Uninsured

 Uninsured Americans are often the face of America’s healthcare challenges as they are the most visible failing of the American system – the failure to provide all US citizens with access to affordable healthcare.  Although, there are two deeper issues within the unfortunate truth that tens of millions of Americans do not have access to basic healthcare: the first being the root cause of such a large uninsured population; the next being just who these 47 million plus Americans really are.  It is simple to focus on the uninsured as the paramount problem in American healthcare, but in fact so many uninsured Americans are in actuality a symptom of healthcare’s rising cost.  Without a concern for first containing the cost of healthcare, the realization of universal healthcare in the United States is destined to remain elusive. 

Being that American healthcare is largely employer based, the uninsured are often the victims of healthcare’s impact on American business.  As a result, being uninsured is less a function of poverty, but instead a rather high percentage of the uninsured are employed or recently employed, middle class individuals and their families.  Another population prone to being uninsured is young Americans between the ages 18-34.  Whether as a result of having a job without health benefits or simply by being in a relatively healthy stage of life, the young are disproportionately uninsured.  However, foregoing health insurance due to its cost is a choice no citizen of the world’s richest nation should ever have to make.  No one is immune to having an accident or to the possibility of developing a chronic disease.  For those Americans who find themselves uninsured at the wrong point in their lives, the consequences can be both costly and dire.

• The population of uninsured Americans is greater than the entire populations of Australia, Greece, Sweden and Ireland combined.
• Almost 30% of 18-24 year olds are uninsured,¹⁹ while almost 27% of 25-34 year olds have no health insurance. ²⁰
• Of the 47 million uninsured Americans, 4/5ths (37.6 million) are either employed or members of a family with an employed adult. ²¹  
• 28 million are small business owners, their employees or their dependents.²²
• 9 million are children.²³