New Survey Reveals that Half of Minorities Have Difficulties Paying for Healthcare

A new survey by the Gallup Organization reveals that minorities in particular face a difficult time paying for their healthcare needs. Half of them reported that during the course of the past year, they did not have enough money to pay for their medical bills.

Recently, the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics reported that approximately 43.6 million (14.8%) Americans did not have any health insurance in 2006. During the course of this year, 54.5 million (18.6%) also reported that they had been without insurance at least ounce in 2006 with 30.7 million (10.5%) stating that they had been without insurance for more than a year at the time of the survey. This new Gallup survey appears to corroborate many of these findings.

The report was part of Gallup's Minority Rights and Relations survey and was conducted via telephone interviews between June 4th and June 24th, 2007. It included 2,388 adults over the age of 18 nationwide. Specifically, this survey included 868 Whites (non-Hispanic), 802 Blacks, and 502 Hispanics. Gallup analysts included over-samples of blacks and Hispanics in an effort to ensure that the poll reflected the proportions of these minority populations in the United States. Approximately, one-quarter (138/502) of the interviews with Hispanics were in Spanish.

Gallup asked survey participants if there had been times during the last year when they did not have enough money to pay for medical or healthcare expenses. In this respect, 32% of Americans were unable to pay for their basic healthcare needs during the course of the preceding year. This was the highest percentage reported in the 31 years that Gallup has been conducting this survey. Back in 1976, only 15% said that they did not have enough money to meet their healthcare requirements.