Hospitals and Health Clinics were meant to be areas to care for the sick and poor. They were meant to be places for people to heal and seek refuge. However, somewhere along the way, that notion changed. Instead, healthcare has become a privilege given to those who can afford it. That is certainly the reality of many children living in the United States. In turn, this lack of healthcare insurance leaves many children with low quality care, and an abundance of health-related issues that produce a poor quality of life. According to the United States Census Bureau, “In 2020, 4.3 million children under the age of 19 – 5.6% of all children – were without health coverage for the entire calendar year” (Census.gov). This is a huge number of children that are not receiving the care they need. The main social problem is that we are seeing more uninsured children in the United States. This is significant because it can lead to more health problems and kids suffering.
In the last decade, we have seen an alarming increase of children who are uninsured. According to the Children’s Defense Fund, nearly 4.3 million children under the age of 19 were uninsured. School-aged children (ages 6-17) represented more than 3 million of the nearly 4.3 million uninsured children. These statistics present the severity of this issue. More and more children are losing coverage. The problem with coverage is even more severe for children of immigrant parents. A study conducted by Julia Gelatt examined how children’s and parents’ immigration status is associated with children’s access to insurance and healthcare and with children’s physical health. Gelatt found that “undocumented immigrant children face severely constrained access to health insurance and a usual source of healthcare, while children with foreign-born parents have much lower global health status than children with U.S.-born parents. These findings highlight the serious health disparities due to immigration-related barriers.
The statistics become even more alarming when looking at minority groups such as Latino and African American children. According to data from the International Journal of Equity in Health, “minority children have the highest uninsured rates in the U.S., accounting for 53 percent of uninsured American children — even though they make up only 48 percent of the U.S. child population”. This lack of coverage creates serious consequences for the health of minority children. In addition, a study was conducted to investigate the factors influencing parental awareness of the lack of health insurance among minority children. After the study was conducted, the results concluded that half of parents of uninsured children are unaware that their children are eligible for programs like Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which are both government-funded health insurance programs in the United States. A solution to combat this issue includes providing more outreach and education on insurance enrollment for parents to be aware of eligibility for their children.
The increasing number of uninsured children in the United States is a public health crisis with serious consequences. Minority children and children of immigrants are especially vulnerable. They face barriers that limit their access to proper healthcare, mostly due to parental awareness. To address this, outreach and education programs about Medicaid and CHIP eligibility need to be developed and implemented. Every child deserves quality healthcare.
References:
https://www.childrensdefense.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/The-State-Of-Americas-Children-2020.pdf
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ssqu.12261
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27000795/
Picture source: https://choc.org/health-topics/understanding-health-care/
