
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, July 19, 1994                   TAG: 9407270050
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Cox News Service
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                 LENGTH: Short

INTEREST GROUPS' AD CAMPAIGNS SPENDING AT A PRESIDENTIAL PACE

Ad campaigns in the health care debate will cost more than all the ads purchased by the 1992 presidential campaigns of George Bush and Bill Clinton, according to a report released Monday.

``We are witnessing the largest, most sustained advertising campaign to shape a public policy decision in the history of the republic,'' said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.

The center's study of ads on health care reform found $50 million budgeted through last Wednesday by 49 groups. The money was going for more than 60 TV and radio ads and 100 print ads.

``In the five days since we completed the study, five new broadcast ads and four new print ads have been unveiled,'' Jamieson said. ``By October, we think the total spent will be more than the Democratic and Republican candidates spent in 1992.'' That was about $60 million.

The study says most of the broadcast ads stress what the sponsors don't like, without explaining what they would prefer.

The study also found that the groups place most of their ads in only a few states or congressional districts, where they could convince key members of Congress that opposing them is dangerous, and in New York and Washington, where they could attract national news coverage.

by CNB