The Commonwealth Fund's recently released Scorecard on State Health System Performance, 2014, finds wide disparities between states on measures of health care access, quality, costs, and outcomes. In a new blog post, the Fund's David Blumenthal, M.D., and David Squires warn that these differences could very well widen. Many of the lowest-performing states are choosing not to expand their Medicaid programs, while some are discouraging people from purchasing subsidized coverage through new insurance marketplaces, they explain.
Blumenthal and Squires explore what it will mean for the nation if Americans "find themselves on radically different health care trajectories, some enjoying progressively better health and health care, while others fall farther and farther behind."