HealthWise: Access to Healthcare in North Carolina
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North Carolinians are losing their access to healthcare. This growing population of people cannot afford health insurance, have lost their jobs or have lost publicly funded medical benefits. Meanwhile, state reports point to a lack of sufficient medical care in the North Carolina's rural communities. As North Carolina has been losing a large number of manufacturing, textile and technical jobs over the past several years, thousands of those now unemployed have lost their health insurance too. According to the State Center for Health Statistics, more than one million North Carolinians or 19% of the state's population did not have health insurance coverage in 2002. Will this problem get worse before it gets better? What are lawmakers and consumer advocates doing now to increase access to healthcare in the future?

On this edition of Healthwise, a panel of experts try to answer these questions, explain why access to healthcare problems exist and examine North Carolina's safety net of services implemented to handle the current healthcare crisis. These programs include free clinics, rural health centers, volunteer physician care projects (Project Access programs), public health departments and even hospital emergency rooms. The panel also discusses possible solutions to our state's healthcare crisis.