Number of Americans Without Health Insurance Climbed to 46.6M in 2005

Split among private plans, employer-based plans and direct-purchased plans, the survey found that percentage of those insured by private plans fell from 68.2% in 2004 to 67.7% in 2005, with those using an employer-based plan making only a slight dip from 59.8% to 59.5%. The percentage of those that purchased health insurance directly also decreased from 9.3% to 9.1%. The percentage of people who received government health insurance was stagnant at 27.3%.

For those under the age of 18, the percentage without health insurance rose to 11.2% in 2005, from 7.9 million to 8.3 million.

From 2004 to 2005, the uninsured rates showed no statistically significant changes, with Hispanic whites standing at 11.3% and blacks at 19.6%. However, the uninsured rate for Asians increased to 17.9% in 2005 from 16.5% in 2004. Among Hispanics, the uninsured rate remained statistically the same at 32.7%, but the number of Hispanics without coverage increased from 13.5 million in 2004 to 14.1 million in 2005.

As expected, higher income households had fewer numbers of uninsured than lower income households; however, all income levels except for those bringing in $25,000 or less showed increases in the number of uninsured.

The South by far ranks at the top for the region with the most uninsured and has risen again from 19 million in 2004 to 19.7 million in 2005. The West saw an increase from 11.6 million to 12.3 million. In the Midwest, the number increased slightly from 7.75 million to 7.7 million. The Northeast was the only region that showed a decrease of uninsured, even though the change was marginal – 6.7 million in 2004 to 6.6 million in 2005.

Using a three-year average (from 2003-2005), Texas has the highest percentage of uninsured at 24.6%, followed by New Mexico, with 21.1% and Florida, with 19.6%. Minnesota had the lowest percentage of uninsured, with 8.7%, followed by Hawaii’s 9.5% and Iowa’s 9.8%.

For the full survey, go here .