2021’s Best & Worst States for Children’s Health Care

Spring is a time to get out of the house and enjoy the fresh air and see friends and family but that idea comes with a risk due to the COVID pandemic. A poll from Ipsos found over half (55%) of Americans report seeing family or friends in the last week, a pandemic-era high. Slightly lower level (45%) report going out to eat in the last week and over a third (37%) of Americans report visiting a park, beach, or other outdoor space.

As of April 8, 3,542,692 total child COVID-19 cases reported, and children represented 13.5% (3,542,692/26,188,186). Unfortunately, kids cannot get vaccinate as of yet. Currently, Pfizer and BioNTech have asked the FDA to expand its authorization of their COVID-19 vaccine to include children as young as 12 years of age. Johnson & Johnson announced that it had begun tests of its vaccine in children and adolescents aged 12 to 17 in early April.

With children under age 16 not yet able to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and Every Kid Healthy Week kicking off on April 26, the personal-finance website WalletHub today released its report on 2021’s Best & Worst States for Children's Health Care.

In order to determine which states offer the most cost-effective and highest-quality health care for children, they compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia across 35 key metrics. The data set ranges from share of children aged 0 to 17 in excellent or very good health to pediatricians and family doctors per capita.

Best vs. Worst

• Massachusetts has the lowest share of uninsured children aged 0 to 18, 1.30 percent, which is 8.3 times lower than in Texas, the highest at 10.80 percent.
• The District of Columbia has the lowest share of children aged 0 to 17 with unaffordable medical bills, 4.60 percent, which is 3.6 times lower than in North Dakota, the highest at 16.50 percent.
• The District of Columbia has the most pediatricians per 100,000 residents, 43, which is 14.3 times more than in Oklahoma, the fewest at 3.
• Utah has the lowest share of obese children aged 10 to 17, 9.60 percent, which is 2.5 times lower than in Kentucky, the highest at 23.80 percent.

WalletHub Q & A

Do you think the government should mandate all children have health-insurance coverage?

“Yes, health insurance should be a right, not a luxury,” said Sasha A. Fleary, PhD, CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy. “Children without health insurance are at disproportionate long-term risk for preventable chronic diseases and adverse outcomes for both non-communicable and communicable diseases. Health insurance does not prevent or treat diseases. Access to quality healthcare is critical for the welfare of all children and quality healthcare should not depend on whether children have health insurance or their type of health insurance coverage.”

“Yes. Universal Medicaid for those under 18 would make sense,” said Peter Muennig, Mailman School of Public Health – Columbia University. “Medicaid would also be a good stand-alone policy for those over 65. Medicare has a lot of disincentives and costs for the patient built-in. That said, universal Medicare for those under 18 and over 65 would be a lot better than the current system”

How has the coronavirus pandemic impacted the utilization of preventive and primary care among children?

“Many primary care visits have been postponed,” said Xiaohui Sophie Li, PhD, CFLE, AFC®, Northern Illinois University. “While some therapy and psychiatry can be done via remote, it may be more challenging to get deeper relationships with providers and patients with remote services.”

“The coronavirus pandemic has moved a portion of this care to virtual platforms,” said Benard P. Dreyer, MD, New York University Grossman School of Medicine. “Many families have also been wary of traveling on public transportation or going to health care institutions. While virtual care can be appropriate, much of primary care for children involves in-person services, such as immunizations. Thus immunizations have been delayed, with catch-up now going on. Furthermore, those families without access to adequate and consistently high-speed internet (primarily poor families, rural families, and families of color) have been especially negatively impacted. Limited English proficiency (LEP) is also a problem since the use of phone or video interpreters is hard to integrate into these visits. Thus immigrant families have also been negatively impacted. Therefore, it is likely that health disparities/inequities based on race-ethnicity, poverty, and LEP may increase.

For the full report and to see where your state or the District ranks, please visit:

https://wallethub.com/edu/best-states-for-child-health/34455