Press Release: Doctors Describe Human Toll As System Fails
September 30, 2003
Physicians Group Decries 2.4 Million Rise in Number of Americans Lacking Health Insurance
Doctors Describe Human Toll, Especially for Children and Minorities As Employers Drop Coverage and Incremental Reforms Fail
SEPTEMBER 30, 2003, CHICAGO, IL
The number of Americans without health insurance jumped sharply for the third year in a row, up 2.4 million to 43.6 million, 15.2% of the population, according to a report released by the U.S. Census Bureau today. Members of Physicians for a National Health Program offered graphic descriptions of the human toll behind these numbers.
In cities across the country the rising number of uninsured is straining the nations safety net health care providers and taking a toll on state government budgets. The resulting gaps in access to care can be fatal. This month, in Dyersburg, Tennessee, a 26 year old patient was turned down for coverage by the states TennCare program after losing his job and workplace-based insurance. Denied access to mental health care, his psychiatric condition worsened and he took a room full of college students hostage, severely injuring two classmates before being killed by police.
In a small town, everyone is affected by a tragedy like this, said retired Tennessee pediatrician Dr. Jim Hudson. This is criminal, that in the wealthiest country in the world, we dont assure access to basic life-saving care.
Minorities have been particularly hard hit. One-in-three Latinos are uninsured (32.4%, including 25% of Latinos who were born in the US), as are one-in-five blacks (20.2%). Latinos suffer staggering health consequences from being uninsured, said Dr. Olveen Carrasquillo, a leading academic researcher on the uninsured at Columbia University in New York. Diabetes is 2-3 times more common in Latinos, which can cause blindness, kidney failure, and leg amputation if untreated. Asthma is 3-5 times more common in Latino kids.
The proportion of all children who are uninsured held steady at 11.6%. 8.5 million children remain uninsured, a graphic illustration of the failure of incremental reforms, such as the Childrens Health Insurance Program which is supposed to sharply reduce the number of uninsured children.
Texas residents are the worst insured in the nation, with one in four (24.1%) lacking any health coverage. Over 50% of my young patients are uninsured, said Houston pediatrician Dr. Ana Malinow, who easily recalls a half-dozen patients with terrible complications from being uninsured, including a two year old with a chronic ear infection and perforated eardrum whose family cant afford the $1,000 deposit required for surgery. In Texas, a simple ear infection in a child may not be properly treated for years, causing preventable hearing loss, speech deficits, and lifelong learning problems. The leave no child behind state is frighteningly callous when it comes to childrens health, and its no better for the adults I see in my volunteer work at a local shelter. The health care system in Texas is failing everybody.