility","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_post_visibility?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"formats","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/formats?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"_fund_pool","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_fund_pool?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"languages","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/languages?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"regions-countries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/regions-countries?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"research-teams","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-teams?post=48827"},{"taxonomy":"workflow-status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/workflow-status?post=48827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}