The Commonwealth Fund released the 2024 State Scorecard on Women’s Reproductive Health. The health of women in the United States is in a perilous place. Deaths from preventable causes are on the rise and deep inequities persist, leading to stark racial differences in maternal mortality and deaths from breast and cervical cancers. Despite a small rebound in women’s life expectancy in 2022, it remains at its lowest since 2006.
These troubling health trends are occurring while women are experiencing the consequences of state policy choices and judicial decisions that limit their access to the full range of health services and reproductive care. Ten states have yet to expand eligibility for Medicaid, leaving nearly 800,000 women uninsured. A highly variable state-by-state approach to the unwinding of pandemic-era Medicaid coverage has left millions of women either newly uninsured or with significant gaps in their coverage.
Women’s health is under threat. That’s why the Commonwealth Fund has developed the first-ever state scorecard to track trends in women’s health over time and document how policy choices and judicial decisions may impact women’s access to timely health care.
Its State Scorecard on Women’s Health and Reproductive Care uses the most recent data to assess how well the health care system is working for women in every U.S. state. It measured performance by 32 different metrics across three areas: health outcomes; health care quality and prevention; and coverage, access, and affordability. This report presents state rankings for each area.