Baton Rouge,
LA - The residents of Louisiana and Mississippi have the worst health in the
United States, according to the United Health Foundation’s America’s Health
Rankings.
The states
tied for 49th place in health indicators in 2012. They also rank at the top —
Mississippi first and Louisiana second — of Poverty in USA’s national list for
poverty.
Two programs in Louisiana are targeting poor
health profiles: Healthy Communities in West Carroll Parish and HealthyBR in
East Baton Rouge Parish. Those parishes, located in nearly opposite ends of the
state, may seem completely different. West Carroll Parish is rural, for
instance, while East Baton Rouge Parish is urban.
Both parishes, however, exceed the national
overall poverty rate of 14 percent. Both have adult obesity rates of 32 percent
and a comparable prevalence of diabetes — 11 percent of East Baton Rouge
residents and 13 percent in West Carroll.
In East Baton Rouge Parish, the Mayor’s
Healthy City Initiative is taking a three-part approach to become healthier:
HealthyBR, MedBR and the Healthy Innovation Center for Research. Several
initiatives fall under HealthyBR, including Fresh Beginnings, a three-year
project that strives to increase healthy food access and promote health and
fitness education.
Fresh Beginnings grant coordinator Lyndsi
Lambert said the project faces a complex combination of problems. Many Baton
Rouge citizens are obese, have heart disease and diabetes, and are uninsured.
East Baton Rouge Parish has seven “food
deserts” — low-income pockets more than a mile away from the nearest grocery
store. This challenge is being tackled by the Food Access Policy Commission,
which launched in February as part of Fresh Beginnings.
About 23 percent of the parish is food
desert, according to Stephanie Broyles, commission member and assistant
professor at Pennington Biomedical Research Center. The commission is studying
the best ways to develop a business structure that can support more food
options in areas of low access.
Broyles said while access to healthy foods
does not automatically mean eating healthy, people cannot be expected to make
healthy choices without access.
“Once that barrier is removed, then they bear
a much larger responsibility for their health and how they respond to messages
about the importance of making healthy decisions,” she said.
One approach to remove the food desert
barrier is The Red Stick Mobile Farmers Market, part of the Fresh
Beginnings program. The mobile market operates
on Wednesdays at the Scotlandville Library (9am-11am) and Star Hill Baptist
Church (12:30pm - 2pm); and Thursdays at the Delmont Service Center
(8:30am-10:30am) and the McKinley Alumni Center (12pm-2pm). Both SU and LSU Ag
Centers are involved in educating the public on the benefits of eating locally
grown fresh produce and maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
Located in Louisiana’s northeastern corner,
West Carroll Parish ranks 33rd out of Louisiana’s 64 parishes for health. Just three
years ago, however, it ranked ninth.
That decline is one reason West Carroll
Parish was selected as the pilot location for Healthy Communities, an
initiative that officially launched in October to improve health in rural
Louisiana. It is a joint effort of Pennington Biomedical Research Center and
the agricultural centers at LSU and Southern University.
Gina Eubanks, Southern University Ag Center
vice chancellor for extension and LSU AgCenter associate vice chancellor, said
Healthy Communities’ goal is to enhance residents’ health from every angle —
eating habits, exercise, healthcare, recreational facilities and food access.
Southern and LSU extension agents in the
parish will focus on demonstrating the importance of being healthy. One
objective is making people more aware of health services in the parish. Because
rural areas generally have fewer or more limited health services than cities,
it is important to get people’s feedback and ensure they suit their needs,
Eubanks said.
Educating and engaging residents is also
crucial. “Health is very personal,” Eubanks said, meaning people need to both
understand how making better lifestyle choices will benefit them and be
equipped with practical knowledge.
Healthy Communities may be a “three to six
year ordeal where it’s truly going to take chipping away ... to see what makes
a difference,” said LSU AgCenter extension agent and Healthy Communities
coordinator Monica Stewart. Eating healthy is not an option for many residents,
a quarter of whom live in poverty. With only one gym and one park in the entire
parish, there just is not much to do, so many residents lead a sedentary
lifestyle, Stewart said.
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Contact:
Bridget Udoh
(225) 771-5714
