L.A. County death rate drops 22%, By Molly Hennessy-Fiske, August 5, 2010, Los Angeles Times: “Los Angeles County’s death rate has dropped significantly in recent years, according to a report released this week by the county’s Department of Public Health. The drop, 22% countywide from 1998 to 2007, came as fewer county residents died from many chronic illnesses. Still, significant disparities persist among racial, ethnic and socioeconomic groups. ‘There’s a lot of good news here,’ said Gerald Kominski, associate director of the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research. ‘There’s a lot of reasons to think Los Angeles County would be doing worse than other areas – we have a high proportion of uninsured residents and a high percentage of people in poverty. But despite that, we continue to improve.’ The news comes about a week after public health officials reported the county’s average life expectancy increased to 80.3 years in 2006, up from 75.8 years in 1991 when the department started tracking it…”
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty