Appalachia

http://www.wdtv.com/wdtv.cfm?func=view&section=5-News&item=Appalachias-Health-Problems-A-Matter-Of-Access-17453
Appalachia's Health Problems A Matter Of Access
Written by Rachel McDevitt
August 08, 2014

This week, the director of the Center for Disease Control visited the Appalachian region of Kentucky, one of the unhealthiest areas in the country, to see what measures could be taken to battle rising obesity and other negative health trends.

The Mountain State shares many of the same health challenges as our neighbor. Public health officials said they've been trying to fight the same unhealthy behaviors for years, but poor access to transportation and high medical costs combined with a low socio-economic population act as barriers to proper health care. They said identifying those barriers is the easy part; it's figuring out how to fix them that is giving them problems.

"Some of the behaviors we're dealing with now, we've been doing forever but we're trying to improve, like obesity, decreasing smoking rates, alcoholism, drug abuse," said Lloyd White, administrator for the Marion County Health Department. "So we try to work on prevention, hopefully to get folks to change behaviors. And we can educate all day, but that doesn't mean they're going to change behaviors."

Health officials said for a change to happen, healthy behaviors need to start in the home.