You Are Where You Live

Where you live can determine how long you live? Maybe and we're not talking "Three Mile island" or "Love Canal" locations but when you're considering schools system, recreation facilities, parks, bike paths, crime rates you might want to add the availability of "fruit and veg" stands to your list of neighborhood home purchase considerations.

What we love is this blame the environment studies rather than blaming the victim. It's not that we are anti-earthers we don't hate the planet. We don't! We love mother earth. What we don't like is old useless suggestions that ignore prior failures of implementation. Failures aren't what we should be studying successes are.

ABC News does it again. Call it reporting on truly environmental (sustainable) planning: "[T]he risk of diabetes associated with living in such a "healthy" 'hood was 38% lower than for people who lived in the unhealthiest places, Dr. Amy H. Auchincloss of Drexel University School of Public Health in Philadelphia and her colleagues found. The findings raise the possibility, Auchincloss told Reuters Health, that changing people's environments could help improve their health. "There's certainly a lot of potential for making an impact," she added, pointing to initiatives like improving public transportation, increasing green space, making sidewalks safer, and opening farmer's markets in urban neighborhoods where supermarkets are scarce."

The LA Times does it better and we recommend you read their story asking: "Can your neighborhood make you sick? Type 2 diabetes may not be contagious, but it certainly appears to be spreading. In 1958, the prevalence was 0.9%. By 2000 it had climbed to 4.4%, and it’s projected to hit 7.2% in 2050. What accounts for this? Perhaps it’s the way residential neighborhoods have evolved to accommodate car rides to fast-food restaurants instead of walks to corner grocery stands."

MSN is not a normal source of information for us adds: "People who live in neighborhoods that promote physical activity and offer access to healthy foods may be less likely to develop type 2 diabetes, researchers say. Their study included 2,285 people, aged 45 to 84, living in neighborhoods in Baltimore, Forsyth County, N.C., and New York City/Bronx. Their neighborhoods were assessed by asking residents questions, such as whether it's easy or pleasant to walk in their community, and whether local stores carry a large, high-quality selection of fruits, vegetables and other low-fat foods. Average neighborhood scores were 3.68 for physical activity and 3.36 for healthy foods, the researchers found."

We have to take their word for it but we did ask Assistant Professor Amy H. Auchincloss of Drexel University if any of the above mentioned three got it right. We'll let you know what she says.

While the stories focused on type 2 diabetes the LATimes incorporates a PearlieMaes style of investigation of multiple studies that reached similar conclusions. One of the reasons we love the LATimes is reporting that goes beyond the obvious to real reporting. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute's (NHLBI) "Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) - (which) investigated the prevalence, correlates, and progression of subclinical cardiovascular disease (CVD) and risk factors that predict progression to clinically overt CVD, and that predict progression of subclinical disease itself, in a population-based sample of 6,800 ethnically diverse men and women."

The green elements of the solution to our health issues include a "Whole Foods" philosophy of using products and produce locally produced to reduce the transportation and energy cost associated with bring items from longer distances to reduce our carbon foot print. Less expenses mean more savings in our pockets and to our planet. Its easier being green than you thought when we think and better plan.