Washington, D.C. — More than six people die each day in Florida because they don’t have health insurance, says a new report by Families USA, the national organization for health care consumers.
The Families USA report, the first-ever state-specific report of this type, is based on a groundbreaking national study by the Institute of Medicine, which in 2002 forged the direct link between a lack of health coverage and deaths from health-related causes.
“Our report highlights how our inadequate system of health coverage condemns a great number of Floridians to an early death simply because they don’t have the same access to health care as their insured neighbors,” Ron Pollack, Executive Director of Families USA, said today. “The conclusions are sadly clear—a lack of health coverage is a matter of life and death for many Floridians.
“Health insurance really matters in how people make their health care decisions,” Pollack said. “We know that people without insurance often forgo checkups, screenings, and other preventive care.”
As a result, he said, uninsured adults are more likely to be diagnosed with a disease, such as cancer, in an advanced stage, which greatly reduces their chance of survival. The Institute of Medicine found that uninsured adults are 25 percent more likely to die prematurely than adults with private health insurance.
Another recent academic study found that uninsured adults between the ages of 55 and 64 are even more likely to die prematurely. For this group, a lack of health insurance is the third leading cause of death, following heart disease and cancer.
The Families USA report for Florida makes three specific points about uninsured adults:
* Families USA estimates that more than six working-age Floridians die each day due to lack of health insurance (approximately 2,400 people in 2006).
* Between 2000 and 2006, the estimated number of adults between the ages of 25 and 64 in Florida who died because they did not have health insurance was more than 13,600.
* Across the United States, in 2006, twice as many people in that same age category died from a lack of health insurance as died from homicide.
“This report is deeply troubling and should underscore the importance of providing health insurance for every American,” U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) said today. “Twice as many people die from lack of health insurance as are murdered—just imagine what our news would be like if people reported on the dangers of being uninsured with the same emphasis we see toward violent crime.”
“I want to thank Families USA for bringing the issue of lack of health insurance on Florida families to the forefront,” U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL) said today. “Florida's hardworking families are hit especially hard by the lack of health insurance because, at the same time, they also are dealing with increased property insurance, skyrocketing gas prices, and expanding education costs.
“Unfortunately, politicians at the federal and state levels have provided little help over the past few years for struggling families,” Castor said. “At the highest level, President Bush twice vetoed the Democratic Congress's expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program (Florida Kidcare). He then promoted the partial privatization of Medicare by HMOs, and most recently opposed a repeal of subsidies to the Big Oil companies. In my own state of Florida, until recently, state leaders made it very difficult for families to access Florida Kidcare.”
In its 2002 report, the Institute of Medicine estimated that 18,000 adults nationwide died in 2000 because they did not have health insurance. That estimate was later updated by the Urban Institute, which reported that at least 22,000 adults died in 2006 due to a lack of health insurance.
