Our weak economy just assisted on another health insurance milestone: more than one million people living in Pennsylvania now are uninsured, reported the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Last May, the state took a survey to determine the uninsured rate and the results found a staggering 8.2 percent of the total population had no health insurance. That’s 1.02 million people total with 880,000 uninsured adults and 140,000 children.
What’s even more troubling, state officials believe the actual number is much higher.
“We have a real crisis in terms of health care for the adult population, and it’s probably gotten worse since the survey, ” said Joel Ario, the state’s insurance commissioner.
The only solution proposed to address the problem was a failed bill by Governor Ed Rendell, which significantly expanding public Pennsylvania health insurance programs to allow more residents to get government subsidies.
Although the bad economy was a factor, most uninsured were actually employed, wrote the Inquirer article.
But overall, everyone took a hit.
“Overall, the study showed that increases in uninsured numbers were seen in almost every category; including adults, children, certain ethnic groups and most geographic areas, ” said Ario.