The Latest Breaking News from Commonwealth Fund

In the Saarland, medical debt is practically nonexistent

PÜTTLINGEN, Germany — Almost every day, Dr. Eckart Rolshoven sees the long shadow of coal mining in his clinic near the big brownstone church that dominates this small town in Germany’s Saarland.

What would a world without medical debt look like? In Germany's former coal-mining region medical debt is almost unknown, despite economic challenges and health problems. Here's why.

The number of Americans with health insurance has climbed to historic highs during the COVID-19 pandemic, but within that silver lining is a darker hue.

It's the latest evidence that insurance coverage alone can't insulate people against soaring medical costs.

Many of the states that are moving to ban abortion tend to have less access to health care, worse maternal and infant health care outcomes and weaker social supports for children and families.

When Congress passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, its authors cited three overarching goals: to improve access to health care, to slow rising medical costs and to improve health outcomes.

The 17 states that ban abortion after 20 weeks make exceptions to protect the life or health of the woman. But doctors and reproductive health advocates worry such exceptions are so vague or narrow that abortion providers are unlikely to invoke them — especially if they fear they could be…

BOSTON — Massachusetts ranked second in a new study that measures states’ overall response to COVID-19.

As the US records 1 million Covid deaths, experts note underinvestment in long-term care, primary care and public health all contributed to the toll

The U.S. health care system “consistently fails” to meet the basic needs of reproductive-age women, which may partly explain why women are more than three times as likely to die during pregnancy or shortly after childbirth in the U.S. compared to other high-income countries, according to new research from the…