SmartAsset, a New York City-based financial planning firm, has ranked Wisconsin as the sixth best state in the country when it comes to health care access.
The firm conducted a study that reviewed data in several areas related to each state population’s access to health care. Those metrics included each state’s total insurance rate; the rate of children who are insured; the rate of low-income individuals who are insured; average monthly insurance premiums; the number of physicians per capita; and prevention and treatment rank.
The study found that nearly 93 percent of Wisconsinites have health insurance, which SmartAsset said is the seventh-highest percentage of any state.
Wisconsin was also tied with Vermont for fourth place in the nation when it comes to prevention and treatment, according to the Commonwealth Fund, a New York-based foundation that supports research on health and social issues.
“While Wisconsin did not adopt the Medicaid expansion provision of the Affordable Care Act, it has enacted several policies of its own to increase Medicaid coverage,” the SmartAsset study reads. “So, while states that opted out of the Medicaid expansion tend to have lower rates of coverage, Wisconsin bucks this trend. Nearly 93 percent of Wisconsinites have health insurance, the seventh-highest percentage of any state.”
In descending order, the top 10 states for heath care access named in the study are Maryland, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Michigan, Vermont, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Hawaii.
According to the study: “Nineteen states have yet to adopt the Medicaid expansion provision that was part of the Affordable Care Act. Just one of those states (Wisconsin) ranks in the top 10 for health care access, while six rank in the bottom ten. These states tend to have lower insurance rates for children and people in low-income households.”
