Human Services News

From Kaiser Family Foundation:

As the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's landfall approaches, new analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation of its household survey of people in the New Orleans area shows that more than four in 10 (43 percent) adults reported at least one health care access problem in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Underscoring the racial disparities documented generally in the Kaiser household survey, 70 percent of the one in four adults without health insurance in Orleans Parish were African Americans.

The newly released, Health Challenges for the People of New Orleans, is a follow-up to the May 2007 report, Giving Voice to the People of New Orleans: The Kaiser Post-Katrina Baseline Survey.

The new 65-page report examines the health care status of the adult population of Greater New Orleans based on a Fall 2006 household interview survey of residents of the parishes of Orleans, Jefferson, Plaquemines and St. Bernard and details their health coverage and access to health care services after the disaster.

Some of the most frequently reported health access problems included deterioration in the ability to have health needs met now compared to before Katrina (22 percent), having a harder time getting to their place of medical care now (18 percent), and having a different medical provider after Katrina (16 percent).

"Louisiana is among the state leaders in covering low-income children, but ranks at the very bottom of coverage of their low-income adult population, with Medicaid eligibility levels at 20 percent of the Federal Poverty Level or $4,130 per year for an adult in a working family of four," said Foundation Executive Vice President Diane Rowland, Sc.D.

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