This release comes on the same day as a U.S. Senate Finance Committee hearing on the future of the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which is credited with a significant role in reducing uninsurance among children. First Focus president Bruce Lesley is the lead witness at that hearing.

The Census-reported child uninsurance rate was 15 percent in 1997, the year a Republican-controlled Congress and a Democratic president enacted CHIP. In partnership with Medicaid, CHIP has cut the uninsurance rate among children by nearly half.

CHIP is a federal-state partnership, giving state leaders the flexibility to design coverage initiatives that meet the needs of their states’ children and families. And CHIP is a true private-public partnership, often covering uninsured children through the same private insurance carriers that participate in employer-sponsored plans.

A July analysis by the widely-regarded actuarial firm Wakely Consulting Group found that Affordable Care Act (ACA) health insurance exchange “marketplaces” have fewer child-specific benefits and dramatically higher out-of-pocket costs than CHIP plans. While CHIP plans have average out-of-pocket costs of $97 for an average family with a $50,000 annual income, the same family would face average out-of-pocket costs of $926 under marketplace plans.

A First Focus analysis released last week shows that CHIP is even more important for children in rural areas than their urban counterparts. That report found that rural children are more than 20 percent more likely to get their health care through CHIP or Medicaid than children in urban areas.

Reacting to today’s Census Bureau data, First Focus released the following statement from First Focus President Bruce Lesley:

“Today’s Census Bureau report confirms what children’s advocates have known for years – than CHIP is a bipartisan health care plan that works for kids. But that success story can only continue if states have confidence that Congress will maintain its investment in CHIP. That’s what makes this afternoon’s Senate Finance Committee hearing on CHIP so important. The committee, and especially Senators Jay Rockefeller and Pat Roberts, deserve our thanks for putting this important children’s issue on Congress’ agenda. We urge Congress to extend CHIP funding this year.”

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First Focus is a bipartisan advocacy organization dedicated to making children and families the priority in federal policy and budget decisions. For more information, visit www.firstfocus.net.

The post Census Uninsured Data Underscores CHIP Hearing’s Importance appeared first on First Focus.

Data from federal agencies confirm that federal investments in children can and do blunt poverty’s reach. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) reduced childhood poverty in 2012 by 1.67 million children. And the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) reduced child poverty by 2.9 million children that year.

But a comparison of child poverty and poverty among senior citizens (9.5 percent, less than half the child poverty rate) reveals that there is much more our nation’s leaders can do to protect children. The federal government makes much more substantial investments in reducing poverty among the elderly than in reducing child poverty. And initiatives like Social Security, Medicare, and tax subsidies for employer-sponsored retirement plans, all of which benefit seniors, are not subject to annual political processes and pressures. By contrast, Congress cut SNAP last year, and improvements that make the EITC more effective in reducing child poverty will expire in 2017.

First Focus has urged a new approach to reducing child poverty, modeled on an effective multipartisan effort in the United Kingdom. The British government acted years ago to establish a national child poverty reduction target, backed by benchmarks against which progress could be measured. Though the task is not complete, Britain has seen reductions in child poverty since the establishment of a target policy, while child poverty in the U.S. has continued to rise.

A First Focus Campaign for Children poll conducted on election eve in 2012 showed strong bipartisan support among voters for action to reduce child poverty. That survey found 82 percent of voters (89 percent of Democrats, 81 percent of independents, and 76 percent of Republicans) want Congress and the White House to deliver a plan to cut child poverty in half within 10 years.

Reacting to today’s Census Bureau data, First Focus released the following statement from First Focus President Bruce Lesley:

“America’s succeeded in protecting seniors from poverty, because Congress decided that was important. Britain has shown us it is possible to protect children, too. The only remaining question is this: will this Congress go home to spend the holidays with their children having done nothing to help the nearly one-fifth of children living in poverty?”

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First Focus is a bipartisan advocacy organization dedicated to making children and families the priority in federal policy and budget decisions. For more information, visit www.firstfocus.net.

The post Child Poverty Data a Call to Action for Congress, Advocates Say appeared first on First Focus.

By Kelsey Ryan

A new report has found that public health coverage through the Child Health Insurance Program (CHIP) is relied on more by rural children in Kansas than urban children.

