Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

ARKids Program A Year Old

A year ago in September, children, teachers, healthcare providers and children's advocates gathered on the steps of the state Capitol to listen as Gov. Mike Huckabee kicked off the enrollment campaign for a new health insurance program for children called ARKids First.

ARKids was one of the first in the nation to provide health insurance coverage for children in families who earned too much to qualify for Medicaid, but could not obtain benefits from an employer.

ARKids First was introduced into the legislature, passed, signed into law by the Governor and begun enrollment within the first eight months of last year. It far outpaced the rest of the country in not only its debut, but also in its enrollment numbers, having signed up 25,000 children within the first ten months.

Now one year later, almost 30,000 Arkansas children have access to medical care on a regular basis because of the innovative ARKids First program.

At a news conference in the Sam and Lucille Eye Center at Arkansas Children's Hospital, the Governor stood in front of almost the same group again to report on ARKids First's success and to hear from some of those who have been affected by the program.

"More than a year ago, Arkansas's Gov. Mike Huckabee became the major facilitator for a program which meets the needs of a medically underserved population of children in our state," Dr. Jonathan Bates, president and CEO of Arkansas Children's Hospital, said.

"Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families initiated the original legislation and the Governor made it the cornerstone of his last legislative package," he continued.

"Based on discussions with other children's hospitals we have come to believe that this program is one of the best of its kind in the United States, covering children who would otherwise have no medical insurance or a primary care physician. It offers early medical intervention and comprehensive care for this very vulnerable group of children and their families," Dr. Bates concluded.

Lashunda Culp-Walls of Little Rock heard about the program and talked to her husband about it.

Walls said her employer's health insurance premiums for family coverage were such a large percentage of her paycheck that they would consume most of her take-home pay. Her husband was not eligible for coverage benefits at his employer.

Walls noted that keeping her fingers crossed that her kids wouldn't get sick was not a good substitute for adequate medical care. "When one of our two kids had an ear infection or a fever, we just had to say prayers and hope the kids didn't get really sick," she said at the news conference. "It's very frustrating to be without medical coverage for the kids.

"It gets hard, when you work 40 hours a week, to not be able to afford medical coverage for the kids. ARKids First has been wonderful and now my kids don't have to go without seeing a doctor when they get sick," she concluded.

Gov. Huckabee told the crowd at Children's Hospital that these were just the kind of families he had in mind when this program was developed.

Interim Department of Human Services director Richard Weiss said that the agency is getting a great deal of national attention and DHS gets several calls a month from other states asking how to build a similar program. Weiss credits the program's success to the vision of the Governor and state officials, healthcare community cooperation and aggressive promotion.

For more information about the ARKids First insurance program, call 1-888-474-8275 or any county DHS office.