Despite Recession and Rising Unemployment, Rate of Uninsured Did Not Increase, Says Census Bureau Data

Thursday, September 10, 2009
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief


David Johnson, chief of Census Bureau's Housing and Household Economics Statistics Division (Census Bureau photo).

(CNSNews.com) - Even though the nation was in a recession and unemployment rates were rising, the percentage of people lacking health insurance in the United States did not increase during 2008, according to data released today by the Census Bureau.

The actual number of people lacking health insurance ticked up slightly during the year, but so did the actual number of people who were insured, as the overall population increased from 299.10 million in 2007 to 301.48 million in 2008. There was also a slight movement of people from private insurance into government insurance—including seniors moving into Medicare.

“The number of people without health insurance coverage increased to 46.3 million in 2008 (from 45.7 million in 2007), and the uninsured rate was 15.4 percent, not statistically different from the rate in 2007,â€