His health problem may then develop into another crisis, resulting in yet another trip to the emergency room. Also, Dr. Anderson says, a person who doesn t have health insurance is much less likely to receive preventive health services than one who has health coverage. One in seven Americans are without health insurance. The majority of uninsured Americans are individuals between the ages of 18 to 34 in a household where at least one member of their immediate family works full-time. About 54 percent have family incomes less than 200 percent of the poverty level.
Minorities are more likely to be uninsured.
The number of nonelderly Americans without health insurance has grown by 10 million over the past decade. Today, a smaller share of Americans have health insurance through their jobs. That proportion had dropped to 64 percent by 1996. In contrast, health coverage through Medicaid has grown, particularly among children. Contrary to the common belief that the uninsured are able to get the medical care they need from doctors and hospitals, in 1997 uninsured adults were four times more likely than those with private health insurance to say they didn t receive the medical care they thought necessary.