Database gives snapshot of health in each county, By Lauran Neergaard (AP), February 17, 2010, Washington Post: “Where you live plays a role in your health, and a new report that ranks health factors in each of the nation’s 3,000-plus counties promises to point local policymakers to ways they can help. Looking at each state’s best and worst further illuminates a well-known trend: The least healthy counties tend to be poor and rural, and the healthiest ones tend to be urban or suburban and upper-income. The report – released Wednesday at http://www.countyhealthrankings.org – isn’t the first to examine county-level health. Cancer and access to health care, for example, have long been studied that way. But the new database ties standard measures – general health and the rate of premature death – with more factors that play a role in those outcomes, from smoking, obesity and binge drinking to the unemployment rate, childhood poverty, air pollution and access to grocery stores…”
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty