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Maine Children's Alliance

Children under age 19 without health insurance in Maine

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Why This Indicator Matters

Having health insurance is important for individual families for several reasons. Uninsured people receive less medical care and less timely care, they have worse health outcomes, and lack of insurance is a fiscal burden for them and their families. When the uninsured do have to seek medical treatment, often costs are borne by hospitals providing free care and eventually these costs are passed on resulting in higher health costs for everyone.
For more information see:  Urban Institute- Why Having Health Insurance Is Important

What the data shows
For 2017, the counties varied between 4.2% of children being uninsured to 7.7%, with the counties of Lincoln and Washington having the highest rate of uninsured children. Kennebec and Androscoggin had the lowest rates.
For the state as a whole, the rate of uninsured increased between 2012 and 2014, but has gone down between 2014-2016. 2017 was nearly the same as 2016. The percent uninsured for all of Maine for children ages 0 -18 is 4.9% in 2017.
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Definitions: Children under age 19 who were not covered by health insurance at any point during the year.
The numerator is children ages 0 - 18 who did not have health insurance at some point in time and the denominator is all children ages 0 - 18.
The U.S. Census Bureau’s Small Area Health Insurance Estimates (SAHIE) program produces timely estimates for all counties and states by detailed demographic and income groups. The SAHIE program produces single-year estimates of health insurance coverage for every county in the U.S. The estimates are model-based and consistent with the American Community Survey (ACS). They are based on an "area-level" model that uses survey estimates for domains of interest, rather than individual responses. The estimates are "enhanced" with administrative data, within a Hierarchical Bayesian framework.

Data Source:

Small Area Health Insurance Estimates (SAHIE) for counties and states



The SAHIE program models health insurance coverage by combining survey data from several sources, including:

The American Community Survey (ACS)
Demographic population estimates
Aggregated federal tax returns
Participation records for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as the Food Stamp program
County Business Patterns
Medicaid
Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) participation records

Footnotes: Updated April 2019.