A difference-in-differences analysis of 284,967 adults aged 40 to 64 in the National Cancer Database compared states that expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act with those that did not, before 2014 and after. Uninsured rates fell from 7.3% to 1.9% in expansion states against 8.2% to 4.7% elsewhere, and expansion carried a hazard ratio for overall mortality of 0.93 (95% CI 0.91-0.94). Five-year mortality fell 1.4 percentage points overall and 6.3 points among Hispanic patients, while among non-Hispanic Black patients it did not move at all.
Why it is interesting: A change in who is insured moved cancer survival at working ages, and it moved it for some groups and not others.