Texans have the least access to health care

Nicole Villalpando, Austin American-Statesman
 |  Hearst – Austin Transition

Texas is in the bottom five states for health care, according to a new study from the finance company Wallet Hub, and was the worst for access to health care. 

The study uses data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics as well as the nonprofit health research group KFF and public policy foundations.  

Why so low?

In access, Texas has the highest rates of uninsured children and uninsured adults, a fact that is expected to continue to grow with the recent federal budget signed into law on July 4. The Big Beautiful Bill is expected to cause another 1.9 million Texans to go without insurance because of the changes in the Affordable Care Act subsidies to the marketplace and changes to Medicaid that will make renewal more difficult. People who are in the U.S. lawfully but are not U.S. citizens also will no longer be able to get health care through the marketplace. 

The best states for health care were New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Iowa and Massachusetts.

The worst states were Mississippi, Alaska, Alabama, Georgia and Texas. 

Texas also was 48th out of 51 (including the District of Columbia) for the cost of health care and for the fewest physicians per capita. And while Texas didn’t hit the worst five for percentage of adults with no medical visits in the past year, it did hit the lowest five for percentage of adults with no dental visits.