{"id":12287,"date":"2020-10-22T16:48:53","date_gmt":"2020-10-22T16:48:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=12287"},"modified":"2020-10-22T16:48:53","modified_gmt":"2020-10-22T16:48:53","slug":"numbers-soar-for-texas-kids-without-health-insurance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=12287","title":{"rendered":"Numbers soar for Texas kids without health insurance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Seven Texas counties \u2013 Harris, Dallas, Tarrant, Hidalgo, Bexar, Travis and El Paso \u2013 were among the top 20 counties in the nation with the highest number of uninsured children, according to a report by the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>Photo: Semevent\/Pixabay<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By ROZ BROWN<\/strong>
Texas News Service<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 Advocates for children are calling on Texas lawmakers to take action in the next legislative session, after a new report shows the state has the highest number of children in the nation without health insurance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Texas had an estimated 995,000 uninsured children<\/a> in 2019, an increase of 243,000 from three years earlier. Data in the annual report from the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families<\/a> was collected in 2019, during a relatively strong economic period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Patrick Bresette, executive director at the Children\u2019s Defense Fund-Texas, said he was startled by the dramatic increase \u2013 especially because the data was collected pre-pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe fact that more than a third of the national loss of children losing insurance occurred in this state, and the next highest state is a fraction of ours, should be a wake-up call for every policy maker and advocate in the state,\u201d Bresette said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said there are simple things Texas could be do to improve the situation \u2013 from expanding Medicaid to streamlining burdensome paperwork that makes it difficult for families to access resources that could help them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Texas\u2019 rate of uninsured children was 12.7% in 2019 \u2013 more than double the national average of 5.7%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joan Alker, executive director of the Georgetown University Center, noted there was a sharp increase in the number of uninsured children of color, likely because immigration policies implemented by the Trump administration have initiated a climate of fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHaving health insurance is critical for long-term benefits,\u201d Alker said. \u201cWe know that kids who have health insurance are more likely to graduate from high school, attend college and be healthier, more productive adults.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The report also mentions the administration\u2019s efforts to undermine the Affordable Care Act, including eliminating funding for outreach and \u201cnavigators\u201d to help people enroll, along with additional red tape that makes it harder for families to access Medicaid or CHIP.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By ROZ BROWNTexas News Service AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 Advocates for children are calling on Texas lawmakers to take action in the next legislative session, after a new report shows the state has the highest number of children in the nation without health insurance. Texas had an estimated 995,000 uninsured children in 2019, an increase of 243,000 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":12259,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12287"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12288,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12287\/revisions\/12288"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}