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Arkansas gets "F" on women's health issues Thursday, Oct 18, 2007 By Rob Moritz Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - Arkansas ranks near the bottom among the states in addressing women's health issues, according to a national study released Wednesday. While the nation as a whole received a grade of "unsatisfactory" in the study, Arkansas was among 11 states and the District of Columbia that received failing grades. Arkansas ranked 49th overall, Louisiana ranked 50th and Mississippi ranked last at 51st. "Making the Grade on Women's Health: A National and State-by-State Report Card," conducted by the National Women's Law Center and Oregon Health and Science University, ranked Arkansas last in the nation for stroke death rate among women and near the bottom for women without health insurance, pap smears, mammograms, annual dental visits, lung cancer, and women without an in-county abortion provider. The life expectancy rate for women in Arkansas ranked 40th nationally at 78.1 years. The national average is 78.8 years. No states received an overall "satisfactory" grade for women's health issues, according to the study. Three states - Vermont, Minnesota and Massachusetts - did receive a "satisfactory minus grade." "The overall conclusion in this year's report is that ... as each year passes, the nation as a whole and states are falling ... farther behind in the quest to meet the national goals for women's health," Judy Waxman, vice president for health with the National Women's Law Center, said during a national conference call Wednesday. The study found too many women had health problems that regular checkups, screenings and better nutrition could help prevent or detect, she said. On obesity, the study found that the percentage of obese women has increased in every state since 2004. Hawaii had the lowest rate of obesity among women at 16.7 percent, according to the study, and 31.5 percent of women in Mississippi were obese. In Arkansas, 28.2 percent were obese, up from 24.3 percent three years ago when the report was last issued. Arkansas also ranked 45th in women without health insurance, with 23.5 percent of women in the state lacking coverage, compared to 21.7 percent in the 2004 report. Nationally, 18 percent of women 18-64 do not have health insurance, according to the study. Officials with the state Department of Health and the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences could not be reached for comment Wednesday afternoon. The study's rankings were based on 27 health benchmarks set by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. ------- On the Net: http://hcr.nwlc.org |
