Obama at a campaign event in Norfolk, Va. on September 4. (Photo by Scout Tufankjian/Obama for America via Flickr)

President Obama leads Republican nominee Mitt Romney by 5 percentage points among likely voters in Virginia, according to a survey released today by Public Policy Polling. The North Carolina-based firm questioned 722 voters on behalf of the organization Health Care for America Now, a group that supports the 2010 health care law.

Fifty-one percent of respondents said they planned to vote for Obama, while 46 percent leaned toward Romney. The poll is Obama’s best showing in Virginia since a survey last month by The Washington Post and ABC News that put the president 8 points ahead of the former Massachusetts governor.

The gender gap in today’s poll was quite pronounced. Women preferred Obama 57 percent to 41 percent, while men broke 50-45 for Romney. Obama also led on questions about preserving Medicare, defending the middle class, and getting the wealthy to pay more federal income tax.

However, the president was slightly behind on job performance, with 49 percent of respondents disapproving of Obama’s term in office to 47 percent approving.

If anything, the poll is just one more reminder of Virginia as one of the most bombarded states in the country in this election, with hundreds of millions of dollars being spent by the Obama and Romney campaigns, Congressional candidates, and numerous issue campaigns to target the Washington area’s voters. And there’s no slowing campaign visits to Virginia. Obama spoke before 15,000 people in Richmond today, Republican vice-presidential nominee Paul Ryan will appear in Charlottesville tonight, Vice President Joe Biden is scheduled to campaign in Virginia Beach on Saturday, and Romney will visit Virginia Beach and Richmond on Sunday.

The margin of error on Public Policy Polling’s survey was 3.6 percent.