The U.S. Census Bureau's first estimate of how many people don't have health insurance finds the highest Virginia perecentages in the state's college towns.
Harrisonburg (James Madison University), with 9,455 people lacking health insurance, had the highest percentage of uninsured in Virginia -- 28.5 percent -- in the bureau's Small Area Health Insurance Estimates.
The numbers, which were released yesterday, are based on 2006 data.
Montgomery County, which includes Blacksburg (Virginia Tech), was at 27.7 percent; Charlottesville (the University of Virginia), 24.7 percent; Lexington (Washington and Lee University and Virginia Military Institute), 22.2 percent; and Williamsburg (the College of William and Mary), 19.8 percent.
Overall, the state had 1,034,424 people, or 15.5 percent, without health insurance in 2006. The number probably has increased since then, said Judith Cash, deputy director of the Virginia Health Care Foundation.
"The world has changed significantly since 2006 in terms of the economy, people having jobs, and people having health insurance," she said.
Lou Markwith, executive director of the Virginia Association of Free Clinics, said he has seen a 20 percent increase in the past two years in the number of people who qualify for his group's volunteer-provided medical services.
Michael Cassidy, executive director of the Commonwealth Institute, counted about 70 localities higher than the state average and about 60 lower.
"Of the ones with particularly high rates, you see a real mix of urban and rural areas in the state," Cassidy said. "It highlights the challenges we face. It's not just a problem of cities versus counties or urban versus rural. Across the state, families are struggling with this problem of not having insurance."
Low-income people fared worse. Statewide, about 30 percent of them were uninsured. In Arlington County, about 73 percent of them were uninsured.
A low-income family is defined as one living at twice the poverty level or below it.
In the Richmond area, Hanover County had 11.6 percent uninsured; Henrico County, 13.8 percent uninsured; Chesterfield County, 14.1 percent; Richmond, 15.3 percent; and Charles City County, 19.4 percent.
Petersburg had one of the lowest rates of uninsured at 9.4 percent; Hopewell was at 9.9 percent.
As for the high rates of uninsured people in college towns, Cassidy said it may reflect an attitude of "young invincibles" who don't think they need health insurance, as well as the difficulty of starting a career.
"It reveals some of the challenges of how you hold on to insurance when you're in transition in your life," he said.
Contact Katherine Calos at (804) 649-6433 or kcalos@timesdispatch.com.
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