Tuesday, February 16, 2021

CHIP and Medicaid Child Enrollment by Region

Government funded programs are a very important source of children's health insurance coverage in the United States. The National Health Interview Survey (2019) estimated that about 41% of American children under the age of 18 rely on publicly supported health insurance coverage.  Most of this coverage is through the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and Medicaid.

As of September 2020, federal reports indicate that there were about 37.4 million individuals who were either enrolled in CHIP or who were children enrolled in the Medicaid program. The twelve-state Southeast is the region most most dependent on publicly subsidized children's health insurance, both in absolute and relative terms.  The 10.7 million children in the Southeast with CHIP or Medicaid Child insurance coverage is the most of any region.  Moreover, this accounts for about 28.6% of all U.S. children with CHIP or Medicaid child coverage, which compares to the region's 25.7% share of the U.S. population.  No other region of the country has as much dependence, relative to its share of total U.S. population, on publicly supported children's health insurance than does the Southeast.  Here is a more detailed breakdown of CHIP and Medicaid child enrollment by region (for state-level details, follow the "region" link) as of 9/30/20:

Region (1) CHIP (2) Medicaid Child Total Child
Far West
1,569.8 5,210.8 6,780.6
Great Lakes
732.5 4,304.0 5,036.5
Great Plains
239.3 1,873.5 2,112.8
MidEast
1,201.5 4,448.0 5,649.5
New England
274.5 1,150.6 1,425.1
Rocky Mountain
172.3 980.7 1,153.0
Southeast
1,657.1 9,015.9 10,673.0
Southwest
872.3 3,658.4 4,530.7
U.S. 6,719.1 30,641.9 37,361.0

(1) CHIP enrollment, in thousands
(2) Children enrolled in Medicaid plans, in thousands (derived by deducting State reported CHIP enrollment from State Reported Total Medicaid Child and CHIP enrollment)
Note:  Sum of regional figures may vary from U.S. totals due to rounding.  

Source: Medicaid.gov Enrollment Reports as of September, 2020