The State Of Childrens Health Insurance
According to a report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, uninsured kids are much more likely to have gone to a doctor than uninsured kids. Of the insured kids about 60 percent are insured by private programs and the rest under public programs like Medicaid and SCHIP. According to the report 41 percent of kids without health insurance missed care and only 10 percent of those children insured under public health programs missed health care.
Children who miss care often fall more sick and their treatment later on becomes more difficult and expensive. Medicaid and SCHIP allow kids to take regular checkups and take the medications they need to stay well as well as see a doctor. There is bad news as well. Some states, California included are trying to stall new enrollments and maybe even unenroll some kids from public health care.
Meanwhile the fate of the SCHIP program is in doubt, with a general election around the corner. The SCHIP program has been a big success in dropping the number of uninsured kids. With a change in president and possibly in every other elective office, what happens to the millions of uninsured kids is a nagging question
