Federal researchers reported on Tuesday that the number of
Americans without health insurance had declined substantially in the first
quarter of this year, the first federal measure of the number of uninsured
Americans since the Affordable Care Act extended coverage to millions
of people in January.
The number of uninsured Americans fell by about 8 percent to
41 million people in the first quarter of this year, compared with 2013, a drop
that represented about 3.8 million people and that roughly matched what experts
were expecting based on polling by private groups, like Gallup. The survey also
measured physical health but found little evidence of change.
The findings were part of the National Health Interview
Survey, a nationally representative examination that is considered a gold
standard by researchers. It interviewed about 27,000 people in the first
quarter, fewer than Gallup but researchers say it is considered particularly
trustworthy because federal interviewers conduct the survey in Americans’
homes. It also sets a federal level that others can use as a benchmark.
There was a sharper drop in the share of uninsured in states
that expanded Medicaid than in those that did not, reflecting the broad
uptake of the government insurance program since the law took effect. The share
of uninsured among 18- to 64-year-olds fell by nearly three percentage points
to 15.7 percent in the first quarter in states that expanded Medicaid, compared
with a drop of about one percentage point to 21.5 percent in states that did
not, a decline that was not statistically significant.
Analysts have scrambled in recent months to measure the
effects of the Affordable Care Act, President Obama’s signature health
insurance overhaul, by drawing on data trickling in from the early months of
this year from health insurance plans, hospital associations and other sources.
But experts caution that those ups and downs will not say much about the
change, and that a meaningful analysis will only be possible once data from
later months accumulate.
That finding resembled a pattern in one of the most
revealing studies of the effects of health insurance on a population in which
researchers found that Medicaid coverage for poor people in Oregon improved
mental health and financial security, but not physical health.
The nation’s uninsured rate stood at about 13 percent at the
time of the survey, and has declined gradually from about 16 percent in 2010,
the highest share of uninsured since the National Health Interview Survey began
tracking it in 1997. Many experts attribute the changes to the health care law,
but there is not definitive proof that the law was the driver.
The most significant decline in the share of the uninsured
was among 19- to 25-year-olds, 21 percent of whom were uninsured in the first
quarter, down from 27 percent in 2013. The share of uninsured for that age
group has been declining since 2010, when a provision in the law began allowing
dependents to stay on their parents’ insurance policies until their 26th
birthday. Experts are also looking at how much Americans are using the health
care system as a measure of the law’s progress.
In an analysis of data from the National Association of
Insurance Commissioners, which receives information on hundreds of health
insurance plans across the country, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation,
which funds research and programs to improve health, found a 20 percent
increase in the rate of hospital admissions among people in the individual
market — the place where many of the newly insured are covered — in the
second quarter compared with the second quarter of 2013.
Click
here to access the full article on The New York Times.