Find out whether your state is prepared for an outbreak

Do you live in Maine, Kentucky, Delaware, Virginia or New York? If yes, congratulations!

According to a new report from the TFAH (Trust for America’s Health) your state has tied for the top billing as far as diagnosing, responding to and preventing disease outbreaks are concerned.

The TFAH has created a special scoring system based on data collected from the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention. The scoring system has a range of metrics including HIV/AIDS and food safety surveillance, rates of flu vaccination, etc. The TFAH evaluated each of the 50 US states to find out how well equipped they are.

The report has also put light on procedures that can be adopted by the entire nation for performing better in the area of preventive health. However, here, it must be mentioned that we might need to wait for quite some time for seeing the entire country scoring impressively in this area.

Recently obtained numbers suggest that around 1 in every 25 people who get hospitalized every year, develops a healthcare associated infection. What’s even more alarming is that such infections cause nearly 75,000 deaths a year. That’s not all; just nine states managed to take steps for reducing that number between the years 2012 and 2013.

The statistics gathered by researchers creating this new report also revealed that around 1 in 4 preschoolers are not getting all the recommended vaccinations. The report has more worrying statistics in store for you. Between the fall of 2014 and the spring of 2015, just 18 out of 50 states managed to get 50% of their population vaccinated for the flu.

When it comes to managing outbreaks, the top five contenders managed to score 8 out of 10. The seven states at the bottom, on the other hand, managed to secure just 3 points out of 10. The 7 states, which according to the TFAH report have the worst rank when it comes to managing outbreaks, are Kansas, Idaho, Oklahoma, Ohio, Oregon, Michigan, and Utah.

http://www.thehoopsnews.com/2015/12/17/9882/wen-hair-care-products-accused-of-causing-serious-hair-fall/

TFAH’s executive director Dr. Jeffrey Levi said that following the dramatic outbreaks of recent times, for instance, the Ebola epidemic of 2015, the country is looking to mobilize its public health efforts quickly and in an extremely intense way. However, he didn’t forget to add that once news of outbreaks starts fading, people start becoming complacent.

According to Levi, we should stop focusing on exotic and new emerging concerns and put our best efforts for preventing the current disease burdens.

The report revealed that as far as food safety is concerned, quite a few states are doing much better. It further informed that the biggest concern for the country now is antibiotic-resistant infections or superbugs.