Not having health insurance kills people. What saves lives? Getting them insured, according to a recent study in the medical journal, Annals of Internal Medicine.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney should be feeling good about the findings. He instituted statewide health insurance reform in 2006 that expanded coverage to thousands of residents. Researchers found this expansion reduced mortality by 2.9 percent. For every 830 adults who gained insurance, one death was prevented in his home state.
Counties with the lowest household income and highest proportion of uninsured residents experienced the greatest reductions in mortality. When researchers focused specifically on deaths caused by cancer, infections and heart disease — where medical intervention can have a significant impact — mortality was reduced nearly 5 percent.
This isn’t just good news for Romney and Massachusetts. It’s good news for the entire nation, because even though Republicans, including Romney, don’t like to acknowledge it, the state’s plan served as a model for the Affordable Care Act that President Obama signed into law a few years later. The goal of both plans was to expand government-provided and private health insurance to cover more people. It stands to reason that evaluating what has happened in Massachusetts so far might offer insight into what the rest of the country can expect going forward.
The bottom line: Access to health care saves lives.
Of course that is hardly groundbreaking news to an insulin-dependent diabetic, someone who recovered from a stroke or someone being treated for heart disease. Anyone who has watched a suicidal loved one improve after receiving adequate mental health treatment knows good care can mean the difference between life and death. Studies have shown expanding Medicaid to pregnant women decades ago reduced infant mortality rates.
When an American with health insurance experiences chest pain or finds a suspicious mole, he goes to the doctor. An uninsured American may focus only on the huge medical bill that will be generated. He may not go to the doctor. Living in a country with some of the best physicians, drugs and treatments in the world doesn’t matter to someone who can’t access it. Health insurance makes the medical system accessible by making care affordable for average people.
Americans should remember that when politicians talk about repealing Obamacare. They should remember it when governors refuse to expand Medicaid to cover more residents. Neither Romneycare or Obamacare is perfect. But both have helped people obtain health insurance, which opens the door to lifesaving medical care.
POLITICS CAN HARM THE nation’s POOR
LOW-INCOME PEOPLE. The goal of the Affordable Care Act was to provide health insurance to millions of Americans. One way it accomplishes this is by expanding government-funded Medicaid to cover more low-income people. Yet a majority of Republican governors and conservative state legislatures refuse to participate. These elected officials are not only leaving billions of federal dollars on the table, they’re sacrificing the lives of their constituents, according to Harvard University researchers.
MEDICAID EXPANSION. In a January study published in the journal Health Affairs, researchers assessed the effect on low-income people living in states failing to expand Medicaid. They will “forego gains in access to care, financial well-being, physical and mental health and longevity,” according to the report.
LACK OF ACCESS: Americans who would have had access to health services, including mammograms, depression screening and insulin, will not have it, researchers wrote. And perhaps the most troubling observation: “We estimate the number of deaths attributable to the lack of Medicaid expansion in opt-out states at between 7,115 and 17,104.”
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