Nearly 4,900 men and women age 18 or older were randomly chosen to participate in a University of Oslo study examining the effects of certain habits—smoking, excessive alcohol consumption (3 or more drinks for men, and two or more for women), getting less than 2 hours of exercise per week, and not eating well (specifically, not enough fruits and vegetables).

The study began in 1985, and followed participants for 20 years, checking death certificates and doing follow-ups. Of the 314 participants who had all four habits, almost one-third died over the duration of the study, while less than 10 percent of the 387 people who had none passed away.

Heart disease and cancer topped the list for cause-of-death for people who had a combination of these habits, while the health of those still living was “equivalent to being 12 years older” than their healthier counterparts.

Lead researcher Elizabeth Kvaavik thinks these findings may be the extra incentive some people need to improve their lifestyles.

"You don't need to be extreme to be in the healthy category,” Kvaavik said in a news piece by MSNBC. "These (healthy) behaviors add up, so together it's quite good…It should be possible for most people to manage."

Kvaavik and her colleagues acknowledge that changing these habits may not be easy, but that they pay off.

“The combined effect of poor health behaviors on mortality was substantial, indicating that modest, but sustained, improvements to diet and lifestyle could have significant public health benefits,” authors of the study concluded.

Visit the Archives of Internal Medicine to read more on the study.

Information comes from the United States Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). Beginning in 2005, the study included this question: In general, how satisfied are you with your life? Between then and 2008, researchers surveyed 1.3 million U.S. citizens who rated their satisfaction using a four-point scale.

“While the nature of the data set means that is not possible to record clinical data on people, the advantage is that its samples provide representative snapshots of the U.S.,” authors Andrew J. Oswald and Stephen Wu write. “Published research on life-satisfaction using this data set is thus only beginning.”

Statistics weren’t solely based on the amount of sunshine. Researchers also based rankings on factors such as crime statistics, environmental qualities (air and water quality, greenness, etc.), and quality of life.

Louisiana, Hawaii and Florida topped the list of happiest states. Outdoorsy states like Tennessee, Arizona, South Carolina, Mississippi, Montana, Alabama, and Maine were also in the top ten. Pennsylvania, Illinois, California and Michigan were among the bottom ten, and New York was ranked last.

“Many people think these states would be marvelous places to live in,” Oswald said in an interview with MSNBC. “The problem is that if too many individuals think that way, they move into those states, and the resulting congestion and house prices make it a non-fulfilling prophecy.”

Because much of the information was gathered before disasters such as Hurricane Katrina, it may not reflect current feelings of well-being.  Nevertheless, this research provides valuable, suggestive information.

“We wanted to study whether people’s feelings of satisfaction with their own lives are reliable, that is, whether they match up to reality—of sunshine hours, congestion, air quality, etc.—in their own state,” Oswald says. “And they do.”

The report Shortchanging America's Health: A State-By-State Look at How Federal Public Health Dollars are Spent was released this week by the non-profit organizations Trust for America's Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). It outlines federal government funding for disease prevention programs provided to the fifty states in fiscal year 2008.

The report found that annual per capita spending varies widely among the states (ranging from $12.74 and $52.78 per person). The national average for state funding from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for public health is $17.60 per person. The report notes that even at the high end, this level of spending on public health is a tiny fraction of the country's total investment in health. The vast majority of heath spending is invested in treating people after they've become sick. The report authors suggest that spending more money on disease prevention programs up front would lessen the need to spend so much on disease treatment "after the fact."

Below is a list of the bottom 10 states that received the least funding per state resident from the CDC in fiscal year 2008, followed in parentheses by the dollar amount of per capita spending.

The top 10 worst states for federal public health funding per capita are:

• Indiana ($12.74)
• Ohio ($12.76)
• Virginia ($12.88)
• Florida ($13.29)
• Kentucky ($13.94)
• Pennsylvania ($13.99)
• Tennessee ($14.96)
• Wisconsin ($14.97)
• Missouri ($15.14)
• Kansas ($15.14)

Interested in learning more about disease prevention? Join the Healia Support Group for Wellness and Lifestyle.

Related blog post: The Top 10 States for Federal Public Health Funding

_{Source: Trust for America’s Health and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Shortchanging America's Health: A State-By-State Look at How Federal Public Health Dollars are Spent, 3/09. http://healthyamericans.org/assets/files/shortchanging09.pdf}

_{Photo: ThrasherDave, Flickr, Creative Commons}

The polling group Gallup, the health company Healthways and a national association representing health insurance companies called America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) together developed the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index (WBI) to measure America’s relative health, well-being, and prosperity. Launched in 2008, the WBI uses data from a 42 question survey that measures how Americans are faring physically, emotionally, socially, and economically at any given point in time. To date, pollsters have conducted nearly 450,000 interviews, at a rate of about 1,000 surveys per day. The report released today includes an overall composite score for each state and congressional district, as well as sub-index scores in six domains: Life Evaluation, Emotional Health, Physical Health, Healthy Behavior, Work Environment and Basic Access. The survey will be ongoing with annual updates for the next 25 years.

