By WAYNE GREENE World Senior Writer
Published: 11/19/2012 12:23 PM
Last Modified: 11/19/2012 1:39 PM
Gov. Mary Fallin (click here) on Monday rejected state participation in a health care exchange and expansion of the state’s Medicaid program under the Affordable Care Act.
The decision means Oklahoma will not do anything to accommodate the controversial federal health care law — known as “Obamacare” — but it also means the state will skip an opportunity to help some 693,000 uninsured Oklahomans, 18.7 percent of the state population, get coverage through the federal government.
“After careful consideration, I have today informed U.S. Secretary of Health Kathleen Sebelius that Oklahoma will not pursue the creation of its own health insurance exchange,” Fallin said. “Furthermore, I have also decided that Oklahoma will not be participating in the Obama Administration’s proposed expansion of Medicaid.”...
Oklahoma ranks 44th in the nation with a rate of 15.6% with the least impoverished in New Hampshire at 5.6%. These statistics was when the USA national poverty rate was only 12.6%.
The Oklahoma poverty rate is over 543,000 people.
Poverty rises in Oklahoma; children especially bearing the brunt (click here)
By GINNIE GRAHAM and CURTIS KILLMAN World Staff Writers
Published: 9/20/2012 11:40 AM
Last Modified: 9/20/2012 11:40 AM
Median household income (click here) and the poverty rate in Oklahoma and Tulsa County remained basically unchanged in 2011 compared to the prior year, according to new census data.
The data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey also shows state unemployment declined from 2010 to 2011, while income inequality increased during the same period in Oklahoma. The American Community Survey is an ongoing poll conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau.
“The fact that poverty basically stayed the same even though the overall economy is improving shows that we are looking at a very uneven recovery,” said Gene Perry, policy analyst for the Oklahoma Policy Institute, a Tulsa-based think tank.
“What that shows is we are seeing a good economy for some, but there are a whole lot of other people who are being left out,” Perry said.
While overall poverty numbers were stable in the state, improvements were noted in some areas from 2010 to 2011.
The poverty rate for married couples with related children under 18 in Tulsa County declined from 6 percent in 2010 to 4.3 percent in 2011, according to the census data.
The state poverty rate among households headed by females with children under 18 declined from 45.5 percent in 2010 to 43.9 percent in 2011.
Julie Alvarez, 40, gives Goodwill of Tulsa credit for helping her dig out of poverty over the past two years....
By GINNIE GRAHAM World Staff Writer
Published: 9/16/2010 3:16 AM
Last Modified: 9/12/2012 1:54 PM
The number of teen girls giving birth in Oklahoma in 2008 (click here)was more than double the number of female freshmen entering the University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University that fall semester, according to a recent data analysis.
Oklahoma's teen birth rates rose between 2005 and 2007, moving up a notch to the fifth highest in the country, according to the Oklahoma Institute for Child Advocacy.
The nonprofit organization has been analyzing data released by the National Vital Statistics earlier this year to break down and compare rates and numbers to other states, said Sharon Rodine, director of youth initiatives for the group.
"This is 100 percent preventable," Rodine said. "Oklahoma is not doing much at all to address teen pregnancy in any area. Other states are getting there, especially in Southern states. This is not a race we want to win."
The largest increase is among Oklahoma's 18- to 19-year-olds, which jumped from the sixth-highest pregnancy rate for that age group to second, behind Mississippi....
Highlights: (click here)
• Of the total teen childbearing costs in Oklahoma in 2008,
48% were federal costs and 52% were state and local costs.
• Most of the public sector costs of teen childbearing are
associated with negative consequences for the children of
teen mothers, during both their childhood and their young
adult years. In Oklahoma in 2008, taxpayer costs associated
with children born to teen mothers included: $36 million for
public health care (Medicaid and CHIP); $27 million for child
welfare; and, for children who have reached adolescence or
young adulthood, $29 million for increased rates of incarceration and $56 million in lost tax revenue due to decreased
earnings and spending.
By Wayne Greene
World Senior Writer
Published: 7/9/2012 2:23 AM
Last Modified: 7/9/2012 7:11 AM
More than half of Oklahoma's uninsured poor people (click here) would be covered by a Medicaid expansion that is part of the Affordable Care Act within five years, according to a 2010 Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured report.
With some effort, the expansion could cover nearly three-quarters of uninsured poor Oklahomans, the report says.
Oklahoma Health Care Authority figures show that some 624,480 Oklahomans - about 17 percent of the population - don't have health insurance.
A high uninsured population doesn't just hurt the people who don't have insurance, said OU-Tulsa President Gerard Clancy, a physician and a leading voice in state health policy discussions.
"The uninsured sooner or later are going to need to access care anyhow," Clancy said.
If they don't have insurance, they will delay care until their illness drives them to an emergency room, where they have to be served, he said....
