What percent of the U.S. population is uninsured?

The most current federal government figures on the extent of the U.S. population that is without health insurance coverage indicate the following for the first half of 2014:

• 27 million (or 8.7 percent of the population) had been uninsured for more than a year
• 38 million (or 12.2 percent of the population) were without insurance at the time that they were interviewed for the survey
• 54 million (or 17.3 percent of the population) said that they had been uninsured at some time during the past 12 months

Interestingly, the numbers for the most recent time period — that is, from January to June 2014 – show a decrease in the number of people without health insurance in each of these three categories since 2009.

This data report also looks at the distribution of U.S. residents who are uninsured, have some type of public plan, or have private health insurance.

Source: Martinez, M.E., and Cohen, R.A. (2014, Dec.). Health insurance coverage: early release of estimates from the National Health Interview Survey, January-June 2014. National Health Interview Survey Early Release Program. Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhis/earlyrelease/insur201412.pdf Posted by AHA Resource Center (312) 422-2050, rc@aha.org