Nevada among worst states for women’s health and reproductive care, new analysis finds

By April Corbin Girnus

Nevada Current

When it comes to women’s health and reproductive care, Nevada appears to have more in common with states with extreme abortion bans than it does with other states that protect access.

A new analysis released Thursday by The Commonwealth Fund ranks Nevada 47th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia when it comes to women’s health and reproductive care. The availability of abortion clinics was just one of 32 indicators used by the health care policy organization to determine how well the health care systems in each state are working for women.

Only three states fared worse overall than Nevada — Mississippi, Texas, and Oklahoma. All three states have total abortion bans. Among the bottom 10 ranked states, which also include Georgia, Alabama and Arizona, only Nevada protects the right to an abortion up to 24 weeks, according to States Newsroom’s abortion access tracker.

Northeastern states dominated the other end of the rankings. The top five best states for women’s health and reproductive care were Massachusetts, Vermont, Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Hampshire.

Abortion is legal in the top 15 states ranked in the new analysis.

Researchers found that states with extreme abortion restrictions have fewer maternity care providers — a dynamic expected to worsen as medical professionals seek less hostile work environments. Nevada appeared to be an outlier — ranking 47th for its low rate of maternity care providers despite having codified in state law the right to abortion and legislators passing shield laws for providers.

Nevada’s medical provider shortage is well documented and affects nearly all practice areas.

On the issue of abortion, The Commonwealth Fund found Nevada has 2.2 clinics per 100,000 women aged 18 to 44 (the standard metric representing childbearing age). That’s above the U.S. average of 1.5 clinics.

States with extreme abortion restrictions also tended to have higher rates of maternal death, defined as death while pregnant or within 42 days of termination of pregnancy for any reason. On this indicator, Nevada ranked 14th of 43.

Nevada’s overall low ranking was related to non-abortion measures of health care access, including affordability, quality of care, and health outcomes.

According to the report, Nevada ranks last in the nation when it comes to the percentage of women ages 45 to 74 who are up-to-date on colon cancer screening and 46th when it comes to the rate of women ages 50 to 74 who are up-to-date on a mammogram. Nevada ranks 44th when it comes to the rates of women ages 15-44 with syphilis and infants born with congenital syphilis.

In 2022, 20 percent of Nevada women aged 18 to 44 reported having not visited a doctor for a routine checkup in the past two years. Only one state reported a higher percentage. The national rate was 13 percent.

Similarly, more than a quarter — 26 percent — of Nevada women aged 18 to 44 reported there was a time within the last 12 months when they needed to see a doctor but could not because of cost. For comparison, nationally 17 percent of women in that age group had forgone medical care because of cost. The lowest rate reported by any state was 7 percent.

But it wasn’t all bad news.

The Commonwealth Fund identified a few bright spots for the Silver State. Among them: Nevada had the 8th highest rate of women between the ages of 18 and 64 who have ever been tested for HIV or AIDS.

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April Corbin Girnus is an award-winning journalist and deputy editor of Nevada Current. A stickler about municipal boundary lines, April enjoys teaching people about unincorporated Clark County. She grew up in Sunrise Manor and currently resides in Paradise with her husband, three children and one mutt.