RI Ranked 3rd Best State for Children’s Health Care

Wednesday, April 12, 2023

GoLocalProv Health Team

 

A new study has Rhode Island as the third-best state in the country for children’s health care.

The rankings released this week by WalletHub has Rhode Island behind only Massachusetts — and the District of Columbia — for the categories of kids’ health and access to health care; kids' nutrition, physical activity and obesity; and kids’ oral health. 

Rhode Island ranks 5th in the country for the lowest percentage of uninsured children. 

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In total, WalletHub evaluated these categories using 33 relevant metrics, and then determined each state and the District’s weighted average across all metrics to calculate its overall score and used the resulting scores to rank-order our sample.

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WalletHub writes: 

"Keeping children healthy is as expensive as it is essential. Luckily, around 95% of children aged 0 to 18 have health insurance to protect them if they do get sick. The bad news is that the high coverage rate hasn’t translated to lower health costs for parents, and the average amount workers pay toward employer-sponsored family coverage is over $6,100 per year. Some families can find relief through Medicaid or through the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). However, many people who don’t qualify for government assistance will still struggle, especially when their wallets are already hurting from high inflation.

Cost isn’t the only important factor for children’s health care, though. Other things that play a big role include the quality of the health care system and environmental factors like access to healthy food and fluoridated water.

It’s a different story in every state, though. WalletHub therefore compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia across 33 key indicators of cost, quality and access to children’s health care. Our data set ranges from share of children aged 0 to 17 in excellent or very good health to pediatricians and family doctors per capita."