Making It Work: Health Reform in Rhode Island

Together with the Rhode Island Foundation, Lt. Governor Roberts will be hosting a series of events focusing on the acute need for health reform in Rhode Island. With so much talk, and yet so much uncertainty about the health reform bill before Congress, now is the time to examine the options that Rhode Island is presented with to make real change in our health care system. The full schedule of the Making It Work series will be released soon.

As an introduction to Making It Work, the Rhode Island Foundation and the Office of Lt. Governor commissioned a study of the uninsured in Rhode Island. Getting Everyone Into the Pool: A look at the uninsured in Rhode Island, projections for the future, and the costs to the system was presented by Deborah Chollet of Mathematica Policy Research and independent consultant Deborah Faulkner on Monday, March 15, 2010. The report detailed the most recent data on the number of families and individuals that are currently uninsured in Rhode Island, and projections of the cost to all Rhode Islanders. Among the key findings: 140,000 Rhode Islanders, or 16% of the population under 65 years of age are currently without health insurance. And providing health care for the uninsured costs at least $604 million annually. Click here for the report.