A rigorous study* of the effects of health reform in Massachusetts since its 2006 launch yielded powerful evidence that the state's expansion of access to health insurance improved health and reduced mortality, particularly among poorer citizens. Adrianna McIntyre summarizes the core finding:
Benjamin Sommers, Sharon Long, and Katherine Baicker estimate that overall mortality in Massachusetts declined 2.9 percent relative to control counties between 2007 and 2010; mortality amenable to health care declined 4.5 percent. This translates to one death prevented for every 830 people who gain insurance, and the effects were larger in counties with low income and low pre-reform insurance rates—the counties we would expect to be most favorably impacted by reform.Health economists, as is their wont, have put (tentative) price tags on lives saved. The ever-humane Harold Pollack pegged the cost-per-life at $3.3 million, adding the essential caveat:
