Study Finds 10% of Kansas Residents Lack Health Insurance

A study conducted this year of Kansas residents younger than age 65 found that about 10% lacked health insurance, the Wichita Eagle reports. The $1.3 million study, funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration, included a telephone survey of "tens of thousands" of Kansas residents and a number of "one-on-one interviews" (Sommers, Wichita Eagle, 10/15). HRSA provided Kansas with a one-year State Planning Grant Program to help state officials develop a strategy to provide residents with access to affordable health insurance (Kansas Insurance Department Web site). According to the study, 41.7% of Kansas residents with incomes less than the federal poverty level, or about $8,590 annually for an individual, lack health insurance. The study also found that 26% of Hispanics and 15% of blacks did not have health coverage, while 8.3% of non-Hispanic whites lacked insurance. In addition, the study found that in the past six months, Kansas residents with health insurance visited doctors or clinics more often than those without coverage (Wichita Eagle, 10/16). Although most Kansas residents younger than age 65 received health insurance through their employers, the study found that 18% did not enroll in employer-sponsored health plans "because they couldn't afford to pay" the premiums, a problem "especially acute" for those employed by smaller firms (Karash, Kansas City Star, 10/15).

Policy Tool
An 18-member state committee led by Kansas Insurance Commissioner Kathleen Sebelius (D) hopes to use the study to develop a plan to provide residents with health insurance (Wichita Eagle, 10/16). According to Assistant Insurance Commissioner Matthew All, "Not only do the uninsured have a lower quality of life, their use of the health care system is inefficient and costly and raises the price of health insurance for everyone else." All said that Kansas could improve the problem over the next five years by:

• Expanding and improving the existing tax credit for small businesses that offer health insurance to employees.
• Using some of the federal funding from the state Medicaid program and HealthWave, the state's CHIP program, to help "working adults" purchase health insurance.
• Expanding Medicaid and HealthWave eligibility to include parents of children covered under the programs.
• Developing a plan to spread the insurance risk of small groups of employees.
• Using federally qualified health clinics as the "focal points of HMO-style benefit packages."