Where You Live Linked to Life Expectancy

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Houston Chronicle, United States - 18 hours ago

.... WASHINGTON — Where you live, combined with race and income, plays a huge

role in ... Asian-American women can expect to live 13 years longer than

low-income ...

Where you live linked to life expectancy Brocktown News

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all 304 news articles » Life expectancy lower in eastern Kentucky

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Kentucky.com, KY - 15 hours ago

.... life spans in Appalachia could also be linked to poverty ... are going to be

exposed to hazards you wouldn't ... However, Strosnider said people who live in

the region ...

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/09/12/D8K35RP80.html

Where You Live Linked to Life Expectancy

Sep 12 3:12 AM US/Eastern

By LAURAN NEERGAARD

AP Medical Writer

Where you live, combined with race and income, plays a huge role in the

nation's health disparities, differences so stark that a report issued Monday

contends it's as if there are eight separate Americas instead of one.

Asian-American women living in Bergen County, N.J., lead the nation in

longevity, typically reaching their 91st birthdays. Worst off are American

Indian men in swaths of South Dakota, who die around age 58 _ three decades

sooner. Millions of the worst-off Americans have life expectancies typical of

developing countries, concluded Dr. Murray of the Harvard School of

Public Health. Asian-American women can expect to live 13 years longer than

low- income black women in the rural South, for example. That's like comparing

women in wealthy Japan to those in poverty-ridden Nicaragua. Compare those

longest-living women to inner-city black men, and the life-expectancy gap is 21

years. That's similar to the life-expectancy gap between Iceland and Uzbekistan.

Health disparities are widely considered an issue of minorities and the poor

being unable to find or afford good medical care. Murray's county-by-county

comparison of life expectancy shows the problem is far

more complex, and that geography plays a crucial role. " Although we share in

the U.S. a reasonably common culture ... there's still a lot of variation in how

people live their lives, " explained Murray, who reported initial results of his

government-funded study in the online science journal PLoS Medicine. Consider:

The longest-living whites weren't the relatively wealthy, which Murray calls

" Middle America. " They're edged out by low-income residents of the rural

Northern Plains states, where the men tend to reach age 76 and the women 82.

Yet low-income whites in Appalachia and the Mississippi Valley die four years

sooner than their Northern neighbors. He cites American Indians as another

example. Those who don't live on or near reservations in the West have life

expectancies similar to whites'. " If it's your family involved, these are not

small differences in lifespan, " Murray said. " Yet that sense of alarm isn't

there in the public. " " If I were living in parts

of the country with those sorts of life expectancies, I would want ... to be

asking my local officials or state officials or my congressman, 'Why is this?' "

This more precise measure of health disparities will allow federal officials to

better target efforts to battle inequalities, said Dr. Wayne Giles of the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which helped fund Murray's work.

The CDC has some county-targeted programs _ like one that has cut in half

diabetes-caused amputations among black men in ton, S.C., since 1999,

largely by encouraging physical activity _ and the new study argues for more, he

said. " It's not just telling people to be active or not to smoke, " Giles said.

" We need to create the environment which assists people in achieving a healthy

lifestyle. " The study also highlights that the complicated tapestry of local

and cultural customs may be more important than income in driving health

disparities, said Suzman of the National

Institute on Aging, which co-funded the research. " It's not just low income, "

Suzman said. " It's what people eat, it's how they behave, or simply what's

available in supermarkets. " Murray analyzed mortality data between 1982 and

2001 by county, race, gender and income. He found some distinct groupings that

he named the " eight Americas: " _Asian-Americans, average per capita income of

$21,566, have a life expectancy of 84.9 years. _Northland low-income rural

whites, $17,758, 79 years. _Middle America (mostly white), $24,640, 77.9

years. _Low income whites in Appalachia, Mississippi Valley, $16,390, 75

years. _Western American Indians, $10,029, 72.7 years. _Black Middle

America, $15,412, 72.9 years. _Southern low-income rural blacks, $10,463, 71.2

years. _High-risk urban blacks, $14,800, 71.1 years. Longevity disparities

were most pronounced in young and middle-aged adults. A 15-year-old urban black

man was 3.8 times as likely to die before the age of 60

as an Asian-American, for example. That's key, Murray said, because this age

group is left out of many government health programs that focus largely on

children and the elderly. Moreover, the longevity gaps have stayed about the

same for 20 years despite increasing national efforts to eliminate obvious

racial and ethnic health disparities, he found. Murray was surprised to find

that lack of health insurance explained only a small portion of those gaps.

