Montana Ranked Average When it Comes to Health

Christian Hauser (11/17/2009)

A new study released confirms what many in Montana already knew. Fewer people here have cardiovascular disease, and fewer are obese.

The study looks good on paper for Montana compared to the rest of the country, but officials say you need to take a closer look.

Greg Oliver with the Missoula City County Health Department says "I would say that's misleading about how healthy we are, but I think it is important to compare each one of the factors they choose."

Even though Montanans are some of the least obese in the country, the number of people who fall into the obese category has doubled over the past 20 years. The report goes on to speculate it will double again in the next ten years. Bringing the percent of the population who is obese to almost 45%.

Oliver added "This has been referred to as the obesity epidemic in that it has been a phenomanol change in how heavy people are in the U.S."

Jody White with the Flathead County Health Department says "The testing and tracking of that information has become more prevalent recently. So it's something that wasn't looked at maybe as in depth and now people are really starting to look at that and study that in terms of chronic illnesses, long term health conditions that people have."

The study points out one other area for improvement, child vaccination rates. The state came in last.