Here Are The Healthiest (& Least Healthy) Places To Live In The U.S.
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You might have found a decent farmer's market, and maybe you do yoga in your living room, but could a healthy lifestyle be more accessible if you lived in a different state? If you're wondering how your state stacks up against others when it comes to wellness, wonder no further: The latest results from the annual Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index are in. To come up with the rankings, Gallup pollsters conducted more than 2.3 million surveys throughout 2015, interviewing roughly 177,000 people about their well-being.
The newest Well-Being Index report reveals that, as a country, our overall scores didn't change much in 2015 (on a scale of 0 to 100, we scored a 61.7 collectively) compared to 2014 (when we scored 61.6). But they did pinpoint a few positive trends in certain areas: Americans are in a better place financially, fewer people are uninsured, and smoking rates are at their lowest since the first Well-Being Index in 2008.
As always, the researchers focused on five major areas of well-being: social, financial, community, physical, and "purpose." That last one may seem out of left field, but it underscores how comprehensive the index is; a sense of purpose is an often overlooked component of health and well-being. In fact, a 2014 study from the The Lancet (also relying in part on Gallup polling data) found that people who feel their lives have meaning tend to live longer than those with a lower sense of well-being.
Ahead, you'll find the top 10 healthiest states, followed by the bottom 10. Check it out to see if your state earned bragging rights — or could use some improvement. You can also find the full report here.
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