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Foreword | Coverage Matters: Insurance and Health Care | Committee on the Consequences of Uninsurance | Board on Health Care Services | Institute of Medicine
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Foreword
Coverage Matters: Insurance and Health Care is the first installment of a sustained effort by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to inform the debate about a pressing and persistent challenge to American health care and public policy: lack of health insurance for about 40 million Americans. In 1999, the IOM determined that this long-standing problem should be a priority of the Institute's policy research agenda. We are grateful to The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation for support of a series of six studies addressing the personal and social impacts of uninsurance. This is the first report in that series. The 16-member IOM Committee on the Consequences of Uninsurance brings an exceptional breadth of experience to this project. Its members have backgrounds in clinical medicine, epidemiology, public health, nursing, health services organization, health and labor economics, strategic corporate planning and small businesses, academic health care, and provision of care to those without coverage and other populations at risk.
This first report of the Committee lays the groundwork for subsequent reports that will identify the costs and consequences for individuals, families, communities, and American society when a large population of individuals does not have health insurance. Although much of the information in this initial report has been available before, Coverage Matters integrates findings from an extensive public policy, economics, and health services research literature to produce a coherent and comprehensible account of who has and who lacks health insurance, and why. This report provides the reader with a road map to subsequent reports, outlining both their content and the analytical framework that the Committee will employ to look at a wide range of impacts. The second report, which will follow in about nine months, will examine the evidence accumulated to date about the risks and health consequences of lacking health insurance, both sporadically and, especially, for extended periods of time. Policy makers and general readers alike should find this initial report and the five to follow a valuable contribution to their understanding of a matter of vital concern to us all--the consequences of having millions of uninsured Americans.
| Kenneth I. Shine, M.D. |
| President, Institute of Medicine |
| September 2001 |
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