Instead, differences in alcohol and tobacco use, blood pressure, cholesterol and

obesity seemed to drive death rates. Most important, he said, will be

pinpointing geographically defined factors _ such as shared ancestry, dietary

customs, local industry, what regions are more or less prone to physical

activity _ that in turn influence those health risks. For example, scientists

have long thought that the Asian longevity advantage would disappear once

immigrant families adopted higher-fat Western diets. Murray's

study is the first to closely examine second- generation Asian-Americans, and

found their advantage persists. ___ The 25 counties with the highest and

lowest life expectancy, according to a study in the online science journal PLoS

Medicine: Highest life expectancy County Life Expectancy Clear

Creek, Colo. 81.3 Eagle, Colo. 81.3 Gilpin, Colo. 81.3 Grand, Colo. 81.3

, Colo. 81.3 Park, Colo. 81.3 Summit, Colo. 81.3 Montgomery, Md.

81.3 Lyon, Iowa 81.3 Sioux, Iowa 81.3 Nicollet, Minn. 81.1 Story, Iowa

81.0 Carver, Minn. 81.0 Collier, Fla. 81.0 Benton, Ore. 80.9 Polk, Ore.

80.9 Fairfax City, Va. 80.9 Fairfax County, Va. 80.9 La Paz, Ariz. 80.9

Yuma, Ariz. 80.9 Winneshiek, Iowa 80.8 , Utah 80.8 Summit, Utah 80.8

Archuleta, Colo. 80.8 Gunnison, Colo. 80.8 Lowest life expectancy

Washabaugh, S.D. 66.6 Todd, S.D. 66.6 , S.D. 66.6 Mellette, S.D.

66.6 , S.D. 66.6 ,

S.D. 66.6 Baltimore City, Md. 68.6 sburg, Va. 69.6 Marlboro, S.C.

69.6 , Ark. 69.8 Coahoma, Miss. 70.1 Union, Fla. 70.2 Baker,

Fla. 70.2 Mcdowell, W.Va. 70.4 St. Louis City, Mo. 70.8 Pemiscot, Mo. 70.9

Sunflower, Miss. 71.1 Crittenden, Ark. 71.1 Richmond City, Va. 71.1

Washington, Miss. 71.1 Tunica, Miss. 71.2 Tallahatchie, Miss. 71.2

Quitman, Miss. 71.2 Logan, W.Va. 71.2 , N.C. 71.2 ___ Life

expectancy by state, according to a study in the online science journal PLoS

Medicine: State Life expectancy Rank Ala. 74.4 48 Alaska 77.1 26

Ariz. 77.5 22 Ark. 75.2 43 Calif. 78.2 10 Colo. 78.2 12 Conn. 78.7 4

Del. 76.8 29 D.C. 72 51 Fla. 77.5 21 Ga. 75.3 41 Hawaii 80.0 1 Idaho

77.9 15 Ill. 76.4 33 Ind. 76.1 37 Iowa 78.3 7 Kan. 77.3 24 Ky. 75.2 42

La. 74.2 49 Maine 77.6 20 Md. 76.3 35 Mass. 78.4 5 Mich. 76.3 34 Minn.

78.8 2 Miss. 73.6 50 Mo. 75.9 38 Mont. 77.2 25

Neb. 77.8 16 Nev. 75.8 39 N.H. 78.3 6 N.J. 77.5 23 N.M. 77.0 27 N.Y.

77.7 19 N.C. 75.8 40 N.D. 78.3 8 Ohio 76.2 36 Okla. 75.2 44 Ore. 77.8

17 Pa. 76.7 31 R.I. 78.3 9 S.C. 74.8 47 S.D. 77.7 18 Tenn. 75.1 45

Texas 76.7 30 Utah 78.7 3 Vt. 78.2 11 Va. 76.8 28 Wash. 78.2 13 W.Va.

75.1 46 Wis. 77.9 14 Wyo. 76.7 32 ___

http://www.globalhealth.harvard.edu FEATURED PUBLICATIONS Eight

Americas: Investigating Mortality Disparities across Races, Counties, and

Race-Counties in the United States by J.L. Murray, Sandeep C.

Kulkarni, Michaud, Niels Tomijima, T. Bulzacchelli, Terrell J.

Landiorio, Majid Ezzati

Supplementary Data

Fig.1, Fig. 2, Fig.3, Fig. 4, Fig.5, Fig. 6, Fig. 7

Global and Regional Burden of Disease and Risk Factors, 2001: Systematic

Analysis of Population Health Data by Alan D. , Colin D. Mathers, Majid

Ezzati, Dean T. Jamison, and J.L. Murray

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