Problem of Lost Health Benefits Is Reaching Into the Middle Class

Diane MacPherson, of Lowell, Mass., lost her job at a relocation management company last November, and with it the health insurance for herself, her husband and their 4-year-old daughter. Her husband works in construction and does not have access to health care coverage at work.

Continuing her family health insurance under the federal Cobra program would have cost $931 a month, so the couple decided to insure only their daughter, at a cost of $270 a month. Two months ago, when Ms. MacPherson's unemployment compensation payments ran out, they dropped their health insurance altogether. Although her husband earns about $75,000 a year, construction work is seasonal and they could not be assured of enough income every month to pay for health insurance.

Then their daughter came down with strep throat. "That was rather humiliating, being in the doctor's office without insurance," Ms. MacPherson said. "You become very obvious to everyone."

The family represents a changing portrait of the 41 million Americans who do not have health insurance today. Once thought to be a problem chiefly of the poor and the unemployed, the health care crisis is spreading up the income ladder and deep into the ranks of those with full-time jobs.
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