With 478.7 diagnoses per 100,000 population, Louisiana has the third highest cancer rate in the nation.
The data, released by 24/7 Wall St., a digital business news website which publishes more than 30 news articles per day, only last week released a report showing Louisiana as the fourth-worst education state in the nation.
The news doesn’t get any better with the state ranking 4th highest in the rate of cancer deaths per 100,000 population (186.1), 10th highest in lung cancer deaths per 100,000 population (68.8) and 7th highest in the number of adults who currently smoke (21.9 percent).
The only hint of good news, if one could call it that, was the breast cancer diagnoses per 100,000, (19th lowest) which was the most common incidence of cancer for the nation and for all but Louisiana and Mississippi.
Only Delaware (488.1) and Kentucky (513.7) had higher cancer rates than Louisiana. Delaware had the 5th highest rate of breast cancer diagnoses (136.9).
But Kentucky, in addition to having the highest overall cancer rate, also was highest in cancer deaths per 100,000 (199.1), lung cancer deaths per 100,000 (91.4) and in the number of adults who smoke (25.9 percent). Kentucky is also the 5th worst educated state
West Virginia, rated as the worst-educated state last week, had the 13th highest overall cancer rate, but was second in cancer death rate, lung cancer death rate and in the number of adult smokers.
And then there’s Mississippi, coming in last week as the second-worst educated state, right behind West Virginia with the 12th highest overall cancer rate, 3rd highest cancer death rate, and 4th highest in both lung cancer death rate and in the number of adult smokers.
Arkansas, the 3rd worst educated state, while only 17th in overall cancer rate, was 6th in overall cancer death rate, 3rd in both lung cancer death rate and the number of adult smokers.
In addition to having high cancer rates, low educational attainment, Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi and West Virginia are also among the poorest states in the nation.
Throw in Alabama, with its low educational ranking and high poverty figures (its cancer rates were somewhat better than its neighboring states) and there definitely appears to be a correlation between smoking-related cancer rates and poverty.
And there’s another statistic that goes right along with that: incarceration rates.
Louisiana, of course, leads the civilized world with 1,420 prisoners per 100,000 population but right behind Louisiana are Oklahoma (1,300), