Vermont health insurance

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status report:
Vermont state health insurance exchange

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

About state health insurance exchanges

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How did Vermont 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]

Our
Pick

No (1)

• Peter Welch

how healthy is living in Vermont?

Vermont is ranked as the number one healthiest state to live in, according to the 2010 America's Health Rankings® by the United Health Foundation.

The good news:

• Vermont is in the top 10 on 14 of the 22 measures used to determine a state's rank.
• The state has been praised for its low percentage of uninsured population (9.6 percent) as well as its high level of public funding ($177 per person).
• 83.5 percent of pregnant women in Vermont received care within the first trimester of pregnancy, and there is a high availability of primary care physicians—170.7 physicians per 100,000 members of the population.
• Vermont's already high rate of high school graduation has increased over the past year from 82.3 to 88.6 percent of ninth graders graduating within their intended four years of high school.
• Both prevalence of smoking and rate of deaths due to cardiovascular disease have shown a decrease in Vermont over the past five to ten years.

The bad news:

• Vermont's biggest challenge is its rate of binge drinking, which is 17.3 percent of the population for 2010.
• It also shows a relatively low immunization coverage rate, with 89.8 percent of 19- to 35-month-old children receiving their immunizations.
• Vermont's rate of obesity has risen since 1990 from 18 percent to 23.3 percent of the population.

Vermont's best and worst category rankings:

• High school graduation – 1st
• Early prenatal care – 1st
• Violent crime (131 offenses per 100,000 pop.) – 2nd
• Public health funding – 3rd
• Immunization coverage – 27th
• Prevalence of binge drinking – 35th

more details

• See the United Health Foundation's latest findings on Vermont.
• Trust for America's Health ia another source for key Vermont 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 Vermont here.

get local health results

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

does Vermont have a health insurance high risk pool?

Vermont does not have a state risk pool. The state has guaranteed-issue meaning all citizens will be accepted at the same premium regardless of their health. Thus New Yorkers are lucky to have access to health insurance that is much better than a risk pool (which almost always charges a higher-than-the-going-rate because it is made up of uninsurable people).

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

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

Georgetown's Vermont 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 Vermont.

Health insurance plan report cards for Vermont

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 Vermont health insurance plan report cards.

Vermont government health insurance resources

Consumer information from Vermont's Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration – includes help on how to buy health insurance.

Department for Children & Families, Medicaid program – a government health insurance program for eligible people age 65 years and older, people who are blind or disabled, children and young people under 21, pregnant women, and parents of children under 18.

Advocacy

Vermont Health Care for All – provides information, news and analysis for understanding the critical problems confronting health care in Vermont.