Universal health care coverage for children is within the nation's reach, but it will not happen the way programs are currently administered. Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) are not signing up eligible children. About 60 percent of the uninsured children in the United States are eligible for, but not enrolled, in a public health insurance program.
Under the leadership of Mayor Dannel Malloy, the city of Stamford, Conn., is showing the nation a simple way to close the gap on uninsured children with an outreach effort called "Every Child Matters." In the fall of 2000, the city's Health and Social Services Department began requiring parents and guardians to indicate their children's health insurance status as part of the annual school enrollment process. In consultation with school nurses assigned to both public and private schools, each family with an uninsured child is contacted first by mail and then by phone to explain Connecticut's health coverage for children. In this way, families are offered hands-on assistance in preparing and submitting applications for coverage.
Every Child Matters is particularly effective because it piggybacks on the health information that the nation's schools already collect from parents: vaccination records, emergency contact information, special health needs, among other things. It also both capitalizes and builds on schools' relationships with parents as a trusted source of information. And, most importantly, it begins with the premise that all children should have health insurance and if they do not, the resources are available to make sure they do.
The city of Stamford took action as the state efforts to extend health care coverage to parents stalled. The action was also driven by demographic changes that saw a 20 percent increase in Stamford's population of children and a doubling of its Hispanic population in the 1990s. Nationally, one of every five Hispanic children is uninsured. Since its inception, Every Child Matters has contacted thousands of families with children who do not have health insurance, and connected over 2,250 Stamford children to affordable health care coverage.
Another school-based outreach effort is underway in California. State Sen. Gill Cedillo, a state assemblyman at the time, introduced legislation signed into law by then-Gov. Gray Davis to create the Express Lane Eligibility program, whereby children who are eligible for the school lunch program can be enrolled in California's Medi-Cal program. In the first year of implementation, 70 schools in five school districts piloted this program with great success during the 2003-2004 school year. Other states, including Washington, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and North Carolina, have established similar programs.
No American child should be without health coverage. That eight and a half million children are not insured and most of them are eligible for public coverage is shameful. More state and local leaders need to replicate innovative outreach efforts like those going on in Stamford and California because children without health insurance are much more likely to suffer from preventable and treatable illnesses than their insured peers. Health care insurance increases the availability of resources for previously undiagnosed or untreated illnesses, which can range from minor infections to life-threatening and chronic conditions like cancer and asthma. Outreach efforts are vital to ensure that children receive timely access to high-quality health care so they can learn and thrive.
Covering Kids & Families
http://www.coveringkids.org/
"Putting Express Lane Eligibility Into Practice: A Briefing Book and Guide for Enrolling Uninsured Children Who Receive Other Public Benefits into Medicaid and CHIP," The Children's Partnership and the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, November 2000
www.expresslaneinfo.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Reports2
&TEMPLATE=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm&CONTENTID=6889
"Blagojevich Administration Delivers on Health Care Pledge," Press Release, Office of the Governor, August 2004
www.illinois.gov/PressReleases/
ShowPressRelease.cfm?SubjectID=3&RecNum=3258
Donna Cohen Ross, "Fostering a Close Connection: Report to Covering Kids on Options for Conducting Child Health Insurance Outreach and Enrollment Through the National School Lunch Program," Center on Budget and Priorities, January 2000
www.cbpp.org/1-20-00health.htm
Mayor Dannel P. Malloy
Stamford Government Center, 10th Floor
888 Washington Boulevard
Stamford, CT 06904
(203) 977-4150
dmalloy@ci.stamford.ct.us
Johnnie A. Lee
Director of Health and Social Service
Stamford Health Department
(203) 977-4399
jalee@ci.stamford.ct.us
Jenny Kattlove
Health Policy Manager
The Children's Partnership
1351 3rd Street Promenade, Suite 206
Santa Monica, CA 90401
(310) 260-1220
(310) 260-1921 (fax)
jkattlove@childrenspartnership.org
David B. Kendall
Progressive Policy Institute
4021 Heritage Way
Missoula, MT 59802
(406) 543-2265
(772) 679-0652 (fax)
dkendall@ppionline.org
More Education Plays