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Report: Ohio ranked 40th for health

BRANDON KLEIN
Special to the Legal News

Published: January 22, 2019

Grappling with challenges from the high prevalence of smoking, low immunization coverage among children and high levels of air pollution, Ohio is ranked the 40th healthiest state, according to the United Health Foundation's American Health Rankings 2018 report, which was released last month.

The state ranked 39th the previous year.

The state ranked 47th in behavioral health, 32nd in environment, 28th in policy, 34th in clinical care and 40th in outcomes.

The state performed poorly in most of the rankings with a couple subcategories where the state ranked in the top 15.

Drug deaths in the state increased 61 percent over the last three years from 18.9 deaths to 30.4 death per 100,000 people.

During the same period, chlamydia, a sexually transmitted disease, increased 13 percent from 460.2 cases to 520.9 cases per 100,000 people.

Over the past four years, meningococcal immunization increased 26 percent to 87.3 percent of adolescents aged 13 to 17 years old.

And cancer deaths increased 2 percent over the last five years in Ohio from 206.9 to 210.3 deaths per 100,000 people.

Ohio had the highest increase of mental health providers over the past year from 182.5 to 228.4 per 100,000 people, a 25 percent increase.

Smoking prevalence was identified as a main challenge for the Buckeye state. With 21.1 percent of adults smoking at least 100 cigarettes in their lifetime and some days, the state ranked as the eighth worst state for the habit.

Ohio ranked as the fifth-worst state for air pollution with 9 micrograms of fine particles per cubic meter compared with the 8.4 micrograms in the United States.

On the other hand, the state ranked 14th for its uninsured population with 5.8 percent adults that fall under that category.

Ohio ranked 13th for the most primary care physicians with 174.6 physicians per 100,000 people - the state's highest positive ranking.

The healthiest states were Hawaii, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, Utah, New Hampshire, Minnesota, Colorado, Washington and New York.

The unhealthiest states were Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kentucky, West Virginia, South Carolina, Tennessee and Indiana.

Ohio would rank as the second unhealthiest state in the Midwest region with Indiana last. With Minnesota ranking first in the region, North Dakota is in second as it's ranked 13th nationally, followed by Nebraska (15), Iowa (18), Wisconsin (23), South Dakota (25), Illinois (26), Kansas (27), Michigan (34) and Missouri (38).

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