The use of telehealth for abortion care has continued to grow in the U.S., according to the latest #WeCount report, particularly since five states passed laws legally shielding providers who work with patients living in states with bans. (Warodom Changyencham/Getty Images)
When it comes to health, low-income rural communities in Ohio and elsewhere face a double whammy: residents tend to be sicker and they tend to have fewer health professionals.
A report released this week by KFF Health News shows that some of those communities actually face a triple whammy. They also lack sufficient broadband to allow health professionals to remotely diagnose and treat people who otherwise lack access.
Ohio — particularly its Appalachian southeast — has more than its share of such “dead zones,” according to the report. The analysis found that 3 million people in the United States lived in such dead zones.
“Compared with those in other regions, patients across the rural South, Appalachia, and remote West are most often unable to make a video call to their doctor or log into their patient portals,” the report said. “Both are essential ways to participate in the U.S. medical system.”
The analysis used data from the Federal Communications Commission, George Washington University, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Census Bureau to identify areas where primary care or mental health providers were lacking, and whether they had adequate high-speed internet. It also looked at income and the prevalence of certain chronic diseases, such as diabetes and obesity.
Counties were considered broadband deserts if less than 70% of households had adequate service as defined by the FCC. Primary care deserts were defined as counties that ranked in the bottom third in terms of providers per Medicaid patient. Mental health deserts were counties that ranked in the bottom third in terms of the number of behavioral health providers per resident.
In Ohio, six counties met the analysis’s definition of a “dead zone” — they had inadequate broadband service and they were Medicaid primary care as well as behavioral health deserts. Those counties were Carroll, Meigs, Monroe, Pike and Vinton counties.
Another five — Adams, Brown, Harrison, Hocking and Holmes counties — lacked adequate broadband and had one care desert. Gallia, Highland and Washington counties didn’t have care deserts, but ranked as broadband deserts.
Broadband shortages are especially concerning in an era of aging populations and growing provider shortages.
The National Institute of Healthcare Management Foundation reports that shortages are growing especially quickly in rural areas, and it estimates that by 2036, the United States will be short more than 85,000 doctors. So, adequate broadband will only become more crucial if states are to fill the gap through virtual visits.
More than $42 billion was earmarked to expand broadband this year as part of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. But Howard Lutnick, President Donald Trump’s secretary for the U.S. Department of Commerce, last week announced a “rigorous review” of the spending. In his announcement, Lutnick complained of “woke mandates” the Biden administration built into the program. That is raising fears that the funding could be on the chopping block.
Such cuts might be bad for Ohioans’ health.
According to the KFF Health News analysis, the Buckeye State is slightly better than the national average when it comes to the percentage of homes with adequate broadband access, 93.7% vs. 93.1%. But it has a higher-than-average percentage of residents in rural areas, 23.7% vs. 20%.
And Ohio lags significantly when it comes to life expectancy, 75.6 years vs. 77.6, median household income, $69,680 vs. $78,538, and rate of poverty, 13.2% vs. 12.%.
Meanwhile, Ohio has higher rates of hypertension, 35.6% vs. 32.7% chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, 9.5% vs. 6.8%, diabetes, 13% vs. 12%, obesity, 38.1% vs. 33.3%, stroke, 4.3% vs. 3.6%, and suicide, 15 per 100,000 vs. 14.4.
YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE.