In 2012, the bureau said, 15.4 percent of people were uninsured, down from 15.7 percent in 2011. The number of uninsured people, 48 million, was not statistically different from the estimate of 48.6 million in 2011.
David S. Johnson, the chief of social and economic statistics at the bureau, said that much of the increase in coverage last year was attributable to government programs. Medicare covered 15.7 percent of the population, compared with 15.2 percent the previous year.
Census Bureau data showed significant changes in coverage over the last 13 years.
From 1999 to 2012, the bureau said, the proportion of people with private health insurance declined to 63.9 percent, from 73 percent, while the proportion with government coverage rose to 32.6 percent, from 24.2 percent.
One of the most popular provisions of the 2010 health care law allows young adults to stay on their parents’ insurance policies until age 26. That provision appears to be having its intended effect.
Among people ages 19 to 25, the proportion who were uninsured declined to 27.2 percent in 2012. Though the bureau said that figure was not significantly different from the 2011 rate, it was down from 29.8 percent two years earlier.
The proportion of children younger than 19 without health insurance declined last year, to 9.2 percent, from 9.7 percent in 2011.
Chris Jennings, the health policy coordinator at the White House, said the census figures showed that President Obama’s policies were “making progress in expanding access to affordable health care.” Mr. Jennings said the progress would accelerate in coming months as millions of Americas gain access to coverage under the 2010 health care law.
Mr. Jennings said the data tended to disprove Republican predictions that the new law would undermine employer-sponsored coverage. The bureau reported that the proportion of people with employment-based coverage — 54.9 percent in 2012 — was “not statistically different” from the share in 2011.
Noting that children were much more likely than adults to have insurance, Mr. Jennings said this reflected “more than two decades of bipartisan effort to expand access” to coverage through Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
The proportion of Hispanics who were uninsured last year declined by a percentage point, to 29.1 percent. But it was still much higher than the comparable rates for blacks (19 percent), Asian-Americans (15.1 percent) and non-Hispanic whites (11.1 percent).
The Census Bureau also reported these findings:
¶The proportion of the foreign-born population without health insurance in 2012 was about two and a half times that of the native-born population — 32 percent, as against 13 percent.
¶Two of the nation’s four major regions, the South and the West, accounted for 61 percent of the nation’s population, but 71 percent of all the uninsured.
¶The uninsured rate was higher among people with lower incomes and lower among those with higher incomes. For example, 24.9 percent of people in households with annual incomes of less than $25,000 had no health insurance coverage last year. Among people in households with incomes of $75,000 or more, the comparable figure was 7.9 percent.
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/18/us/percentage-of-americans-lacking-health-coverage-falls-again.html?partner=rss&emc=rss