Some people have had to wait as long as 12 months to obtain health care coverage under the state's two-year-old adultBasic program. But the wait is about to become a little less exacerbating in Western Pennsylvania.

Each of the 36,000 low-income people in the region who are on the adultBasic waiting list can obtain a $100 voucher, effective July 1, to help pay for health care costs. The vouchers are being offered through a new initiative, the adultBasic Waiting List Community Response, launched by the Highmark Caring Foundation.

The Highmark foundation has put up $1 million for the vouchers and, along with the Jewish Healthcare Foundation and the Fayette County Community Foundation, hopes to raise a total of $3 million.

The vouchers can be used at any of 88 community health centers in Western Pennsylvania. Information about how to obtain the voucher and where to use them will be mailed next week to each person in 29 Western Pennsylvania counties on the adultBasic waiting list.

The adultBasic program was launched two years ago with proceeds from Pennsylvania's share of the national tobacco settlement. It provides basic coverage for people ages 19 to 65 with incomes less than 200 percent of the federal poverty level -- $24,980 for a family of two -- who don't qualify for Medicaid.

Within eight months, all of the program's slots were filled and a waiting list began to form, said Rosann Placey, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Insurance. As of last month, 41,247 people were enrolled in adultBasic and another 90,000 were on the waiting list statewide.

In Western Pennsylvania, just over 21,000 people are covered by adultBasic, with 36,000 on the waiting list.

The vouchers are only available in Western Pennsylvania, where Highmark is the state's adultBasic contractor. "It's the first contractor to belly up to the bar to see what could be done for people on the waiting list," Placey said.

Though $100 might not sound like much relative to today's health care costs, the money stretches further at federally qualified health centers, rural health clinics and other participating clinics, which charge clients on a sliding scale based on income, said Aaron Bilger, a Highmark spokesman.

The $1 million donated thus far by Highmark isn't enough for all of the vouchers for everybody on the waiting list, Bilger acknowledged, but "we know from experience that not everyone will take advantage of it." And, he added, the initiative leaders are confident that additional donations by other organizations will cover the cost of all of the vouchers.

In other words, there shouldn't be a waiting list to get a waiting list voucher.