Survey: Health Care Access Improves for Latinos, but Not Among Certain Segments

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The number of Latinos with health care coverage has risen dramatically thanks to the Affordable Care Act, but certain groups have lower coverage rates or know little about the health insurance marketplace, according to a new poll.

The poll, sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico and implemented by Latino Decisions, examined Latinos’ attitudes on immigration policy, the Affordable Care Act, discrimination, and personal connections to immigrants.

Only 17% percent of Latinos now lack health insurance, down from 28% in 2013.

But a significant gap in health coverage exists when it comes to nativity, with 87 percent of U.S.-born Latinos saying they are covered but only 78 percent of foreign-born Latinos have coverage.

Other key health findings, as reported by NBC News, include:

• 73% of Latinos reported being in good, very good or excellent health.
• When asked whether their health care situation would improve, stay the same or get worse under the ACA, most Latinos (76%) said it would stay the same or get better.
• Only 8% said they got coverage from a new health insurance marketplace, and less than 30% called or visited a website to learn about insurance options during the last enrollment period.
• Of those who did access the marketplace, about 1 in 5 said they experienced problems that prevented them from enrolling and 1 in 10 said cost remains a problem.

Survey leaders said more education is needed about the ACA among Latinos.

“One in four Latinos, or 25% indicate that they literally heard nothing at all about the exchanges or [health insurance] marketplaces,” Dr. Gabriel Sanchez, executive director of the RWJF Center for Health Policy at UNM, told HealthLeaders Media. “That’s an important number because although the ACA is clearly working and increasing access… there’s still a pretty large segment of the Latino population that is not being touched by that outreach effort.”