Utah health insurance

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status report:
Utah state health insurance exchange

What progress is being made in setting up its federally-mandated Utah state health insurance exchange?"

About state health insurance exchanges

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How did Utah officials vote on health reform?

H.R.2: Repealing the Health Care Bill

#14

Date of Vote: 1/19/2011 Status: House passed 245-189, 1 not voting

HOUSE|SENATE

1/19/2011--Passed House amended. Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act - Repeals the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, effective as of its enactment. Restores provisions of law amended by such Act. Repeals the health care provisions of the Health Care and Education and Reconciliation Act of 2010, effective as of the Act's enactment. Restores provisions of law amended by the Act's health care provisions. [more]

Yes (2)

• Rob Bishop

• Jason Chaffetz

Our
Pick

No (1)

• Jim Matheson

how healthy is living in Utah?

Utah is now ranked as the 7th healthiest state to live in, according to the 2010 America's Health Rankings® by the United Health Foundation, which is a several-place drop from last year's 2nd place ranking.

The good news:

• Utah is ranked first (that is, has the lowest rate) in both smoking and binge drinking.
• It also has the lowest rate of deaths due to cancer in the nation, 142 deaths per 100,000 individuals in the population.
• In addition, deaths due to cardiovascular disease have seen a decline from 265.5 deaths to 233.4 deaths per 100,000 members of the population.
• Utah also has low rate of preventable hospitalizations, infant mortality, and violent crime.

The bad news:

• Challenges facing Utah in 2010 included low availability of public health care funding and low availability of primary care physicians (87.4 physicians for every 100,000 members of the population).
• The state has seen a few negative trends over the past few years, including an increase in the percentage of children in poverty since 2009 and an increase in obesity since 1990.
• Utah's geographic disparity is listed at 16 percent.

Utah's best and worst category rankings:

• Deaths due to cancer – 1st
• Prevalence of smoking (9.8 percent) – 1st
• Prevalence of binge drinking (8.6 percent) – 1st
• Preventable hospitalizations – 2nd
• Geographic disparity – 44th
• Primary care physicians – 45th

more details

• See the United Health Foundation's latest findings on Utah.
• Trust for America's Health ia another source for key Utah health quality findings. In addition, 2010's federal health reform, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), included the creation of a prevention fund to provide more than $16 billion over the next 10 years to invest in effective, proven prevention efforts, like childhood obesity prevention and tobacco cessation, and the site has a report on how it impacts Utah here.

get local health results

State snapshot too large? Get county-by-county health rankings for Utah, from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Population Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin.

does Utah have a health insurance high risk pool?

Utah Comprehensive Health Insurance Pool
Toll-free 1-800-705-9173 or (801) 442-6660

IMPORTANT UPDATE: Starting in 2010, Utah started offering health care insurance coverage to residents through the federally established temporary high-risk pool program. To find out more about Utah's participation, click here.

Risk pools are state-sponsored programs to help people with a history of medical problems in their family to purchase coverage. These pools are for people who can afford to buy health insurance, but are not able to get underwritten in the private market because of a pre-existing health condition. These programs can vary significantly from state to state in price, benefits and number of people served. Often insurance companies doing business in the state are required to contribute to the pool to keep it in the black. In the best cases, they allow people to be able to switch jobs or become self-employed without the fear of losing their health insurance coverage. Read more about risk pools here.

how to find health insurance in Utah

Cover The Uninsured is a national effort to highlight the fact that too many Americans are living without health insurance and to demand solutions from our nation's leaders. Read more information on its efforts. It is a project of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

• Cover The Uninsured's facts on the uninsured in Utah and all other states.
• The Foundation for Health Coverage Education's guide on how to find health insurance in Utah.
• Materiales En Español – Guías para encontrar cobertura de seguro de salud.

Georgetown's Utah health insurance guide

Georgetown University's Health Policy Institute has researched and written state-by-state guides for finding and keeping health insurance. It updates these guides as federal and state policies change. A number of non-profit organizations help fund its research. Learn more about the Health Policy Institute.

Review Georgetown's guide for Utah.

Health insurance plan report cards for Utah

The National Committee for Quality Assurance is a private, non-profit organization that, among other things, provides health care plan report cards for consumers.

Go here to search for Utah health insurance plan report cards.

Utah government health insurance resources

Utah Department of Human Services: Insurance Programs – Medicare, Medicaid and long term health insurance information.

Utah Children's Health Insurance Program – families who cannot afford to buy health insurance for their children may be eligible for health coverage through the Utah CHIP.

Advocacy

Utah Health Policy Project – a resource for the public, community leaders, businesses, health care providers and policy makers interested in strengthening the health care system while working to develop visionary and systemic solutions to the crisis of the uninsured and under-insured.