Blue medicine v Red Medicine

As if doctors don't have enough problems, now they must adjust to a new political reality and its impact-the "diploma divide".

As recently observed, educational attainment has not replaced race in that respect, but it is increasingly the best predictor of how Americans will vote, and for whom. It has shaped the political landscape and where the 2024 presidential election certainly will be decided. To understand American politics, candidates and voters alike will need to understand this new fundamental.

Americans have always viewed education as a key to opportunity, but few predicted the critical role it has come to play in our politics. What makes the “diploma divide,” as it is often called, so fundamental to our politics is how it has been sorting Americans into the Democratic and Republican Parties by educational attainment. College-educated voters are now more likely to identify as Democrats, while those without college degrees — especially white Americans, but increasingly others as well — are now more likely to support Republicans.

It seems obvious to say, but if you want a real sense of the differences between America’s two major parties — and if you want a sense of what the future could bring if either party wins full control of the federal government next year — all you have to do is look at the states.

The impact of red v blue medicine includes:

1. Patient willingness to comply with recommendations
2. The end of expertise
3. Rules and regulations concerning trans-gender and LGBTQ and abortion rights
4. The sick care workforce pipeline and composition
5. Public health policy
6. Societal incivility and hostility towards sick care workers including violence
7. The costs of gun violence
8. Education and health outcomes
9. Health insurance coverage and care availability
10. Medical and other health professional school admissions
11. Behavioral health and addiction
12. Medical techology dissemination and implementation
13. Student loan debt
14. Specialty choice: Altruism v income
15. Clinical bias
16. Doctors leaving one state to practice in another, or prematurely retire.
17. Patients leaving states to get the care they want

More than 50 Idaho obstetricians have stopped practicing in the state since a near-total abortion ban took effect in August 2022, according to a newly released report.

The number of college graduates is dropping. Fewer high school students are going to college, including community colleges. Meanwhile, medical school graduates are increasing but many qualified applicants are rejected, and several don't match for a residency after graduation.

The presentation of a patient in the morning report will include the patient's political affiliation to understand the political determinants of their health outcomes.

The have v. have-nots color wars cause collateral damage that fill hospital beds.

Arlen Meyers, MD, MBA is the President and CEO of the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs on Substack and Editor of Digital Health Entrepreneurship