Medicaid Expansion Reduces Maternal Mortality: Medicaid Cuts Would Be Deadly for Mothers and Babies

Medicaid has long been a cornerstone of care for low-income pregnant women and children. Its expansion under the Affordable Care Act, which extended critical coverage to low-income adults including women of reproductive age, has been pivotal to ensuring the health of our nation’s moms. Despite this, ongoing congressional efforts to slash Medicaid funding through attacks on access to coverage under Medicaid expansion threaten to undermine maternal health progress and jeopardize the health of pregnant women.

To better understand how access to coverage under Medicaid expansion impacts maternal mortality, Families USA conducted an analysis comparing maternal mortality rates between states that expanded Medicaid and those that have not. The findings reveal that, between 2019 and 2023, maternal mortality rates in nonexpansion states were 35% higher than in expansion states. Furthermore, during the COVID-19 pandemic, maternal deaths surged more dramatically in nonexpansion states — a 46% increase from 2020 to 2021 — compared to 21% in expansion states. These disparities reinforce the urgent need to protect and strengthen Medicaid as a vital tool in promoting maternal health and preventing avoidable deaths.

Read the full analysis below.