Office of Governor Gary Locke
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - February 4, 1997
Contact:  Marylou Flynn in the Governor's Communications Office (360-902-4116).
Alt Contact:  Sue Crystal at the Health Care Policy Board (360-407-0042)

Governor hails findings of new study on health care for Washington's children

OLYMPIA -Gov. Gary Locke today called Washington State "a forerunner in the cause of affordable health care," after hearing the findings of a new study which shows a significant drop over the past two years in the number of Washington children without health insurance.


Preliminary findings of study, conducted by the Rand Corporation and Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., found that - despite a rapid increase in Washington's overall population - the number of uninsured children 18 years old or younger has declined from 177,683 in 1994 to 123,591 in 1996.


According to an analysis of the study prepared by the state Office of Financial Management (OFM), the proportion of uninsured children in Washington has declined from 11.4 percent in 1994 to 7.7 percent in 1996. The study also found that the rate of uninsured people of all ages has dropped from 12.2 percent to 10.9 percent during that two-year period.


"This demonstrates that our state's commitment to affordable health care is really paying off - especially for Washington's children," said Locke, who is in Washington D.C. for a meeting of the National Governor's Association. "Since the late 1980s, there's been a strong bipartisan effort by legislators and governors to ensure that children and all people in our state have access to affordable health care."


Locke, who championed such landmark programs as First Steps and the state's Basic Health Plan as chair of the House Appropriations Committee in the early 1990s, said the Rand/Mathematica study shows that Washington is at the forefront of the national effort to stem the number of people who can't afford health insurance. President Clinton is expected to address that issue in his "State of the Union" speech tonight, which Locke plans to attend.


If Washington's rate of uninsured people had remained at the 1994 rate of 12.2 percent, OFM calculates that the number of people in 1996 without health care insurance would have climbed from 624,894 to 669,500 - rather than dropping to 599,775 as indicated by the Rand/Mathematica study. Although the study was specific to Washington State, a 1995 survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the national rate of people without health insurance at 15.4 percent.


Sue Crystal, chair of the state Health Care Policy Board, said Washington's commitment to extend heath care coverage to all children under 200 percent of the poverty level has made a real difference in children's health in recent years.


"Everyone in our state can be proud of the progress we've made in addressing the health care needs of children," said Crystal, who serves as an advisor to Governor Locke and the state Legislature on health care issues. "Without programs like First Steps, Second Steps, and the Basic Health Plan, these results would not have been possible."


Crystal said she was also encouraged by the increasing number of low-income children covered by private health insurance, which has grown from 219,227 (37 percent) in 1994 to 271,251 (40 percent) in 1996, according to the study.


"The indications are that private businesses are also stepping up to the mark," Crystal said. "We're not just seeing a transfer of low-income children from private health insurance to state programs."


Beginning with First Steps program in 1989, Washington has systematically expanded its efforts to provide affordable health care to working families with children. In 1993, as part of the state's health-care reform effort, then-budget chair Locke successfully advocated dedicating a share of the new funding provided under the Washington Health Services Act to extend Medicaid coverage to all children under 200 percent of the federal poverty level.


"The expanded coverage for children under Medicaid made the Basic Health Plan more affordable for low-income working families," Crystal said. "Under the policy adopted in 1993, coverage for low-income children was provided free and adults were required to pay only their share of the premiums."


As with its initial survey in 1994, the study released today by Rand/Mathematica was funded exclusively by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), a national organization dedicated to improving health care in the United States. The 1996 study was based on a randomly drawn sample of 1,964 households with 5,119 residents in Washington State. RWJF paid Mathematica $259,000 to conduct the 1996 survey, which has a 1.3 percent margin of error.


Glenn Olson, OFM Senior Forecast Coordinator who administered the FWJF grant, said additional survey data - specific to those covered by Medicaid and the Basic Health Plan - will be collected in March and be available later in spring.

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