Covering Kids is a national health access initiative for low-income, uninsured children.

The program, funded by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, has three primary goals:

• Design and conduct outreach programs that identify and enroll eligible children into Medicaid and other health coverage programs.
• Simplify the enrollment processes.
• Coordinate existing coverage programs for low-income children.

These three goals will be addressed by state and local coalitions.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundationâs mission is to improve the health and health care of all Americans.

Healthy Start

In 1997, as a part of the Balanced Budget Act, Congress created the Child Health Insurance Program (CHIP). States were given the opportunity to either expand their current Medicaid program, create a new state health coverage program or both. Ohio elected to expand the Medicaid program, now called Healthy Start or CHIP.

Covering Ohio Kids

The Covering Ohio Kids project is led by The Ohio Commission on Minority Health. Covering Ohio Kids will provide information and recommendations to the Ohio Department of Human Services on aspects of Healthy Start that include:

• Outreach approaches that have proven successful and unsuccessful.
• Qualitative information on characteristics of uninsured families and children for use in planning state and county outreach efforts.
• Identification of barriers to Medicaid outreach and enrollment processes, with particular emphasis on populations such as special needs children, ethnic minority families, homeless children, non-English-speaking families and low-income employees.

The information will be used to plan state and local outreach efforts. In addition, Covering Ohio Kids will develop collaborative strategies with state and local agencies and systems to reduce duplication of effort and address identified gaps and barriers that impede enrollment into Healthy Start and other health coverage programs

Covering Ohio Kids also has three local pilot sites addressing the same outreach, coordination and simplification issues. The pilot sites are:

• Hamilton County: Childrenâs Defense Fund- Greater Cincinnati Project has focused CHIP outreach efforts in community-based organizations, particularly schools, small businesses and faith-based organizations. Contact: Mason Gray, Outreach Specialist, (513) 751-2332.
• Hocking County: Family and Children First Council is working with the entire community including schools, businesses and health care providers to increase Healthy Start enrollment. Contact: Sandy Hamilton, Coordinator, (740) 380-3642.
• Cuyahoga County: Neighborhood Centers Association is focused on small businesses to inform employers and employees about Healthy Start. Contact: Marzetta Riley, Outreach Specialist, (216) 391-4707.

For more information contact the Ohio Commission on Minority Health at (614) 466-4000 or e-mail to minhealth@ocmh.state.oh.us.

Other links:

• CDF-Ohio
• Kid South
• Insure Kids Now
• Healthy Start

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Minority Health Month 2001 Funded Agencies

http://www.state.oh.us/mih/ohiokid.stm
Last updated: March 20, 2001