What Is www.HealthyKids.org?

The Florida Healthy Kids Corporation arranges health care coverage for Florida's uninsured children. We develop and implement solutions, making quality a priority at every step in the process. We strive to instill a sense of security among the families of those we serve.

The Florida Healthy Kids Corporation was established in 1990 by the Florida Legislature as a public-private initiative to improve access to comprehensive health insurance for the state's uninsured children. The founding of the program came about as a result of an article that was published in the March 31, 1988, New England Journal of Medicine by Steve A. Freedman, Ph.D., F.A.A.P., Director of the Institute for Child Health Policy at the University of Florida.

The Corporation helps thousands of uninsured children gain access to affordable, quality health care. Healthy Kids acts as a quasi-single payer financing mechanism by aggregating local, state, federal and family funds to pay premiums to commercial health plans who assume the insurance risk. This program is unique because it is designed to provide affordable access to health insurance coverage for working families for whom the payment of the full premium would be out of reach.

Participation by school districts, health plans and other entities in this initiative is voluntary and a key factor in the program's success. With operational sites statewide, Florida Healthy Kids is poised to make quality health care available to uninsured kids in the State of Florida. The broad coverage of the benefit structure, from immunizations to transplants to dental services, seeks to ensure that children in the State of Florida are able to enjoy the continuity of care that is essential to their health, well being and development.

In addition to being selected by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation as the National Program Office for the Foundation's Healthy Kids Replication Initiative, the Florida Healthy Kids Corporation was named the winner of the 1996 Innovations in American Government Award by the Ford Foundation and the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. The program was honored at a ceremony at the State Department and received a $100,000 award from the Ford Foundation. The Innovations Award recognizes governmental initiatives that provide creative solutions to pressing social and economic problems or, in the words of Susan V. Berresford, Former President of the Ford Foundation, "government at its best."

Source: www.healthykids.org