Many Kentuckians Going Without Health Insurance

The Kentucky Health Issues Poll (KHIP) conducted in December 2010 shows that about a quarter of the state's population does not have health insurance. This means that health insurance has a big gap to fill.

Though Kentucky’s strengths include a comparatively low prevalence of binge drinking, low violent crime rate and ready access to early prenatal care, the state faces challenges in terms of the high percentage of smokers in the population and high rates of obesity prevalence, cancer deaths and preventable hospitalizations. Also, according to the 2010 America's Health Rankings® by the United Health Foundation, Kentucky fell a few spots from last year's #41 ranking, taking over as the 44th healthiest state to live in.

The main findings of the Kentucky Insurance Poll are:

• Households with lower incomes have higher rates of being uninsured. About 46% of adults in households with an income level that is below 100% of federal poverty guidelines (FPG) were uninsured compared to 16% of those living above 200% of the FPG.

• Over one third of people age 18-29 (young adults) are twice as likely to go without health insurance when compared to people over 45.

• About 1 in 4 Kentucky Adults age 18–64 do not have insurance. As seen in previous KHIPs, age, education level, and income are factors that had a positive influence on the percentage of Kentucky adults who were insured.

• More than a third of Kentucky residents age 18-64 did not have health insurance at some point in the last year.

Having coverage continuously for one year signifies that a person has stable insurance. This is a measure of the ability to utilize healthcare services. This KHIP survey showed that the majority of insured Kentuckians had stable insurance coverage over the past year.
It is also expected that under new federal law, 261,000 Kentuckians will benefit from Medicaid expansion. Nevertheless, there will still be many Kentucky residents who are uninsured and who need to take an informed decision on purchasing an appropriate plan so that they can be ready to face a potential healthcare crisis. Contacting a licensed insurance agent it the best way to learn about various health plans, get quotes, compare them and make the right choice.