Shocking Disparities in Healthcare Access Exist Across U.S. Cities

As families face the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic, politicians respond to questions about public health insurance and communities question system inequities in healthcare systems, the discussions around healthcare have simultaneously grown on the national and personal agenda.

One major part of the discussion is the disparity in healthcare across the country based on social determinants of health. As explained in research from the National Institute of Health, social determinants including social, economic and political considerations have tremendous impacts on Americans’ health. One key social determinant of health is healthcare access for residents. Depending on where Americans’ live, they may not be able to easily reach a healthcare provider to address their physical and mental health needs.

A recent study from Coventry Direct chose to take a closer look at these state-by-state disparities. Ranking a number of factors including numbers of providers per 100,000 residents, insurance coverage and pre-existing health conditions of residents, the study ranked the 50 best and worst cities for quality healthcare across the United States.

The best city for quality healthcare access was Hayward, CA, a city in the San Francisco Bay area, scoring 84.7 out of a possible 100 points. The city was just one of many California locations where quality healthcare is relatively accessible. In fact, 23 of the top 50 cities were all located in California. Not surprisingly, there are many public health programs in which California leads the way, and currently, the push for single-payer healthcare coverage is even being pushed by the Governor himself, as reported by Cap Radio.

On the other hand, the cities with the least access to quality healthcare mostly fell in the American South and Midwest, following trends in national healthcare outcomes, poverty and mortality, as can be seen in research from the NIH. The city with the worst access to healthcare was McAllen, TX scoring a shocking 7.2 from 100 possible points. This gap in score from the highest to the lowest ranking cities captures the huge gap in healthcare access between different American cities that has been at the center of national debates. Many other cities in Texas were also among the worst in the country for healthcare access, which may in large part be due to the number of uninsured residents in Texas, where politicians decided not to extend Medicaid, as reported by NPR.

Besides Texas, many Southern cities also ranked low for quality healthcare access, a dark statistic given that rates of chronic illness are higher for adults in the South, according to statistics from the CDC. Apart from areas facing chronic health barriers, cities that have faced healthcare threats like natural disasters also were among those with the worst healthcare access, including New Orleans, a city which scored only 29.7 points, where residents still live with long term mental and physical health effects after Hurricane Katrina, as reported by the NIH.

Many of the other low-scoring cities were adjacent to rural areas in the South, reflecting the statistic reported from Kaiser Health News that nearly 80% of rural U.S. locations are designated as “medically underserved”. For rural counties that face issues like hospital deserts (which can be explained in this article from Rasmussen College), shortages in medical professionals and pre-existing issues like poverty, regional healthcare access remains poor and would likely be score even fewer points in the study than the paltry 7.2 earned by McAllen, TX.

If anything, the huge range in scores suggests that more conversations must be had in how Americans are being served their healthcare needs. Hopefully, this national moment of healthcare reckoning will result in more Americans gaining access to the quality healthcare they need.