Slightly more than half of modest-income Ohioans who don’t have jobs also don’t have health care insurance, according to an analysis commissioned by Families USA, the consumer health care advocate.
Fifty-three percent of Ohio’s 218,834 unemployed workers who lived in households of four earning less than $44,100 a year were uninsured at the end of 2008, according to the Lewin Group analysis (pdf). Nationwide, 54 percent of unemployed, modest-income workers lacked health insurance.
These are not surprising statistics. Workers who lose their jobs often find it difficult to afford health insurance, Families USA said in its report, posted today. Many of these workers are ending up competing for care at free clinics, according to a story by Kaiser Health News and the Washington Post.
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Also not surprising: Families of four that earn less than 200 percent of the poverty-income level often have a greater challenge affording health insurance after the loss of a job than do higher-income families.
Yet only one in four unemployed workers in the moderate income group receives health coverage through Medicaid or some other public program, Families USA said. The U.S. Labor Department said today that 3.6 million workers have lost jobs since the recession began in Dec. 2007.
These statistics could become more troubling as the number of unemployed people grows.  In Ohio, 465,000 Ohioans were unemployed in December, according to the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services. That’s up nearly 30 percent from unemployed ranks of 361,000 in December 2007. Not all of the unemployed in Ohio fall into the moderate-income category.
Both the U.S. House and U.S. Senate have included health insurance relief for unemployed workers in their proposed economic stimulus bills. This week, the Ohio Department of Insurance made its own recommendations for how to fulfill Gov. Ted Strickland’s call for cutting the state’s unemployed ranks.
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