A report by the Commonwealth Fund analyzed overall performance of health care system in caring for children in fifty states and the District of Columbia. There were taken into consideration factors such as access, quality, costs, equity and healthy outcomes. The states were ranked afterwards on basis of this investigation.

The Commonwealth Fund is a private foundation that researches health matters and struggles to provide larger coverage for people. This recent report found that top-performing states had lower rates of uninsured children than those ranked at the bottom. However, they also have higher health costs.

The report uses data gathered from government agencies as well as private groups, such as the Kaiser Family Foundation, a neutral research group. The conclusion is that all states have a weakness in one of the health areas, so there’s room for improvement all over the U.S.

As regards the frequency of visits to the doctor and dentist, only 46% of kids see the doctor and dentist at least once a year in Idaho, but 75% of Massachusetts children do.

Child mortality rates are 2,5 times higher in the District of Columbia than in Maine. And South Carolina kids are 5,7 times as likely to arrive in the hospital for asthma as those in Vermont. The percentage of children who received five recommended vaccinations from ages 19 months to 35 months ranges from 94% in Massachusetts to 67% in Nevada. In terms of costs per individual, Utah has the lowest spending per person at $3,972. The District of Columbia has the highest at $8,295. In general, states in the Northeast, such as Massachusetts and Maine, and in the upper Midwest, such as Michigan and Ohio, generally ranked high in several measures of performance. In contrast to them are states in the South, such as Mississippi, and the Southwest, such as Nevada.

The report is part of the efforts made by many states to strengthen insurance programs targetting families.