Texas continues to be the state with the highest percentage of residents without health insurance, according to the latest Gallup health survey on insurance coverage in the United States.

The report released Friday found for the fourth year Texas had the most uninsured citizens, with the gap between other states widening. At 27.6 percent, its rate is more than four percentage points higher than the next highest state, Mississippi.

Massachusetts remains the state with the lowest percentage of uninsured, at 4.9 percent. Vermont, Hawaii, Connecticut, Minnesota, and Wisconsin also have uninsured rates below 10 percent.

No state showed a consistent decline in uninsured since 2008, when Gallup began tracking this information. Nationally, Gallup found year-to-year increases in the percentage of uninsured at the national level, with an increase from 14.8 percent to 17.1 percent over the last four years.

Adults aged 18 to 25 were less likely to be uninsured than in past years, due to a new provision of the 2010 health care law that allows young adults to be on their parents health insurance until age 26. Hispanics were most likely to be uninsured, with more than 40 percent not having health coverage in 2011.  In addition, more than 30 percent of low-income Americans were uninsured in 2011, which has been on the incline since 2008.

Poll results are based on telephone interviews between Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2011, with 353,492 participants over the age of 18 living in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

 

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