President Barack Obama said Tuesday his signature healthcare plan would probably need to be re-branded and re-marketed to build consumer confidence,
The Wall Street Journal reported.
Polls have shown that an overwhelming number of Americans have unfavorable attitudes toward Obamacare, including a majority of those who have no health insurance.
The president said he was convinced that the
HealthCare.gov site eventually would be successful. "I am confident that the model we've built, which works off the existing private insurance system, is one that will succeed."
Once the site is repaired and Americans feel more confident, "We're going to have to, obviously, re-market and re-brand, and that will be challenging in this political environment," the president said.
Henry Chao, deputy chief information officer at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, told a congressional panel Tuesday that 30 percent to 40 percent of the HealthCare.gov site was still being built,
The New York Times reported.
When the time comes, re-branding will be difficult, the president said, because "one side of Capitol Hill is invested" in the plan's failure. This makes the process of fixing problems on the site and "fine-tuning the law" more of a challenge, the Journal said.
He also said there was a more systemic problem in how the federal government procures information technology projects. The current system is inefficient. "In fact, there's probably no bigger gap between the private and public sectors than IT,"
The Washington Times reported him as saying.
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