MEMORANDUM

TO: Members of the Faculty Senate of the University of Florida,
Members, Faculty Senate Health Care Committee

FROM: A. Joseph Layon, MD
Committee Chair,
Professor of Anesthesiology, Surgery, and Medicine

Re: Second Report on Health Insurance Coverage for UF Students and Non-Faculty Staff

Date: 17 April, 2000

Colleagues, this note, and the attached document, will serve as a second interim report to the University of Florida Faculty Senate on health insurance coverage for UF students and non-faculty staff. As you will recall from the first report, dated 22 February, 2000, we queried many of our Colleges and found that health insurance was quite uniformly not provided, although some colleges "required" students to have coverage. Even here, it appears that a "don't ask don't tell" dynamic is extant, with students using funds allocated for health insurance to maintain their daily lives.

Graduate students, whether employed or not, appear to lack coverage, with perhaps a few exceptions [ie, individual departmental stipends in the College of Health Related Professions]. Professional students, a subset of graduate students, appear to be in the same situation. Residents in the College of Medicine are covered under the faculty health plan.

Information on health coverage of undergraduate students is essentially non-existent. The best estimate generated from the Modell study [~1995], prepared for Andrew Sorensen, was that perhaps 60% are uncovered.
Although the data are neither easily accessible nor complete, even when using both human and world-wide-web based resources, the attached table demonstrates that of eight UF peer institutions, health insurance coverage is unequivocally required of both graduate and undergraduate students in three [38%], unequivocally not required in another three, and unclear in two [24%]. The student [graduate or undergraduate] is required to pay for health coverage in five [62%] of the peer institutions. In six of the institutions- which includes some of the previous five- the university pays all or most of the premium for either employed graduate students [five, 62%] or undergraduate and graduate students [one, 12%]. Of no little significance to our students, the cost of these premiums are quite steep and would be difficult for the student to bear by him/her self.

The next Senate Health Care Committee meeting is being scheduled for late April. At that time, we will further discuss the attached data and begin to generate recommendations. Sometime in May, Interim Provost David Colburn will provide the Committee with information on the interest of our colleagues in the State University System in collaborating in an insurance purchasing group. Thereafter, it is my hope that our Committee will have adequate time for discussion and, at the first Faculty Senate meeting of the next academic year, have a report prepared for discussion by Senators.

Attachment

Xc: KI Berns, MD, PhD
Nik Gravenstein, MD

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