The Associated Press
December 27, 2007 07:39 pm
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INDIANAPOLIS — Nearly 4,500 Hoosiers so far have signed up for a new state program that allows low-income adults without health insurance to gain coverage.
Gov. Mitch Daniels, health care advocates and lawmakers on Thursday celebrated the number of applicants while encouraging others who might be eligible to apply.
The state estimates that more than 550,000 people are eligible for the Healthy Indiana Plan program that takes effect Tuesday, although enrollment likely will be limited to about 130,000. Daniels said that will still bring peace of mind to many Indiana adults who cannot afford health insurance or do not have access to it.
“Today is a day we have worked for and waited for a long time, the day when words on paper and abstract concepts about health care and uninsurance turn into real differences in the lives of real people,” Daniels said at a Statehouse news conference.
Shelley Ross of Indianapolis, who lost her health coverage when she and her husband divorced about a year ago, is one of those people. The 40-year-old single mother of two teaches at a community college but is considered a part-time employee not eligible for its health care benefits.
She said she has put off taking her asthma medicine and having cataract surgery because of it, but that should change now that she’s in the state program.
“I got my insurance card today,” she said with a wide smile. “I’m very excited.”
The program was approved by the General Assembly on a bipartisan basis earlier this year after months of negotiations between lawmakers and the Daniels administration, mainly through the state’s Family and Social Services Administration.
The plan is available to uninsured adults ages 18-64 in households earning up to twice the federal poverty level, a sliding scale from $20,420 for an individual to $41,300 for a family of four.
Those whose employers offer health insurance, whether they’re enrolled in those plans or not, are not eligible.
People will enroll in one of two plans provided by two insurers, MDwise and Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield. Both plans will provide enrollees:
— Up to $500 a year in free preventive health care such as smoking cessation, mammograms, prostate exams and flu shots.
— A health savings account worth $1,100 a year, with contributions by the state, the enrollee and willing employers. Individual contributions vary from 2 percent to 5 percent of gross household income, and employers can pay up to half of that share. Ross said her monthly contribution will be $91.
— For medical costs exceeding $1,100, benefits of at least $300,000 annually.
The program will cost the state an estimated $190 million per year, most of that coming from a 44-cent-per-pack increase in the cigarette tax. The state is using those funds to leverage about $1.1 billion in federal Medicaid funding over five years.
Daniels did not have an exact number of applications that have been accepted since Dec. 17 but said the vast majority have been approved.
The state is promoting the program through radio and television commercials, billboards and postcards sent to people thought to be eligible.
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