October 01, 2003
Wednesday - 1:15 am

The number of people with health insurance rose by 1.5 million between 2001 and 2002, to 242.4 million, and the number of uninsured rose by 2.4 million, to 43.6 million, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Tuesday.

An estimated 15.2 percent of the population had no health insurance coverage during all of 2002, up from 14.6 percent in 2001, according to the report, Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2002.

The proportion of insured children did not change in 2002, remaining at 64.8 million, or 88.4 percent of all children.

For the second year in a row, the overall decrease in coverage was attributed to a drop in the percentage (62.6 percent to 61.3 percent) of people covered by employment-based health insurance.

The percentage of people covered by government health insurance programs rose in 2002, from 25.3 percent to 25.7 percent, largely as the result of an increase in Medicaid coverage.

Other highlights:

• Although Medicaid insured 14.0 million people in poverty, another 10.5 million people representing 30.4 percent of those in poverty had no health insurance in 2002; this percentage was unchanged from 2001.
• The rate of uninsured Hispanics, who may be of any race, was 32.4 percent in 2002 higher than any other racial or ethnic group, but unchanged from 2001.
• The proportion of the foreign-born population without health insurance (33.4 percent) was more than double that of the native population (12.8 percent).
• The health insurance coverage rates for non-Hispanic whites who reported a single race was 89.3 percent. For blacks and Asians who reported a single race, the rates were 79.8 percent and 81.6 percent, respectively.
• Young adults (18-to-24 years old) were less likely than other age groups to have health insurance coverage -- 70.4 percent in 2002. This compares with 82.3 percent for those 25-to-64 years old and 99.2 percent for those 65 and over, reflecting widespread Medicare coverage.
• While most children (67.5 percent) were covered by an employment-based or privately purchased health insurance plan in 2002, nearly 1-in-4 (23.9 percent) was covered by Medicaid.
• The proportion of people who did not have health insurance ranged from about 8.0 percent in Minnesota, Rhode Island, Wisconsin and Iowa to 24.1 percent in Texas, based on three-year averages. New Mexico was the only state where the proportion of people without coverage fell, while the proportion rose in 18 states, based on comparisons of two-year averages.

The United States Census Bureau notes that the estimates in the report come from the 2001, 2002 and 2003 annual social and economic supplements to the Current Population Survey. As in all surveys, the data are subject to sampling variability and other sources of error.

Related information/reports:

U.S. Census Bureau Guidance on the Presentation and Comparison of Race and Hispanic Origin Data

Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2002

Source of News Release:

U.S. Census Bureau
Web Site

 

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