Insurance Coverage in the Medicaid Expansion Target Population

Key Points

• • About half of the uninsured Kansas adults potentially eligible for Medicaid, if expanded, lived in one of the five most populous counties — Douglas, Johnson, Sedgwick, Shawnee and Wyandotte.
  • While fewer than one in 10 uninsured Kansas adults potentially eligible for Medicaid, if expanded, lived in the southwest region of the state, those counties had relatively high uninsured rates for those adults (generally above one-third are uninsured).
  • There was a nearly three-fold difference between Kansas counties with the highest and lowest uninsured rates among adults potentially eligible for Medicaid, if expanded, from a high of 48.0 percent in Seward and Haskell Counties, to a low of17.4 percent in Geary County.

Note: Kansas adults potentially eligible for Medicaid, if expanded, includes all those age 19-64 with family income =138 percent federal poverty level (FPL), or family income at or below $16,753 for an individual and $34,638 for a family of four in 2018. Percentages may not sum to 100 percent because of rounding. Military/TRICARE coverage is included in Employment-Based coverage. Direct-Purchase is health insurance purchased directly from a private company or on the federally facilitated Kansas marketplace. VA Health Care is provided by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to eligible veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces.

Source: KHI analysis of 2018 1-year American Community Survey (ACS) Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) after excluding Kansans residing in institutions.

More than a quarter (28.1 percent) of the Medicaid expansion target population in Kansas was uninsured in 2018.  The map above shows where in Kansas the uninsured adults who are potentially eligible for Medicaid, if expanded, lived.