How healthy is your county?

How healthy is the county you live in? A new database allows you to compare your county against others in your state.

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

Here are some statistics for Lane County, here in Oregon:

• 21% of those under age 65 do not have health insurance
• 17% of our children under age 18 live in poverty.
• 9% of all households are single-parent households.
• 15% of adults reported binge drinking in the last 30 days.

God bless those who have been called to parish nursing ministry!