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Health Insurance For Kids

SCHIP—the State Children’s Health Insurance Program—is helping kids across America to grow up strong and healthy. Each state has a customized plan that provides free or low-cost health insurance to children in working families who would otherwise be without the financial means to obtain coverage.

Efforts are underway to enroll more children in the program or in state Medicaid programs.

President Clinton and the National Governors' Association launched the Insure Kids Now campaign in February 1999. It includes:

  • An Insure Kids Now Website that gives information on eligibility requirements for families, on-going outreach efforts, general SCHIP information, and links to State-specific Web pages. This website is sponsored by the Health Care Financing Administration, which administers SCHIP.
  • A national toll-free 1-877-KIDS NOW hotline, which traces and connects callers directly to their respective state agency. Each agency is able to give specific information about the SCHIP plan for their State.

In addition, the Boost 4 Kids Network, organized by the National Partnership for Reinventing Government, has created a useful webpage that has extensive resources for anyone looking for health insurance information in a specific state.

Background information on SCHIP is also available.

Successful Outreach

President Clinton praised the SCHIP program in the July 10, 2000 National Governors Association Annual Meeting. "We've now got over 2 million kids enrolled," he said. "I'm especially proud of the states that have found innovative ways to overcome the problems of signing kids up. And I always hate to mention some, for failure of not mentioning others, but I would like to acknowledge, for example, that Ohio has changed its system to make it easier for CHIP parents to mail in forms that are simpler. Indiana has actually gone out to schools and childcare centers and had a remarkable amount of success in signing people up. Virtually every state has done something innovative."

You’ll find highlights of the states’ annual reports in the Health Care Financing Administration’s preliminary highlights (You will beed Adobe Acrobat Reader to read this pdf file. It is available free from ).

Do You Want to Help?

For information on helping SCHIP, visit the Insure Kids Now Website.

Online Messages about the Importance of Children's Health Insurance

Click on one of the links below to begin viewing or listening to the online messages.

In addition, you can hear an audio recording of Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala discussing SCHIP on the HHS Radio Line at 1-800-621-2984.

Other Sites That May Be of Interest

August 2000