Improving Health Care Options in New York: The Experience of the Coverage Consortium

This NYHealth special report contains a summary of findings from an NYHealth Coverage Consortium initiative that funded a set of institutions across New York State to work on solutions and action steps necessary for expanding health care coverage.

The objective of the Coverage Consortium initiative was to provide New York State policymakers with well-researched policy options for getting more people health insurance. Its larger goal was to harness the thinking of people with diverse perspectives, making the “sum greater than the total of its parts.” Starting in July 2007, the Foundation issued 10 grants to seven universities, policy institutes, and community agencies across the State. The projects produced 48 written reports on topics such as merging the individual and small-group insurance markets, expanding access to health care for immigrants, reducing racial disparities, and using free-market strategies to enroll more adults.

The 10 grants funded under this initiative addressed a range of solutions and action steps necessary for expanding health care coverage in New York State:

• Center for the Independence of the Disabled in New York: Policies to Maximize Immigrants’ Enrollment in Existing and Prospective Insurance Programs
• Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health: Improving the Analysis of Health Insurance Expansion Options for New York State
• Community Service Society of New York: Reducing Racial Disparities in Health Outcomes Through a Publicly Financed Insurance Expansion
• Cornell University’s Department of Policy Analysis and Management: Informing Health Care Reform Policy Options for New York State
• Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, Inc.: Conference on Solving the Problem of New York State’s Uninsured
• Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, Inc.: Reforming New York State’s Individual Insurance Market, Phase 2
• Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government: Reforming the Small Group Insurance Market: An Assessment of State Policies
• Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government: Reforming the Small Group Insurance Market: Phase 2
• United Hospital Fund of New York: Promoting the Expansion of Health Insurance in New York State
• United Hospital Fund of New York: Expanding Health Insurance Expansion in New York State, Phase 2