HHS Report: Health in America Tied to Income,
Education
Copyright 1998 U.S. Newswire
July 30, 1998
BYLINE: National Center for Health Statistics, Public Affairs,
301-436-7551, e-mail:
paoquery(At)cdc.gov
DATELINE: WASHINGTON, July 30
BODY:
The nation's health continues to show record progress, but
Americans with low
income or less education aren't as likely as more advantaged
Americans to share
in the good health news, according to the U.S. Department of Health
and Human
Services' (HHS) comprehensive annual report on the health of the
nation.
"Health, United States, 1998," issued today by HHS
Secretary Donna E. Shalala, reports record-high life
expectancy, with a narrowing life expectancy gap between whites and
blacks. It also shows record-low infant mortality; as well as
declining death rates
for a number of the leading causes of death, including heart
disease,
cancer and firearm-related mortality.
At the same time, the report includes a special study
of socioeconomic
disparities in health. For almost all health indicators
considered, each increase in either
income or education increased the likelihood of being in good
health. Persons
with lower income or education also had a higher prevalence of
health risk
factors, such as sedentary life style and cigarette smoking, were
less likely
to have health insurance coverage or receive preventive care, and
were more
likely to report unmet
health care needs.
"Health is improving in America along many fronts, and our
challenge is to share
that progress as widely as possible," Shalala said.
"This comprehensive report shows the progress we're making,
but it also
documents the strong relationship between socioeconomic status and
health in
the United States for every race and
ethnic group studied.
"There is a role for everyone in every community in
eliminating disparities in
health and health care in America," Shalala said.
"The best solutions to closing this gap are strong, effective
partnerships which
build on the latest and best knowledge."
The report prepared
by the National Center for Health Statistics, (NCHS) a part of the
Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention in HHS, examines a wide range of
topics. The
findings show that:
-- Adults with less education tend to die younger than
more-educated adults. Across the board, less-educated adults
have higher death rates for all major causes of death,
including chronic diseases, communicable diseases, and injuries.
-- Cigarette smoking among adults 25 years of age and
over declined between
1974 and 1995, but declines were greater for more educated adults.
In 1995 the least educated men and women were more than twice as
likely to
smoke as the most educated.
-- Socioeconomic status also influenced the health of
children. Low
birthweight and infant mortality rates were higher among the
children of less-
educated mothers than among children of more-educated
mothers. Infants born to
mothers who did not finish high school were about 50 percent more
likely to be
of low birthweight than infants whose mothers finished college.
-- Exposure to environmental lead and elevated blood
lead levels in young
children were associated with low family income. Children 1-5 years
of
age living in families with low income were over seven times as
likely to have
elevated blood lead levels as children in high-income
families. However, the risk also varied by race and
ethnicity; poor non-Hispanic black
children are at the greatest risk, with more than 20 percent having
high blood lead levels, compared with 8 percent of poor
non-Hispanic white and
6 percent of poor Mexican American children.
-- Socioeconomic status has a direct influence on
insurance coverage and
access to care -- for both preventive services and regular visits.
Low income
adult men were seven times as likely to be uninsured as high-income
men and low
income women eight times as likely as their high-income
counterparts to be
uninsured.
-- Children in higher income families were less likely than
poor children to
be without a regular source of health care. However, insurance
coverage makes a real difference for poor children in terms of
access to health
care. Among all poor children under 6 years of age, 21 percent of
those without
health insurance had no usual source of care compared with 4
percent of poor
children
covered by insurance.
The annual assessment of the health of all Americans
reports that infant
mortality fell to a record low of 7.3 deaths per 1,000 live births
in 1996 and
that life expectancy reached an all-time high of 76.1 years. The
long- standing
gap
in life expectancy between men and women narrowed to 6 years and
the
differential between the white and black population narrowed as
well. Life expectancy for the white population now stands at
76.8 years; and for
black Americans life expectancy has now reached 70.2 years.
A number of the leading causes of death showed declining death
rates in the
1990s. Heart disease, the leading cause of death, continued its
long downward
trend, with the death rate down 12 percent from 1990 to 1996. In
the same time
period, the death rate for cancer -- the
second leading cause of death -- declined by 5 percent, after
increasing
steadily for the previous 20 years. Between 1993 and 1996, the
death rate for
firearm-related injuries and the homicide rate declined by about 20
percent
after increasing steadily since the
mid-1980s. However, the death rate for stroke, the third leading
cause of
death, which, like heart disease, has had a long downward trend,
has shown
little improvement since 1992.
Changes in health care are noted. HMO enrollment
continued to rise so that in 1997 one
quarter of the U.S. population was enrolled in HMO's. During
the 1990s the use of traditional fee for service medical care
benefits
by employees in private companies declined sharply. Also during the
1990s, the
full funding of medical care coverage became less common in both
small and large firms.
------
Copies of the report can be downloaded from the NCHS
Home Page on the Internet
at http://www.cdc.gov/nchswww/nchshome.htm.
--
Note: HHS press releases are available on the World
Wide Web at: http:
//www.hhs.gov.
------
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