Rate remained steady compared with 2017 but was substantially lower than rate of 16 percent in 2010
WEDNESDAY, Oct. 3, 2018 (HealthDay News) — In the first quarter of 2018, the uninsured rate was 8.8 percent, not significantly different from a year earlier, according to a report released Aug. 29 by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).
Robin A. Cohen, Ph.D., from the NCHS, and colleagues used data from the first quarter of the 2018 National Health Interview Survey to estimate health insurance status.
The researchers found that in the first three months of 2018, approximately 8.8 percent of Americans (28.3 million individuals) of all ages were uninsured. Among adults aged 18 to 64 years, 12.5 percent reported being uninsured, 19.2 percent had public coverage, and 70 percent had private health insurance coverage. Of those with private health insurance coverage, 4.2 percent (8.3 million) were covered by private health insurance plans obtained through the Health Insurance Marketplace or state-based exchanges. The percentage of adults younger than 65 with private health insurance enrolled in a high-deductible health plan increased from 43.7 percent in 2017 to 47 percent in the first three months of 2018. Among children (aged 0 to 17 years), 4.6 percent were uninsured, 41.9 percent had public coverage, and 54.6 percent had private health insurance coverage.
“A total of 20.3 million fewer persons lacked health insurance coverage in the first three months of 2018 compared with 2010 (48.6 million or 16 percent),” write the authors.
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