The nation’s overall score on the WBI has declined precipitously over the past year, and some states have been affected more than others. In general, Western states had the highest well-being scores while the lowest scores were mostly in the South. The bottom 10 states for well-being appear below, with the average score for overall well-being (out of 100) following in parentheses. Lower scores mean less overall we-being.

The top 10 states with the worst overall well-being in America are:

1. West Virginia (61.2 /100)
2. Kentucky (61.4)
3. Mississippi (61.9)
4. Ohio (62.8)
5. Arkansas (62.9)
6. Indiana (63.3)
7. Missouri (63.8)
8. Oklahoma (64.0)
9. Tennessee (64.0)
10. Michigan (64.0)

Share your thoughts on the rankings in the Healia Community for Men’s Health or the Healia Community for Women’s Health.

Related blog post: State and Congressional District Well-Being Rankings Released: Top 10 states for well-being in America.

_{Source: Gallup, Healthways, and America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, 2008 State and Congressional Well-Being Reports, 3/09. http://www.ahiphiwire.org/WellBeing/}

_{Photo: B Rosen, Flikr, Creative Commons}

While it may seem like an interesting choice of timing, this week three organizations teamed up to release rankings of the 50 states and the 435 congressional districts based on their residents’ overall well-being. The polling group Gallup, the health company Healthways, and a national association representing health insurance companies called America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) together developed the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index (WBI) to measure America’s relative health, well-being, and prosperity.

Launched in 2008, the WBI uses data from a 42 question survey that measures how Americans are faring physically, emotionally, socially, and economically at any given point in time. To date, pollsters have conducted nearly 450,000 interviews, a rate of about 1,000 surveys per day. The report released today includes an overall composite score for each state and congressional district, as well as sub-index scores in six domains: Life Evaluation, Emotional Health, Physical Health, Healthy Behavior, Work Environment and Basic Access. The survey will be ongoing with annual updates released each year for the next 25 years.

While the nation’s overall score on the WBI has declined precipitously over the past year, some states are still doing rather well. In general, Western states have the highest well-being scores while the lowest scores are mostly in the South. The top 10 states for well-being appear below, with the average score for overall well-being (out of 100) following in parentheses. As of this writing, the national average score on the WBI is 63.8, down from 66.8 a year ago.

The top 10 states for well-being in America are:

1. Utah (69.2/100)
2. Hawaii (68.2)
3. Wyoming (68.0)
4. Colorado (67.3)
5. Minnesota (67.3)
6. Maryland (67.1)
7. Washington (67.1)
8. Massachusetts (67.0)
9. California (67.0)
10. Arizona (66.8)

Share your thoughts on the rankings in the Healia Health Community for Wellness and Lifestyle.

_{Source: Gallup, Healthways, and America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, 2008 State and Congressional Well-Being Reports, 3/09.http://www.ahiphiwire.org/WellBeing/}

_{Photo: Rob Lee, Flickr, Creative Commons}

Two non-profit organizations, the Trust for America's Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) today released a new report on federal government funding for the fifty states in fiscal year 2008 for publich health disease prevention programs. The report, Shortchanging America's Health: A State-By-State Look at How Federal Public Health Dollars are Spent also examines how the economic downturn could lead to serious cuts to disease prevention and emergency preparedness programs at the state level.

The report found that states receive an average of $17.60 per person from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for public health programs and that annual per capita spending varies widely among the states (ranging from $12.74 and $52.78 per person). The report notes that even at the high end, this level of spending on public health is a tiny fraction of the country's total investment in health. The vast majority of heath spending is invested in treating people after they've become sick. The report authors suggest that spending more money on disease prevention programs up front would lessen the need to spend so much on disease treatment "after the fact."

In tough financial times, the problem of small investment in public health is only expected to get worse, leading to serious long term consequences for the nation’s health and health spending. State funding for public health programs is expected to drop given the widespread budget shortfalls among the states and federal funding is unlikely to make up the all difference. However, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (also known as the stimulus package) includes an additional $1 billion for public health programs for next year, which will help provide additional support in many communities.

Below is a list of the top 10 states that received the most funding per state resident from the CDC in fiscal year 2008, followed in parentheses by the dollar amount of per capita spending. It is no coincidence that the list is populated mostly with America’s smallest states: some public health programs funded by the CDC are not apportioned by population, giving smaller states a larger amount per person.

The top 10 states for federal public health funding per capita are:

1. Alaska ($52.78)
2. Vermont ($35.15)
3. Wyoming ($32.43)
4. Rhode Island ($32.09)
5. New Mexico ($30.94)
6. South Dakota ($29.12)
7. North Dakota ($27.45)
8. Hawaii ($25.55)
9. Delaware ($24.98)
10. Montana ($24.33)

Interested in learning more about disease prevention? Join the Healia Health Community for Wellness and Lifestyle.

_{Source: Trust for America’s Health and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Shortchanging America's Health: A State-By-State Look at How Federal Public Health Dollars are Spent, 3/09. http://healthyamericans.org/assets/files/shortchanging09.pdf}

_{Photo: jswieringa, Flickr, Creative Commons}