Children's Health Initiative

In 2002 the San Mateo County Children’s Health Initiative (CHI) was established to address community-wide concern for the 17,000 county children who lacked access to comprehensive health insurance coverage. CHI ensures that all children ages 0-18 in San Mateo County have access to comprehensive health insurance coverage. In January 2003 the new Healthy Kids (HK) insurance program was established to provide comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage to all uninsured children ineligible for the existing Medi-Cal (MC) and Healthy Families (HF) programs. Over 13,300 children have been enrolled in the HK program since its inception. As of July 2008, there are 6,414 HK members enrolled.

Undoubtedly, the creation of the CHI resulted in the decrease of the number of uninsured children in San Mateo County. According to the 2005 California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) Data, the number of uninsured children in the county has decreased from 17,000 uninsured children reported in the 2001 CHIS data to only 3,000 uninsured children in the 2005 CHIS data. This means that the uninsured rate for children in San Mateo County was reduced from 4.3% to 1.9%.

As CHI and the Healthy Kids Program celebrates its five year anniversary in 2008, San Mateo County continues to move closer to providing 100% coverage for all children in the county and demonstrating the value and efficacy of long-term statewide policy reform.

Do You Know Your San Mateo County CHI Facts