Americans Living Longer, Not Healthier

The 2012 report from America’s Health Rankings suggests Americans are living longer but not necessarily living healthier. America’s Health Rankings, a partnership of American Public Health Association, the Partnership for Prevention and the United Healthcare Foundation, has updated this report every year since 1990, reports that life expectancy in the U.S. is now at 78.5 years and that death from cardiovascular disease and cancer are down significantly since 1990.

However, 26.2% of Americans are sedentary, though it’s higher than 35% in West Virginia, Mississippi and Tennessee; 27.2% of Americans have obesity; 9.5% have diabetes; and 30.8% have high blood pressure.

States with low ratings on health should take heart: “We know it is possible to improve; states are capable of doing that,” says Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association. What will help is “taking lessons from things they do well and applying them more vigorously to the things they are not doing well.”

Click here to read the USA Today story and here to read the report rankings.

Old and Young image © Mbjerke / Wikimedia Commons