Projecting the Effect of
the Recession on
Health Insurance Coverage for Nevadans
February 9, 2009
Nevada will have as many as 527,000 to
532,000 medically uninsured citizens in 2009
and as many as 605,000 to 614,000 by 2010
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Dear Colleagues,We are pleased to present the 2009 edition of the Nevada Study of Medically Uninsured Populations covering the period 2002 - 2008. This report is based on estimates reflecting the insurance situation prior to the difficulties in the financial system and the collapse of the housing market. An immediate question arises: What impact should we expect to see in 2009 and 2010? In order to answer this question, we asked Decision Analytics, Inc. to develop a limited time-series model relating some key drivers to the percentage of persons in Nevada who are medically uninsured. That report is available as an integrated part of the study and can be viewed on-line and downloaded in its entirety: Projecting the Effect of the Recession on Health Insurance Coverage for Nevadans. One important consideration when modeling effects over time is the existence of “lagged” effects. Put simply, an economic recession (affecting many factors in the economy) may take some time to appear in other data series. This is certainly true for unemployment, which is a “lagging indicator”; unemployment rates tend to increase approximately a year after a recession takes hold of the economy. Uninsurance rates are similar to unemployment in this way: They appear to lag unemployment by approximately 18 months. (Notably, this corresponds to the period of “Cobra” coverage, should a former employee choose to use it.) Thus, unemployment is not an immediate driver of uninsurance; it takes some time for the impact to be felt. Thus, we project a range of 527,000 to 532,000 medically uninsured citizens in 2009, and a range of 605,000 to 614,000 in 2010, as compared to an estimate of 478,000 in 2008. This projection is, of course, dependent on the accuracy of the population projection that is here simply taken without changing any projection assumptions. We want to continue working together in best efforts as we meet these challenges. Never before has Nevada's healthcare safety-net and Community Health Centers been more needed than today and tomorrow. Sincerely,
Patricia Durbin
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