The Rankings

Tennessee

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Strengths:

• Low prevalence of binge drinking
• High immunization coverage
• Ready availability of primary care physicians

Challenges:

• High prevalence of obesity
• High prevalence of diabetes
• High violent crime rate

Highlights:

• In the past year, the violent crime rate decreased from 668 to 613 offenses per 100,000 population.
• In the past five years, diabetes increased from 9.1 percent to 11.3 percent of adults. Now 548,000 Tennessee adults have diabetes.
• While smoking decreased from 26.7 percent to 20.1 percent of adults in the last five years, 975,000 adults still smoke in Tennessee.
• In the past ten years, obesity increased from 22.9 percent to 31.7 percent of adults, with more than 1.5 million obese adults in the state
• . In the past ten years, the rate of uninsured population increased from 9.9 percent to 14.9 percent.

Health Disparities:

In Tennessee, obesity is more prevalent among non-Hispanic blacks at 40.9 percent than non-Hispanic whites at 30.5 percent and Hispanics at 30.3 percent. Diabetes also varies by race and ethnicity in the state; 12.2 percent of non-Hispanic blacks have diabetes compared to 10.5 percent of non-Hispanic whites and only 6.3 percent of Hispanics.

State Health Department Web Site: health.state.tn.us