The Commonwealth Fund

How New Limits on State Provider Taxes Will Affect Medicaid Funding

H.R. 1’s Medicaid provider tax changes are projected to reduce federal investments by nearly $226 billion over 10 years and cause 2.4 million people to lose coverage.
The Commonwealth Fund

How Medical Frailty Exemption Policies Can Offer a Lifeline to People with Disabilities and Chronic Illnesses When Medicaid Work Requirements Are Implemented

Under H.R. 1, states must require that low-income people meet work-reporting requirements to qualify for Medicaid under the ...
The Commonwealth Fund

What Does the Decline in Medicare Part D Plan Availability Mean for Beneficiaries?

Source: Faith Leonard and Gretchen Jacobson, “What Does the Decline in Medicare Part D Plan Availability Mean for ...
The Commonwealth Fund

An Overview of Federally Funded Contraceptive Programs

With sufficient funding, states can utilize Medicaid SPAs and Section 1115 waivers, MCO contracts, and Title X grants to ...
The Commonwealth Fund

In Kentucky, Insured People Experience High Costs and Delays in Care, Putting Health at Risk

Insured patients, especially those outside urban areas, described a shortage of health care providers, both for primary care ...
The Commonwealth Fund

How States Are Preserving Science-Backed Recommendations for Preventive Care and Vaccines

These developments have prompted states to preserve scientifically backed services where they can: state-regulated private insurance plans, Medicaid, and public health programs. State policymakers ...
Commonwealth Fund

The Pitfalls of Regulating Health Care Prices Are Real but Manageable

Of all the many imperfections of U.S. health care markets, the most egregious might be the noncompetitive conditions created when health care providers, particularly hospitals and health systems, ...
Commonwealth Fund

Maternal Mortality in the United States, 2025

This brief was originally published in December 2020 and updated in July 2025. In 2023, at a time when maternal mortality was declining worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the ...
Commonwealth Fund

Insights into the U.S. Maternal Mortality Crisis: An International Comparison

The United States continues to have the highest rate of maternal deaths of any high-income nation, despite a decline since the COVID-19 pandemic. And within the U.S., the rate is by far the highest ...
Commonwealth Fund

State Scorecard on Medicare Performance

Why a State Medicare Scorecard? Medicare, established 60 years ago, provides health care coverage for more than 68 million Americans, including nearly all adults age 65 and older as well as 7 million ...
Commonwealth Fund

Maternity Care Providers and Trainees Are Leaving States with Abortion Restrictions, Further Widening Gaps in Care

Maxine Fuqua, 33 (right), of Wilmar, Ark., is examined by Leia O’Fallon, APRN, with the help of Fuqua’s daughter Kael, 8, during a routine checkup at 29 weeks pregnant at Mainline Health Monticello ...
Commonwealth Fund

Maternal Mortality in the United States: A Primer

In 2017, at a time when maternal mortality was declining worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported that the U.S. was one of only two countries (along with the Dominican Republic) to ...