New Hampshire Health Insurance
New Hampshire’s health status
Great news if you are living in New Hampshire: when it comes to health, the state is one of the best in the nation. New Hampshire is rated the third healthiest state in 2008’s America’s Health Rankings, put together by the United Health Foundation. The state’s ranking went up a spot from last year’s fourth position, and two of the factors that have greatly improved in the state are the percentage of immunization coverage, which increased from 81.8 to 93.2% of children ages 19 - 35 months having complete immunizations (the highest percentage in the country), and the decrease in percentage of geographical disparity within the state (at 5.6% it’s also the lowest in the nation).
New Hampshire has also the great honor of having the lowest percentage of children living in poverty, with only 6.5% of the population of NH under 18 living in poverty. Despite going up by 0.5% as compared to last year, the percentage is still the lowest in the nation, for another year. The percentage of population lacking Health Insurance also stayed relatively stable, with 10.9% of the population lacking health insurance, a very good number. Cardiovascular-related deaths have lowered, as well as cancer-related deaths. Nevertheless, the premature death rate of years lost before age 75 has increased slightly, but at 5,858 years lost per 100,000 population, is still the third lowest in the nation. It’s obvious that the state has been doing things the right way for a long time, and these efforts have paid off: since 1990, the prevalence of smoking decreased from 30.7 to 19.3% of the population, and the incidence of infectious disease decreased from 18.3 to 8.1 cases per 100,000 population.
There are very little things New Hampshire can do to improve, as they are doing almost everything right. A key factor that could improve even more their health status, is to raise the state’s public health funding. Although raised slightly as compared to last year’s amount, $59 dollars per person spent on public health is still a low amount when compared to the average. The number of poor mental health days per month also increased greatly in the past year, from 3.0 to 3.5 days in the previous 30 days. The prevalence of obesity is also one of the issues that despite most efforts to control within the New Hampshire population, still seems to go up. Although still low as compared to most states in the country, 25.1% of the population are obese in NH, 2.7% more than 2007 and 7.2% more than 2003. These issues need to be revised to ensure New Hampshire’s great health maintains.
New Hampshire has been for a long time one of the best places in the country when it comes to health. Its consistency and great organization make New Hampshire’s health care system one of the best in the country.
New Hampshire health insurance information
In New Hampshire, 89.1% of the citizens in New Hampshire have Health Insurance. Despite the somewhat poor government funding, this percentage is excellent, which means New Hampshire has worked hard towards offering an accessible health plan to its citizens, as only about 10.9% of the population in New Hampshire has no Health Insurance. The percentage of employers offering health insurance to employees is good, with 62% percent of employers offering health Insurance plans, though this percentage has been going down since 2003. About 76.9% of workers take the Health Insurance plans offered by their employers.
Despite the low public health funding in New Hampshire, the state has a high rate of primary care physicians for the population, with 123.2 physicians per 100,000 population. New Hampshire’s health care system is one of the top in the country because not only is highly accessible, but also very effective and adequate. The percentage of the New Hampshire population that could get medical care when needed is 90.9%. The patients served by FQHCs as a percent of population under 200% FPL stands at 26.1%.
If coverage has been denied for you, there are still some options you can check:
Best health plans in New Hampshire (according to US News)
The prestigious US News ranks yearly the best Health Plans in the country, polling and evaluating consumer assessment, prevention, and treatment offered by all plans. They gather information and rank the results, nation-wide and state-wide, showing on their results the best plans available for New Hampshire as well. The Rankings reflect results of consumer surveys and success in preventing and treating illness compared with average health plan.
Not only they rank Commercial Plans, they also rank Medicare or Medicaid plans, covering and evaluating as many plans as possible. If you want to browse their list of best-of, please go to the US News Health Plans Search site.
Get involved
If you are concerned about New Hampshire’s health care issues and want to speak out, your safest bet is to contact your federal official, either via phone or fax. Postal Mail is not recommended, since it takes too long, and e-mail might not be seen. Also, make sure you communicate with the right Member of the Senate and/or Congress.
If you want more guidance and tips on how to contact and communicate with your representatives, there are various sites on the Internet that can help on how to contact your elected officials.
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| Contact the White House PHONE: toll free 1-800-671-7887 (ask for the Comment Line) State officials:
Official New Hampshire health insurance information
| Recent New Hampshire health insurance newsHealth Insurance is always a hot topic for discussion, since it involves the citizens of New Hampshire and their welfare. Here are some of the latest news and updates on the current issues and news related to Health and Health Insurance for New Hampshire: |
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