Does this mean we're winning?

The Harvard Initiative for Global Health has just published a study showing the range of life expectancy across the United States. Out of more than 3,000 counties, Benton county is 15th in the nation, with a life expectancy of 80.9 years.

Life expectancy in the U. S. ranges from a low of 66.6 years in a smattering of counties in North Dakota to a high of 81.3 years in a few places in Colorado, Maryland and Iowa. The longest-living sub-group in the country is a group of Asian American women in Bergen County, New Jersey, who tend to live to the dangerously ripe age of 91.

The article touches on several possible reasons for the disparity in life expectancy from county to county and state to state, but points out a couple of specific factors that help explain Benton County residents' longevity. We have lower than average levels of smoking and obesity, arguably the two major controllable health risks. I chalk it up to all these tree-hugging, farmers-market-shopping, bicycle-riding, Birkenstock-wearing, peacenik hippies. Corvallis is chock full of people living healthfully.

Now we just need to pour a few more wheatgrass smoothies for the residents of our assisted living facilities and bump that number up a tiny bit. Colorado? You're going down.