Percentage Of State Residents Without Medical Insurance Rises [The Hartford Courant, Conn.]

Sept. 17--Nearly 14 percent of Connecticut residents under age 65, or 413,000 people, had no health insurance for the entire year in 2009, according to Census Bureau data released Thursday.

Connecticut fared better than the nation, which had nearly 19 percent of children and adults under 65 uninsured all year -- about 50 million people in all.

But the rate of uninsured is rising in Connecticut, according to a report released Thursday by Connecticut Voices for Children, based on census data. In 2006-07, the rate was 10.7 percent, and in 2008-09 it was 12.6 percent, the report said. Two-year averages are necessary for comparisons because of small sample sizes.

The uninsured rate increase in Connecticut is entirely among adults, the report said. In 2009, 7.7 percent of children under 18, or 62,000, lacked insurance -- not a statistically significant change from recent years.

Working-age adults are almost twice as likely to go without coverage as children, to a large degree because of subsidized health insurance programs for children, like HUSKY.

"As families struggle through difficult economic times and fewer have access to health insurance through their jobs, we need to support health insurance programs that work, like HUSKY," said Mary Alice Lee, senior policy fellow at Connecticut Voices for Children. "We need to expand our state and national efforts to make sure that adults have the health insurance they need."

All citizens and permanent residents 65 and over are covered by government health insurance through the Medicare program. That population, combined with the poorest covered by Medicaid, now totals 30.6 percent of all people with insurance.

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