Characteristics of persons with and without health care coverage: United States, 1989.

In 1989 an estimated 33.9 million persons in the civilian noninstitu­ tionalized population of the United States (13.9 percent) were reported to lack health care coverage. This point-prevalence estimate represents an average for 52 weeks of household interviews conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census for the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). It is a measure of a person’s coverage status at the time of interview, not at any time prior to the interview. Noncoverage was relatively higher for younger persons, males, persons who are not white, those with low incomes, persons 18 years of age and over who were unemployed or had less than 12 years of education, residents of the South and West Regions of the country, and residents of central cities in metropolitan statistical areas (MSA’S), Table 1 shows that more than 20 percent of persons in the following groups lacked coverage: Unemployed workers 18 years of age and over (38.3 percent), persons living below the poverty level (32.5 percent), members of families with low annual incomes (27.7 percent for $5,000-$9,999, 27.1 percent for less than $5,000, and 24.3 for $10,000-$19,999), young adults 18-24 years of age (27.4 percent), and black persons (20.2 percent). In contrast, the lowest proportions of those without health care coverage were among persons 65 years of age and over (1.2 percent) and members of families with an annual income of $50,000 or more (3.6 percent). Because of Medicare, most persons without any form of health care coverage are under 65 years of age (an estimated 33.6 million persons, or 15.7 percent of those in this age group). In terms of both age and sociodemographic characteristics, more than 40 percent of the persons in some of the resulting subgroups lacked coverage. These included persons 18-44 years of age who were unemployed or were members of families with an annual income of $5,000-$9,999; those 25-44 years of age who had family incomes of Iess than $5,000 per year or were below the poverty Ievel; and young adults 18–24 years of age with less than 12 years of education. Figure 1 shows the proportion of persons of all ages and of those under 65 years of age without health care coverage by family income. For all ages combined, the estimates of noncoverage range from 27.7 percent for those in families with an annual family income of $5,000-$9,999 to 3.6 percent for members of families with an annual income of $50,000 or more. The estimates for persons under 65 years of age range from 36.9 to 3.7 percent for the corresponding income groups. The estimate reported above of the number of persons without health care coverage is similar to the corresponding estimates of two recent large-scale U.S. Government surveys. The National Medical Expenditure Survey of 1987 reported pointprevalence estimates for different periods of the year of 34-36 million persons without health care coverage (l). The preliminary estimate from the March 1990 Current Population