Submitted by Armen Hareyan on Apr 24th, 2008
Across Kentucky, about 23% ofadults ages 18 to 64 were uninsured during the beginning of this year,according to the Kentucky Health Issues Poll, the NorthernKentucky Enquirer reports. In addition, 31% of adults in the state had been uninsured atsome point in the previous 12 months.
For the poll, researchers surveyed 1,632 adults in Kentucky in January and February. The pollfound that about 4.3% of adults were covered by Medicaid statewide. Northern Kentucky had the highest percentage of Medicaidbeneficiaries at 8.8% and the lowest percentage of uninsured residents at11.1%. The poll found that residents who were younger, lower-income and lesseducated were more likely to be uninsured than older, wealthier andcollege-educated adults.
The poll also found that 91% of Kentuckyresidents favored access to affordable, quality health care for all Americans. Inaddition, 72% said they would pay higher taxes or give the federal government alarger role in providing care to accomplish this.
The poll was funded by the HealthFoundation of Greater Cincinnati and the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, and has a margin of sampling errorof plus or minus 2.4 percentage points (O'Farrell, Northern KentuckyEnquirer, 4/22).
Reprintedwith permission from kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, and sign upfor email delivery at kaisernetwork.org/email . The Kaiser Daily Health PolicyReport is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J.Kaiser Family Foundation. 2007 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser FamilyFoundation. All rights reserved.
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#1 Kentucky Health Insurance
We live in Kentucky where we have a 28 yo son who works and has his own insurance but our 24 yo daughter does not have Health Insurance. The problem is that she is high risk due to a alcohol problem in her past where she had received treatment for. Now she is sober, living her young life in a responsible manner. With Kentucky Access she is able to be covered. The problem is that Ky. Access is about 400.00 monthly and does not cover quite as much as private insurance. Our daughter is now facing a mental illness and with medication and therapy her alcoholism and brain illness is completely under control. She is now able much more able to be an asset to society, but without insurance, we cannot continue to pay for medication and treatment. She is extremely remorseful for her past behavior, and has been so enthusiastic in continuing her life in the best way she can, but without her being able to receive treatment for all medical issues causes her to become very overwhelmed. We are concerned of her retreating into past behaviors. While in school she was covered until age 22 I believe, but took part time classes while she worked therefore was not able to participate in our family coverage. We are willing to pay for her to have private insurance but due to her past rehab history, there are no companies that will accept her. when in rehab our insurance did not cover any of that anyway, and usually they do not cover mental illness with addiction issues, which I feel is discrimination. Many facilities do not even accept insurance for care for addiction rehab, so we're not quite sure why the issue is so important, when she is so young that she has perfect health, besides her past history. I feel that if parents want to continue to pay the needed portion of the still dependent child then insurance companies should accept this. These companies are getting away with denying coverage to those who they may need to spend money on. It is OK for them to receive the premiums but if a patient has any chance they may be a problem, then they have an excuse to say no, that is not acceptable. I am not sure the answer is "free health insurance", that is frightening, coming from a retired nurse. The problem is with the core of the medical field which is Medical Insurance. They are even protected by ERRISSA Laws that prohibit lawsuits against them. It's the doctors and the care givers that are being neglected not receiving the amount they are worth. They are forced to charged large amounts due to these co. that will only allow them to be paid so much, which is petty compared to what the Insurance companies make. I feel if lawmakers could investigate these fraudulent companies more then put certain laws to enable this from happening, instead of issuing laws to protect these companies from lawsuits, when they do not uphold their word in contract. This only gives them power to cover what they feel like, not what is contractual.
Kat