|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Issue: 1131 Date: 4/26/2012
Become A Fan, Like St. Louis Chinese American News
|
|
St. Charles named healthiest Missouri county
|
|
|
| 請您關注和惠顧聖路易時報的廣告客戶，並向朋友推薦聖路易時報，感謝您的支持！ |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
JEFFERSON CITY, MO. (Tim Sampson, Missouri News Horizon) - What a difference a few miles can make.
That's the message from researchers at the University of Wisconsin's Population Health Institute, which recently named St. Charles the healthiest county in Missouri - even though nearby St. Louis City ranked as the 10th least healthy county in the state.
"Where you live does make a big difference in how healthy you're likely to be," said Angela Russell, an associate researcher with the institute, which annually compiles health and social data from over 3,000 counties across the nation and ranks them by state.
Researchers look at a variety of public health indicators, including premature mortality rates, obesity, smoking, sexually transmitted disease rates and birth weights. But researchers also took into account environmental and social factors, such as air pollution, number of fast food restaurants, and access to healthcare and education.
Russell said the findings in the St. Louis area show how stark the difference can be between two areas that are relatively close geographically. While the city of St. Louis ranks near the bottom, the nearby suburbs of St. Charles, Jefferson and St. Louis Counties all ranked in the top 25 of Missouri's 115 ranked counties
St. Charles has the lowest premature death rate in the state, while St. Louis ranked 102nd in the state. St. Charles also had lower rates of smoking and obesity and a higher rate of citizens covered by health insurance than St. Louis. Russell also said St. Louis's violent crime rate - the worst in the state - also had an impact on its overall rank.
Russell said the point of the rankings is to help give local community leaders a wealth of easily accessible data to help start finding solutions for public health problems. Public health statistics are often connected to social factors like wealth and education.
"Every additional year of formal education someone receives, the more likely their health will be better in the future," she said. "There is a very tight connection between the two."
That's bad news for St. Louis, which ranked dead last in Missouri for the social factors the institute examined with a 62 percent high school graduation rate and 41 percent child poverty rate.
Although less sharply divided, there is evidence of a gap in the Kansas City area, with Jackson County ranked 71st in overall public health, while more suburban, neighboring Clay County ranked 10th.
But cities aren't the only areas facing public health problems. The institute's findings show a clear decline in county public health rankings in the state's southeast corner, especially in the Bootheel where Pemiscot County was declared the least healthy county in the state.
"There is sometimes a false assumption made that public health is more of a challenge in urban areas," Russell said. "But rural counties face their own challenges as well."
For more information on county health rankings in Missouri and other states, including interactive maps, can be found at
http://www.countyhealthrankings.org . |
|
 |
|
|
|
