Millions of Californians Lack Health Insurance

One in five Californians, about 6.5 million of the state's residents, do not have health insurance and more than half the state's uninsured children eligible for public programs, are not enrolled.

A report by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research found the number of adults who received health insurance through their employers in 2005 was 56.2 percent, down from 57 percent in 2001, but up from 55.1 percent in 2003.

Among children in California, roughly 10.7 percent went without health insurance for all or part of last year, a significant improvement from 2001, when 14.8 percent of California's children lacked health coverage. The report noted that about half of the kids in California who don't have health care could be eligible for public assistance, but their parents or guardians aren't applying for the help.

Job-based insurance is driving the slight gains in coverage that we saw for adults in 2005, but it's still below 2001 levels, said co-author E. Richard Brown, director of the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and professor in the School of Public Health. If we now had the same rate of job- based coverage for adults and children that we had in 2001, an additional 645,000 Californians would be covered.

The state picture is slightly worse than the insurance situation in Orange County, where, according to a study issued last year, roughly 18.2 percent of all residents lack insurance. That study, the California Health Interview Survey, found that 8.5 percent of adults in Orange County, 173,000 people, had delayed or declined medical care in the past year because of lack of insurance. The UCLA report did not offer a similar statewide estimate.

Existing public/private programs to reduce the number of uninsured kids can only take us so far, said Robert K. Ross, M.D., president and CEO of The California Endowment, which provided funding for the reports. This research confirms that in order for us to go the distance we must have a major additional source of revenue .

Researchers note that a measure on the November ballot, Proposition 86, would provide stable insurance for as many as 400,000 children who are currently ineligible for public programs.