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TUESDAY, OCTOBER 1, 2002

The number of American Indians and Alaska Natives without insurance has increased over the past three years, the U.S. Census Bureau reported on Monday.

Based on an average of federal statistics, nearly 30 percent of Native Americans lacked insurance, the largest of any racial group in the country. Only Hispanics, who can be of any race, surpassed this rate.

According to the Census Bureau, 872,000 American Indians and Alaska Natives were without coverage from 1999 to 2001. This represented a small, but steady increase throughout the reporting period.

Due to known under-reporting in Indian Country, the data is not accurate, the agency said. But the rise reflected a nationwide trend of the uninsured.

"More than 41 million people had no health insurance coverage during all of 2001," said Robert Mills, a federal statistician, attributing the increase to the growing American population. "That's up by 1.4 million over the previous year, and it represents about 14.6 percent of the population."

The report solidifies the prior findings of a National Academy of Sciences panel on insurance. In May, a group of medical experts and researchers said nearly a third of Native Americans go without health coverage.

Americans who do not have coverage are more likely to suffer from poor health and die prematurely than their counterparts, the panel reported. Even going without insurance for as little as one year can have an impact on a person's life, medical experts said.

"Having health insurance results in better health outcomes," said co-chair Mary Sue Coleman.

Native Americans whose only source of health care is in the Indian Health Service were counted as uninsured for purposes of the report. Prior to 1997, this segment was not included in the data.

But the change in policy hasn't affected the statistics greatly, according to the Census Bureau.

Get the Report:
Health Insurance Coverage: 2001 (9/30)

Relevant Links:
Census Bureau - http://www.census.gov
Indian Health Service - http://www.ihs.gov

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