The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE - Kentucky is among 15 states where some eligible people can't yet get a new federal tax credit that pays a portion of health-insurance premiums.

The credit took effect a year ago, but Kentucky doesn't have a health insurer that sells a qualifying plan.

The Health Coverage Tax Credit is meant to help people who lost their jobs because of foreign competition or whose pension benefits were picked up by the government after a company failure. It is part of a trade act President Bush signed into law in 2002.

An estimated 4,400 people in Kentucky are eligible.

Insurers have worried that people seeking the credit might have higher medical costs than the premiums they can charge. To address that concern, the Kentucky General Assembly passed a measure last spring lifting the 35 percent cap for people eligible for the credit.

That persuaded Anthem, the state's largest insurer, to reconsider. The Indianapolis company, which already offers plans in Indiana and Ohio that qualify for the tax credit, is looking at "what kind of a product we can now offer in Kentucky," said Joe Bobbey, the company's Midwest spokesman.

If Anthem does offer a plan, it's hard to say how many people would be helped, since people aren't flocking to get the credit.

In Kentucky, about 1,400 people getting PBGC pension benefits are eligible for the credit, along with about 3,000 people who lost jobs to foreign competition. But only 175 Kentuckians were getting monthly premium subsidies through the program as of May 31, according to the U.S. Department of Treasury.