Mississippi has been crowned the unhealthiest state in the U.S., according to data collected on national rates of obesity, diabetes, heart disease and stroke.
Sometimes referred to under the umbrella term "metabolic disease," these four conditions are known to be linked.
A research team at LookMeds—a patient management company specializing in weight-loss medication—used data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the American Diabetes Association (ADA) in order to rank each state and the District of Columbia to find America's health crisis hotspots.
Mississippi was top of their leaderboard because it consistently performed poorly, with the second highest rates of all four conditions in the U.S.
In numbers, Mississippi had obesity rates of 40.1 percent and diabetes rates of 15.3 percent, as well as 248 heart disease deaths per 100,000 people per year and 54.2 stroke deaths per 100,000 people per year.
According to the CDC, 41.9 percent of adults and 19.7 percent of children have obesity in the U.S.—based on data from 2017 to 2020—and severe obesity affects 9.2 percent of adults.
Meanwhile, the ADA says that 11.6 percent of Americans have diabetes nationally, according to data from 2023, the vast majority of whom have type 2 diabetes, which is related to lifestyle and diet.
LookMeds gave their second place to Alabama—with 39.2 percent obesity, 14.9 percent diabetes, and the third highest rates of heart disease mortality (234.2 per 100,000) and stroke mortality (51.1 per 100,000) in the country—and in third came Louisiana.
West Virginia had the highest rates of both obesity and diabetes in the U.S.—at 41.2 percent and 15.9 percent, respectively—but did slightly better on heart disease and stroke, so was only fourth place overall.
In fifth place was Arkansas, and other states in the unhealthiest top 10 were Tennessee, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Ohio and South Carolina, in that order.
At the other end of the spectrum was Colorado, which was the best all-rounder and had the lowest national rates of diabetes at 6.9 percent. Only 24.9 percent of Colorado residents had obesity, and its heart disease and stroke mortality rates were comparatively low too, at 131.4 and 33.8 people per 100,000, respectively.
Also in the top five were Massachusetts, Vermont, Hawaii and Minnesota. The latter had the lowest rates of heart disease mortality, at 124.1 per 100,000 people.
The District of Columbia had the lowest prevalence of obesity in the country, and New York State had the lowest stroke mortality rates.
From sixth to 10th place, in terms of the healthiest states, came Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Utah and Connecticut—in that order.
Similar maps featured by Newsweek include a map showing the states Robert F. Kennedy Jr. might target with health policies first, a map showing obesity data from the CDC in September 2024, and a map that indicates the states where a healthy lifestyle is easiest to follow.
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