Forty-seven million Americans went without health insurance in 2006, an increase of 2.2 million people from the year before, according to a report issued by the U.S. Census Bureau Tuesday (Aug. 28). It marks the sixthconsecutive year the ranks of the uninsured have grown.
For the second year in a row, the percentage of children without medical coverage also increased. The Census Bureau estimates 8.7 million kids – or 11.7 percent – had no insurance, an increase of 700,000 over the year before.
Advocacy groups immediately seized on the numbers to back their call for an expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), a joint state-federal venture for families who make too much to qualify for Medicaid.
“The huge number of uninsured Americans exceeds the cumulative population of 24 states plus the District of Columbia. This epidemic of uninsurance has reached crisis proportions, and Americans want to see the problem solved,” said Kathleen Stoll, health policy director of Families USA, a group pushing for a large expansion of SCHIP...
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