The State of the Uninsured and Health Insurance Coverage

by Clive Riddle, February 23, 2018 The National Center for Health Statistics has just released updated health insurance coverage estimates from selected states using 2017 National Health Interview Survey data.  Here are seven things to know about their findings for the first 9 months of 2017: 1.     28.9 million (9.0%) persons of all ages were uninsured, not significantly different from 2016, but 19.7 million fewer persons than in 2010. 2.     12.7% of adults aged 18–64, were uninsured, 19.5% had public coverage, and 69.3% had private health insurance coverage. 3.     4.4%  of adults aged 18–64 (8.6 million) covered by private health insurance plans obtained their coverage through the federal or state-based exchanges. 4.     Adults aged 25–34 were almost twice as likely as adults aged 45–64 to lack health insurance coverage (17.3% compared with 9.2%) 5.     4.9%  of children aged 0–17 years, were uninsured, 41.9% had public coverage, and 54.6% had private health insurance coverage. 6.     The percentage uninsured decreased significantly for all age groups from 2013 through the first 9 months of 2017, ranging from –6.2 percentage points for ages 45–64 to –10.7 percentage points for ages 18–24. 7.     43.2% of persons under age 65 with private health insurance were enrolled in a high-deductible health plan (HDHP) compared to 39.4% in 2016 However, as a warning sign that 2018 may see slippage in these insurance coverage, the Minnesota Department of Health just issued an ominous press release, indicating that “last year Minnesota saw one of its largest, one-time increases in the rate of people without health insurance since 2001. The uninsured rate rose from 4.3 percent in 2015 to 6.3 percent, leaving approximately 349,000 Minnesotans without coverage.”