Greenup County Health Department Blog

More Adults Uninsured

More than 15% of Americans don’t have health insurance, and among young adults ages 18 to 24, the percentage of those uninsured is nearly double that number, according to new CDC data.

In a 2009 survey, 46.3 million people — or 15.4% of the U.S. population — were without coverage, Robin A. Cohen, PhD, and colleagues reported in a National Center for Health Statistics brief.

About 19% of Americans went without any coverage for at least part of the year prior to the 2009 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), and nearly 11% had been uninsured for more than a year at that time, they reported.

In general, rates of uninsured adults have been increasing over the last decade. The rate of uninsured adults ages 18 to 64 jumped to 21.1% in 2009 from 19.7% in 2008. Ten years earlier, that number stood at 17.8%.

On the other hand, coverage for children increased, the researchers said. Only 8.2% of those ages 18 and younger went without insurance at the time of the 2009 survey interview, down from 13.9% in 1997.

One-third of Hispanics were uninsured for part of the past year, and almost one-fourth had been without health insurance coverage for more than a year, based on data from the January to September 2009 NHIS.