- Finding uninsured Americans by the numbers, By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar (AP), February 5, 2014, ABC News: “Wanted: Millions of uninsured Americans willing to give President Barack Obama’s health care law a chance. With time running out, it may not be so hard for the administration and its allies to find them. A study for The Associated Press finds that the uninsured aren’t scattered evenly across the country: half of them live in just 116 of the nation’s 3,143 counties. That means outreach targeted to select areas can pay off big, reaching millions of prospective customers needed to stabilize the law’s new insurance markets…”
- Fewer than 2 million signed up for Medicaid under the health law, report says, By Sandhya Somashekhar and Lena H. Sun, February 5, 2014, Washington Post: “Between 1 million and 2 million Americans signed up for Medicaid last year because of the health-care law, according to a new report suggesting that many of the people who have joined the program since the initiative’s rollout in October would have done so absent the law. The Obama administration has said that 6.3 million people were determined to be eligible for Medicaid between October and December. But the study, from health-care industry consulting firm Avalere Health, suggests that only a fraction of the enrollments are strictly the result of the health-care law…”
- Washington Medicaid enrollments surpassing expectations, By John Webster, February 5, 2014, Spokane Spokesman-Review: “With two months to go, Washington residents are pouring by the thousands through the online gateway to 2014 health insurance coverage, blowing away expectations for Medicaid enrollments, the expanded government program for the working poor and their children. In Spokane County, one in four residents relies on Medicaid coverage…”
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty