AMERICA’S HEALTH RANKING 2022 ANNUAL REPORT
from United Health Foundation, December, 2022
LINK: Hawaii Summary
Overview
The United Health Foundation, in partnership with the American Public Health Association, is pleased to present the 2022 special edition of the Annual Report — the America’s Health Rankings® platform’s broadest portrait to date of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact, analyzing more than 80 measures at the national and state levels to understand the effects of the pandemic at its height in 2020 and 2021. The report supplements this analysis with additional COVID-19-related measures, including racial/ethnic subpopulation data, and insights from the new COVID-era Disparities Survey, collected online by Morning Consult in October 2022.
Visit the Annual Report Action Toolkit to access additional resources that can help you share the data with relevant stakeholders and enact change.
This year, the Annual Report finds that the direct and indirect effects of the pandemic remain a challenge, especially for racial/ethnic minorities.
Racial and ethnic disparities widened in several measures of mortality. The pandemic may have exacerbated a longer-term increase in drug deaths and premature deaths, which respectively increased 30% and 18% nationally between 2019 and 2020.
The prevalence of multiple chronic conditions has worsened since prior to the pandemic, as have rates of cancer, arthritis and depression, and some risk factors for chronic conditions.
While the rate of frequent mental distress reached a new national high during the pandemic, the supply of mental health and primary care providers increased to their highest levels recorded by America’s Health Rankings. The uninsured rate also decreased and high-speed internet access increased among nearly all racial/ethnic groups, narrowing the racial gap.
The new COVID-era Disparities Survey collected direct insights from individuals affected by the pandemic. The survey found that the pandemic’s impact on the health and well-being of Americans differed by race and ethnicity. Notable findings include:
The percentage who lost friends and family members differed by race/ethnicity, with the highest rates among Black and Hispanic respondents.
While many Americans across groups experienced an enduring impact on their mental health and felt socially isolated, some factors contributing to those effects varied — as did the percentage of respondents who have resumed all pre-pandemic activities at the time of the survey.
The healthiest states were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut and Hawaii. Louisiana had the most opportunity to improve, followed by Mississippi, Arkansas, West Virginia and Alabama.
Resources:
SA: Hawaii among healthiest states, new survey reports