New Study Ranks Vermont And Iowa’s Health Care Systems As Best In U.S.

By Ravi Bhatia-Talk Radio News Service

Vermont and Iowa have the best health care of all states in the U.S., according to a report conducted by the privately owned Commonwealth Fund.

The report ranks states on 38 indicators in the areas of access, prevention/treatment quality, avoidable hospital use and costs, healthy lives and equity.

“We think the state scorecard underscores the urgent need for federal action to raise the floor on coverage and to support and stimulate state initiatives to improve,” said Cathy Schoen, Vice President of Commonwealth. “We know federal action has been critical for children, it’s now time to turn to adults to make coverage affordable and open the doors to care.”

Oklahoma and Mississippi ranked as the two worst.

“These are not just statistics, they represent real lives and people,” Schoen said. “If all states can reach the benchmark already achieved by the top states, 29 million people would have insurance, cutting the uninsured rates in half. Nine million more adults would receive recommended care. Nearly a million more children would be immunized. Medicare would save as much as five billion or more just for preventing readmissions for preventable admissions. And there would be 80,000 fewer premature deaths per year.”