Where U.S. Death Rates are Highest

Death favors some parts of the U.S. more than others, and
it's been that way for at least 35 years, a new study shows.

"There's no easy way to explain, so far, how death is rooted in place.
But place matters; that's clearly the case," Mississippi State University's
Jeralynn Sittig Cossman, PhD, says in a news release.

Cossman and colleagues report persistent variation in death rates among the
nation's counties from 1968 to 2002.

During that time, death rates were higher than the national average in some
counties in Nevada and in the South, and lower than average in some counties in
the Upper Great Plains region.

Migration trends, such as young people leaving rural counties, doesn't fully
account for the findings.

For instance, the Upper Great Plains has experienced hard economic times and
young people leaving for other parts of the country, but the
region's death rates are still lower than other regions.

It will take more work to figure out how much of the trend is due to
people's behavior and how much is due to their environment.

Cossman's study appears in December's edition of the American Journal of
Public Health.

By Miranda Hitti
Reviewed by Louise Chang
©2005-2006 WebMD, Inc. All rights reserved