In Kansas, CHIP is known as Healthwave. It covers health coverage for children under 19 in low income families that do not qualify for Medicaid but have family incomes under 232 percent of the Federal Poverty Level, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. It differs from Medicaid because it is not open-ended and states are awarded yearly allotments for coverage…

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The post Report: More rural families using child health insurance program appeared first on First Focus.

Kids who live in rural areas are 24 percent more likely than kids who live in urban areas to rely on CHIP and Medicaid for health care, according to a report released Wednesday by the children’s advocacy group First Focus. The report found that in 2012, 47 percent of rural kids are on CHIP or Medicaid compared to 38 percent of urban kids…

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The post CHIP Critical for Rural Kids appeared first on First Focus.

A Washington, D.C., group that advocates for families and children is urging Kansans to speak up for renewal of the Children’s Health Insurance Program. Kansas Public Radio’s Bryan Thompson has more…

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The post Kansas Kids Rely on CHIP Reauthorization appeared first on First Focus.

By Elise Viebeck

A Senate panel will take its first step toward extending funds for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) with a hearing on CHIP’s track record next week.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) will lead Tuesday’s hearing in the Senate Finance Subcommittee on Health Care, which he chairs…

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The post Senate plans first hearing on CHIP funding appeared first on First Focus.

“CHIP is incredibly important to rural kids,” said Bruce Lesley, president of First Focus.

CHIP, created by a Republican-controlled Congress and a Democratic president in 1997, has consistently earned broad, bipartisan support in public opinion surveys.  The successful private-public initiative gives states flexibility to design health plans that respond to their children’s needs, and nationwide, CHIP and Medicaid have helped to cut uninsurance among children in half.

Under current law, federal funding for CHIP will end on September 30, 2015. Because CHIP is a state-federal partnership, state budget officials must make decisions about the future of their states’ CHIP programs well in advance of that deadline. Advocates in every state in the Union joined First Focus earlier this year in urging Congress to act quickly to protect CHIP funding.

“CHIP is a bipartisan health care plan that works for kids and families, but its future is at risk,” said Lesley. “Congress must act this year to protect CHIP and children’s health, including kids in rural America.”

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First Focus is a bipartisan advocacy organization dedicated to making children and families the priority in federal policy and budget decisions. For more information, visit www.firstfocus.net.

The post Rural Children at Risk if Congress Fails to Act on CHIP appeared first on First Focus.

By Bruce Lesley
President
First Focus Campaign for Children
Washington, D.C.

Joseph Lagana
Founder and CEO
Homeless Children’s Education Fund
Strip District

Yes, Congress should increase funding to help the homeless (“False Promises: More Homeless Aid Eligibility Requires More Funds,” Aug. 22 editorial), but pretending children aren’t homeless doesn’t help. Rather, Congress should end the de facto U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development ban on helping homeless children…

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The post Policy must be changed for the sake of all homeless kids appeared first on First Focus.

…

On November 17, 2013, Brígido Acosta Luís was walked across the U.S.-Mexico border by immigration authorities from Brownsville, Texas, to the northern Mexican city of Matamoros. He was dressed in the pajamas he had been wearing the evening that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested him at his home in the Chicago suburb of Schaumburg, Illlinois, four weeks earlier.

Deportation was an abrupt end to the life 33-year-old Acosta had built in the six years since he illegally crossed the border to the United States in 2007. In Schaumburg, he had a wife, Maria Paz Perez, a 3-year-old son, Xavier, and a teenage stepdaughter, Isabel, all of them American citizens. He had also started a small insurance business with Perez. After Acosta’s deportation, the daily lives of Perez and her two children swiftly began to unravel.

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The post Till I.C.E. Do Us Part appeared first on First Focus.

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Affordable Care Act health insurance exchange marketplaces have fewer child-specific benefits and dramatically higher out-of-pocket costs than the Children’s Health Insurance Program coverage, according to a new report.

Jointly funded by the federal government and states, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) provides health coverage to nearly eight million children in families with incomes too high to qualify for Medicaid but who can’t afford private coverage. The program’s funding is set to expire Oct. 1, 2015.

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The post Colorado’s public health insurance more affordable, better coverage for kids than marketplace plans appeared first on First Focus.