In 2015, 11.9% of Louisiana residents did not have health insurance, down from 14.8% the year prior, as more residents took advantage of health care coverage offered under the Affordable Care Act, according to new U.S. Census Bureau figures.
The Louisiana Budget Project says the decline in uninsured residents last year means more Louisianans had health insurance than ever before in 2015. And because the latest data does not include the recent expansion of Medicaid coverage to low-income adults—which took effect July 1 and resulted in nearly 300,000 people gaining coverage—LBP says Louisiana can expect even more dramatic coverage gains when the 2016 data becomes available around this time next year.
LBP Director Jan Moller says the new figures are good news for Louisianans and the state at large, adding “we know that people who have health coverage are more likely to get preventative care and treatment for chronic conditions which makes them more productive at work.”
Nationally, the uninsured rate declined from 11.7% in 2014 to 9.4% last year, also a new low, LBP notes.
“The greatest coverage gains occurred in states that expanded their Medicaid programs, and the gap is growing between states that have embraced Medicaid expansion and those that have not,” writes LBP analyst Nick Albares in a report on the figures. “Next year, Louisiana will be included among the expansion states.”
Still, the data comes as insurers such as UnitedHealth and Aetna are exiting public health insurance exchanges in some markets due to financial losses.
Earlier this year, UnitedHealth announced it was getting out of public health insurance exchanges in most markets, including in Louisiana, by 2017 in anticipation of roughly $1 billion in financial losses over a two-year period covering 2015 and 2016. In August, Aetna also announced plans to exit exchanges in 11 states.
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana also told Daily Report that it expects to lose in excess of $200 million in Louisiana on individual plans over a three-year period ending this year. The insurer says it will have to reevaluate its participation in the market over on an annual basis.
