Georgians Are Missing Health Insurance
Across the middle of Georgia in the USA, approximately 1 in 5 people (not including OAPs) are living without a valid health insurance policy, analysis has shown. The report revealed that 83,625 people are lacking health insurance, which is a huge amount considering how important health insurance is. The program dubbed ‘Obamacare’ is launching in the region tomorrow, which will force residents to either purchase a health insurance policy or pay a fine to the government.
The US Census Bureau’s Small Area Health Insurance data isn’t perfect, with the numbers being from 2011 instead of the present year. The data only includes people who earn an income of up to 4 times the poverty rate and up to the age of 64, before most people become eligible for Medicare. The study focused on 11 counties within Georgia: Baldwin, Bibb, Bleckley, Crawford, Houston, Jones, Laurens, Monroe, Peach, Twiggs & Wilkinson.
Across the studied counties, trends began to appear. The percentage of people living without health insurance didn’t stray far from the regional average of 19%, with the best county being Houston at 17.6% and the worst is Crawford at 23.9%. In Middle Georgia, the age group with the highest rate of un-insurance is between 19 and 39. These younger ages are the best time to purchase health insurance because the premiums are lower and the chance of actually being able to get a decent policy gets smaller and smaller as the years go on.
The Federal Government said: “Young adults should get health insurance because it will cover unexpected hospital stays, which average at $30,000 for just 3 days. Most people who don’t get health insurance will have to pay what the federal government calls a fee or the ‘individual shared responsibility payment’”. James Donley, a real estate attorney from Macon said: “If it makes more sense to get health insurance, then I’ll get health insurance. Right now, it’s a pretty clear economic situation: pay the taxes, unfair as they may be.”
James Savery, 30 September 2013