Health care remains Hot Topic

On the week when a key Senate Democrat unveiled a long-awaited bill, the battle over health care reform was the No. 1 story—the eighth time in nine weeks that issue has topped the news agenda. The health care debate, fueled by Senator Max Baucus' proposal, accounted for 17% of the newshole the week of September 14-20, according to the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. While that is a significant drop from the previous week (32%), when Barack Obama's prime-time speech drove the coverage, the subject was particularly dominant in the media sectors that feature talk shows, radio (31%) and cable (28%), according to PEJ's weekly News Coverage Index.