Statistics show how low incomes, geography and behavior affect how long one lives. Poor, rural white women are dying at alarming rates. PB
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From the Washington Post online:
White women have been dying prematurely at higher rates since the turn of this century, passing away in their 30s, 40s and 50s in a slow-motion crisis driven by decaying health in small-town America, according to an analysis of national health and mortality statistics by The Washington Post.
Among African Americans, Hispanics and even the oldest white Americans, death rates have continued to fall.
But for white women in what should be the prime of their lives, death rates have spiked upward. In one of the hardest-hit groups — rural white women in their late 40s — the death rate has risen by 30 percent.
The Post’s analysis, which builds on academic research published last year, shows a clear divide in the health of urban and rural Americans, with the gap widening most dramatically among whites.
The statistics reveal two Americas diverging, neither as healthy as it should be but one much sicker than the other.
In modern times, rising death rates are extremely rare and typically involve countries in upheaval, such as Russia immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In affluent countries, people generally enjoy increasingly long lives, thanks to better cancer treatments; drugs that lower cholesterol and the risk of heart attacks; fewer fatal car accidents; and less violent crime.
But progress for middle-aged white Americans is lagging in many places — and has stopped entirely in smaller cities and towns and the vast open reaches of the country.
The things that reduce the risk of death are now being overwhelmed by things that elevate it, including opioid abuse, heavy drinking, smoking and other self-destructive behaviors...
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Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2016/04/10/a-new-divide-in-american-death/?hpid=hp_rhp-top-table-main_whitedeath-underdisplay%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
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Where living poor means dying young
According to a large study published today about how income and geography shape life expectancies, a poor person living in the San Francisco area can expect to live about three years longer than someone making the same income in Detroit.
That difference is equivalent to how much national life expectancies would rise if we eliminated cancer.
"If you think about the cancer comparison, having cancer is not just about having a shorter life. It's also about having an unhealthier life, a much lower quality of life," says Stanford economist Raj Chetty, the lead author of the study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Seven economists, from MIT, Harvard, the U.S. Treasury and McKinsey and Co., were co-authors.
Think about their new data as if the poor in Detroit get cancer and the poor in San Francisco don't. "Then," Chetty says, "you can see that this is a big deal."
The research, based on the tax and Social Security records of everyone in America between 1999 and 2014 with a valid Social Security number and earnings, gives the most precise look yet at a pattern that has long troubled health experts: In America, the richer you are, the longer you live.
But what's especially striking is that the poor live even shorter lives in some places than others. They have longer life expectancies in affluent cities with highly educated populations, such as San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles.
Among the 100 largest commuting zones ranked by the researchers, six of the top eight for low-income life expectancies are in California, a state with a strong safety net and a history of regulating where you light your cigarette or what comes from your car's tailpipe.
The poor live shorter lives in Las Vegas, Louisville and industrial Midwest towns, such as Gary, Ind.
Geography also matters much more for the poor than the rich. The health behaviors of the wealthy are similar wherever they live.
For the poor, their likelihood of risky behaviors such as smoking depends a great deal on geography, on whether they live in a place where smoking is common or where, as in San Francisco, cigarettes have been shunted out of view...
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/11/where-living-poor-means-dying-young/
