JACKSON, Miss.–Mississippi is doing better, said Dr. Dan Edney, state health officer, addressing the state Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee.
Speaking ahead of a report due out Thursday, Edney said the state’s obesity, diabetes rates and opioid deaths have all dropped.
“So we’re rescuing a lot of people. But, they’re still overdosing,” he said, displaying slides to go with each category. He said the state still needs to meet the responsibility of overcoming the disease of opioid addiction by addressing the root causes, not just giving people Narcan, to reverse the effects of an overdose, then putting them back on the street.
Mississippi improved from 50th to 45th in obesity.
“You might say 45th is not that great. Well, 45th is a huge swing,” he said. “Our trends have steadily gone down for four years now. Even through the pandemic we watched our obesity drop.”
Edney noted that a part of that is that overall people are fatter in the United States as a whol;e. But, some of the new numbers indicate Mississippi is gettin g a little thinner.
With diabetes rates improving, so is cardiovascular disease, though it remains the leading cause of death in the state. The next is cancer. Accidents are third.
Mississippi is still the unhealthiest state in the country, according to state health department stats.
