Our Statistics

2011 County Health Rankings - Where does Pend Oreille County sit?

In March 2011 the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute released its 2011 County Health Rankings, with new data addressing both health factors and health outcomes rankings for each county.

The rankings are based on factors ranging from mortality and quality of life to rate of high school graduation, unemployment, obesity, and even air quality.

This map shows how Washington counties rank on health factors, including behaviors, clinical care, social and economic factors, and physical environment.

Worth noting: The Washington counties ranking lowest in health factors all have high rural populations. In rank order, numbers 39 to 30 are Ferry, Grays Harbor, Pacific, Adams, Pend Oreille (#34), Yakima, Cowlitz, Okanogan, Skamania, and Mason.

Across Washington, Pend Oreille was ranked 36th on Morbidity and 38th in Social & Economic Factors. Perhaps not surprisingly, our best ranking was in Physical Environment, where we ranked 17th. To take a closer look at all of Pend Oreille County's rankings, by factor, click here. Bottom Line: We have work to do!

U.S. Obesity Trends

About one-third of U.S. adults (33.8%) are obese. Approximately 17% (or 12.5 million) of children and adolescents aged 2—19 years are obese. [Based on data from the National Health & Examination Survey].

During the past 20 years, there has been a dramatic increase in obesity in the United States and rates remain high. In 2010, no state had a prevalence of obesity less than 20%. Thirty-six states had a prevalence of 25% or more (including Washington (25.5%) and Idaho (26.5%)); 12 of these states (Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia) had a prevalence of 30% or more.

If you click on the map to the left, it will take you to the CDC's website, where this animated map shows the United States obesity prevalence from 1985 through 2010. Caution: It is depressing to watch ...

America's Health Rankings

United Health Foundation's America's Health Rankings comprehensively evaluate and rank each State in the Country on a variety of "health-related" factors. Washington is not looking too good, having dropped in overall state rankings to #15, down from #11 in 2010. Our key strengths appear to be our low relative prevalence of smoking and diabetes and our low relative rate of preventable hospitalizations. Our key challenges appear to be low immunization coverage, low use of prenatal care and low graduation rates.

Here are some of the highlights:

In the past year, the percentage of children in poverty decreased from 18.0 percent to 16.1 percent of persons under age 18.
In the past five years, diabetes increased from 6.3 percent to 7.6 percent of the population. Now 391,000 Washington adults have diabetes.
While smoking decreased from 20.7 percent to 15.2 percent of adults in the last ten years, 782,000 adults still smoke in Washington. Smoking was 14.9 percent last year.
In the past ten years, obesity increased from 18.8 percent to 26.2 percent of adults, with more than 1.3 million obese adults in the state.
High school graduation is the lowest in seven years, at 71.9 percent of incoming ninth graders who graduate in four years.

For more information, click on the image to the right to visit the America's Health Rankings Website or view Washington's ranking sheet here.