BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — A new study shows the number of Louisiana adults without health insurance has been cut in half since the state expanded its Medicaid program.
The Louisiana Health Insurance Survey has been conducted by LSU every two years since 2003. It found 11.4 percent of non-elderly Louisiana adults were uninsured in 2017. That's about 321,000 people aged 19 to 64.
In 2015, the rate was 22.7 percent.
Driving the drop is Gov. John Bel Edwards' decision to enact Medicaid expansion. That has added 474,000 adults to government-financed insurance since July 2016.
The report says about 53 percent of Louisiana adults have health insurance through their employers, while Medicaid covers about 21 percent.
Fewer than 3 percent of Louisiana children are uninsured. The report showed nearly 54 percent are covered through Medicaid.
