PRINCETON, N.J. — How healthy is life on the North Olympic Peninsula?
That depends on where you live, whom you ask and how well you can stand statistics.
Two new county-by-county studies of health across the nation answer the question in different ways.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation of New Jersey, working with the University of Wisconsin, says Jefferson County is the 15th healthiest among Washington state’s 39 counties and that Clallam County ranks 27th.
Jefferson slipped from its 11th place in 2014, while Clallam climbed from a 30th-place ranking last year.
The foundation released the rankings Wednesday.
Meanwhile, a study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention compares each county more broadly with its population peers across the United States.
The findings were made public this month.
In Jefferson County, according to the CDC, you’ve a better-than-average life expectancy and are less likely to die from obesity, Alzheimer’s disease and venereal diseases.
However, you stand a worse chance with cancer.
Clallam County residents fare better than average at chronic kidney disease and coronary heart disease mortality and for deaths from venereal disease and older adult depression.
But in Clallam, you’re likelier than average to die from Alzheimer’s, cancer, stroke or an “unintentional injury” that might include a motor vehicle wreck, especially one involving alcohol, CDC statistics say.
In the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation rankings, Clallam falls into the lowest third and Jefferson ranks in the top third of health outcomes and health factors among the 39 counties.
Some key findings:
■ Residents of Clallam County are likelier than their in-state peers to smoke but stand a higher risk of death from drunken driving.
■ Jefferson County residents are about average for smoking and overeating but are less likely to suffer alcohol-impaired driving deaths.
■ Premature deaths in Clallam County totaled 7,191, substantially higher than the rest of Washington state and counties across the country.
■ Jefferson County’s per capita rate of premature death was about average at 5,466, but it scored more poor physical and mental health days per capita.
What does it mean? According to Iva Burks, director of Clallam County Health and Human Services, it’s not that her county is especially unhealthy; it’s that more people with poor health live here.
Age is a big factor, she said, as was noted once at an Olympic Medical Center meeting by a man who called Sequim “God’s waiting room.”
Obesity, smoking and substance abuse also play roles, Burks said.
The 2015 County Health Rankings from the Johnson Foundation measured factors that ranged from low birth weight to premature death, with alcoholism, diabetes, obesity, smoking and sexually transmitted diseases — among others — along the way.
For a look at counties on the Olympic Peninsula, in Washington state and across the nation according to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, visit www.countyhealthrankings.org.
For the CDC comparisons, visit wwwn.cdc.gov/CommunityHealth.
If you don’t mind digging for data, you can find more clues to healthiness in documents prepared for each county by Clallam County Health and Human Services, Jefferson Healthcare and Jefferson County Public Health.
Each county has released lengthy reports about health behaviors, lifestyle habits, diseases and causes of death, all linked to age, gender, education and economic well-being.
You can learn, for instance, that Jefferson County’s per capita consumption of fruits and vegetables rides slightly above the state average. Clallam County, however, boasts above-average screening for colorectal cancer.
“The Clallam County’s Community Health Assessment,” published in 2012, is available at http://tinyurl.com/PDN-clallampublichealth.
Jefferson County’s similarly titled study was published last year. You can view it at http://tinyurl.com/PDN-jeffcopublichealth.
But back to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation study: It draws some decidedly unsurprising conclusions — namely, that people who stay in school longer and make more money often enjoy better health.
Here are the foundation’s health-outcome raw rankings by county (a separate but similar list compares health factors):
In first place is Whitman, followed by San Juan, Kittitas, Whatcom, King, Island, Snohomish, Thurston, Douglas, Walla Walla, Benton, Columbia and Chelan.
Then, Clark, Jefferson, Skagit, Kitsap, Lincoln, Franklin, Adams, Pierce, Spokane, Grant, Skamania, Klickitat and Lewis.
The list is finished by Clallam, Asotin, Garfield, Yakima, Stevens, Cowlitz, Mason, Ferry, Pend Oreille, Grays Harbor, Okanogan, Pacific and Wahkiakum.
If you want to find the “unhealthiest” regions in Washington, a map shows that the state’s southwest and northeast corners, plus Yakima County, have the worst health outcomes. The same regions show up similarly on a map of health factors.
If there’s a “healthiest” region, it comprises the counties of King, San Juan, Snohomish, Thurston and Whatcom, plus Whitman and Walla Walla.
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Reporter James Casey can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5074, or at jcasey@peninsuladailynews.com.
