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Luzerne County continues to bobble near the bottom when it comes to health. The annual, nationwide “County Health Rankings” by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation plunked the county at number 62 of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties — narrowly avoiding being one of the state’s five unhealthiest.
The foundation looks at more than 30 factors, including premature deaths, sexually transmitted diseases, low birth weight, unemployment rate, children in poverty and crime rates, to name a few.
Some of the usual suspect often cited in years past as local problems didn’t look too terrible.
Luzerne County was not a particularly tobacco happy place, for example, with 18 percent of adults smoking, same as the statewide rate. The bad news: only 11 counties had a higher rate.
The county was also average in obesity, with 29 percent of adults reported obese, same as the statewide rate. Only 10 other counties had a lower rate.
And we also had the same rate of excessive drinkers as the statewide figure: 18 percent, with only nine other counties at a lower rate.
But one factor that may have helped sink the county was inactivity, with 28 percent of adults reporting living inactive lifestyles. Only five counties were more idle.
Dr. Tina George, who has a family practice in Avoca and a master’s degree in public health, said part of the problem is simply the physical environment of municipalities built before urban design was a thing.
“We don’t have cities like they do out west, where communities were planned and laid out to be walkable, to have places for exercise, to have food markets,” George said. “We didn’t have the advantages of making a community that promotes a healthy lifestyle.
There’s also the perennial bugaboo of demographics. “I think we have a much higher level of poverty than people realize,” George said. The link between income and health is well documented, which is why the report includes data like unemployment rates — 6.3 percent in Luzerne County, with only 11 other counties higher — and children in poverty, 24 percent here, well below the statewide rate of 19 percent.
George said the report’s sources, while from credible national databases, don’t always tell the whole story, particularly those that rely on surveys of people who may be less than honest about their own habits.
The 18 percent excessive drinkers, for example, “sounds like it may be under-reported,” she said.
And if the obesity rate has stabilized or even gone down, it reflects a national trend, George added. “We seem to have hit a peak,” she said, “some say it’s because of increased awareness, others say it has to do with more accurate labeling, or more activity.
The report highlights a disturbing national trend: increased premature death fueled by growing drub abuse, particularly among those ages 15 to 44. “From 2014 to 2015, 85 percent of the increase in premature deaths can be attributed to a swift increase in deaths among these younger populations,” the report says.
Carol Ragugini, director of Commonwealth Health’s Choices program, said drug use far outpaces alcohol abuse in the area, and that drug overdose deaths have soared in part because heroin being sold on the streets is cut with Carfentanil, a powerful drug that increases the high but makes an overdose death more likely by neutralizing the impact of narcan, a drug given to reverse the life-threatening effects of an overdose.
“One dose of narcan isn’t going to do it, it wears off before the drug does,” Ragugini said. “We’ve had cases in the emergency department where they get narcan three times before they are responsive enough for treatment.”
The problem may be compounded by unintended consequences of efforts to stop abuse of prescription drugs, she added. A new national registry makes it hard for abusers to “doctor shop” to get more prescription pills, so they turn to heroin.
“It can be easier and cheaper to get heroin than to go through the proper channels,” Ragugini said.
As was the case last year Chester was Pennsylvania’s healthiest county, while Philadelphia kept a firm grasp on the basement. Lackawanna County ranked 57th, Wyoming 37th, and Schuylkill 64th.
