Jeff Bingaman United States Senator from New Mexico

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Jeff Bingaman today said he is pleased New Mexico has been recognized as a national leader for its work to address children's dental health needs but underscores that more progress is needed.

A Pew Center on States report released this week awarded New Mexico an A for meeting six of eight policy benchmarks aimed at addressing this important health issue.  The report states that New Mexico is the only state in the West that has met the goal for water fluoridation, with 77 percent of its residents on community systems receiving optimally fluoridated water.  Additionally, the state's Medicaid program reimburses dentists at a level that exceeds the national average, and has outperformed most other states in ensuring that low-income children are receiving dental examinations.

"Dental health is key to a child's overall health.  Unfortunately, 17 million children in America  - about 1 in 5 - still don't have access to dental care.  I am pleased New Mexico is making meaningful progress in this area," Bingaman said.  "Much work still remains to be done and I believe the health insurance reform bill before the Congress provides us with an opportunity to do more."

The report highlights a few areas where New Mexico still lags behind other states. In particular, over one-third of New Mexican third graders go without treatment for their cavities -- the 5th worst treatment rate in the nation.  In addition, less than 25 percent of New Mexico schools with high risk populations operate dental sealant programs.

Bingaman was instrumental in helping bring about many of the policy changes that have helped increase New Mexico children's access to dental care.  For example, Bingaman was the champion of provisions in the 2009 Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) law, which expands access to dental services for kids in Medicaid and CHIP, improves funding for school based health centers that are critical to the provision of dental services to at risk kids, and improved quality reporting for dental services.

The health insurance reform bill currently being debated in Congress contains additional provisions championed by Bingaman aimed at improving dental health access to American's children and others, including the ability to provide training of mid-level dental hygienists, improved coordination of federal oral healthcare oversight, improved training of pediatric and public health oral healthcare providers, among others.

The full Pew report, "The Cost of Delay, State Dental Policies Fail One in Five Children," is available online.