Editorial: Are Nevadans healthy?

Thursday, July 5, 2007 | 7:30 a.m.

N evada stands out nationally on certain health issues, but the numbers are not the type anyone would want to brag about.

Federal figures show that Nevadans in general, and Clark County residents in particular, die younger than residents of many states and suffer higher-than-average rates of substance abuse, chronic illnesses and suicide.

A story in the Las Vegas Sun on Monday, about the newspaper's analysis of mortality data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shows that from 1999 to 2004 Nevadans had the 12th-highest rate of death among people younger than 65.

Nevada's rate of accidental poisonings - including drug overdoses - was twice the national rate. The state's rate of alcoholic liver disease was 1.7 times higher than such disease nationally, and its suicide rate remains the nation's highest, the Sun reports.

It would be easy to assume that these numbers are driven by the anything-goes image and culture associated with Las Vegas, where most of the state's population lives. But experts told Sun reporters Marshall Allen and Alex Richards that such conclusions aren't necessarily true.

Certainly, higher rates of alcohol-related illnesses and chronic diseases that affect the heart and lungs could be at least part ly attributed to the fact that alcohol is available 24 hours a day in Nevada, and many of its residents work in places where cigarette smoke is prevalent.

But as Sheniz Moonie, a UNLV epidemiologist and biostatistician, told the Sun , many questions remain as to what kind of lifestyle Nevadans actually live as opposed to the one that is marketed to tourists.

These are important questions to ask and ones to which we need answers. The data suggest that these health trends have been ongoing for almost a decade. There must be at least a few common threads that could be explored. State and local public health officials should work together in studying these problems as a group, rather than pursuing them independently of one another. If these poor health showings are related, they must be treated as such.