As welfare recipients find jobs and move off the rolls, they often find themselves without health care coverage. When they exit the welfare system, they lose Medicaid coverage and their new employers often don't provide company-sponsored health insurance.

Some experts say former welfare recipients are the cause of the increase in the numbers of uninsured Americans.

• The Census Bureau reports that about 43.5 million people lacked health insurance coverage last year -- a 1.7 million increase from the previous year.

• The proportion of Americans without insurance has been climbing almost every year during the 1990s -- increasing from 15.6 percent in 1996 to 16.1 percent last year.

• The share of Americans receiving job-related health insurance has held steady over the past two years at about 61 percent -- but the proportion on Medicaid declined from 11.8 in 1996 to 10.8 percent last year.

• In 1996, the last year for which data are available, Medicaid coverage among welfare recipients declined by more than 7 percent -- while enrollment among all other types of beneficiaries increased about 3 percent.

Analysts explain that as health care costs rise, insurance companies are increasing premiums. This has encouraged employers to pass more of the insurance costs on to their employees. Low-wage workers -- some of whom are former welfare beneficiaries -- lucky enough to be offered job-related health insurance are increasingly declining it, since the higher rates they are expected to pay are beyond their means.

Among workers making less than $7 an hour, 89 percent who get job-based coverage took advantage of it in 1987. By 1996, that had dropped to 76 percent.

Source: Laura M. Litvan, "Welfare Reform: Bad for Health?" Investor's Business Daily, October 21, 1998.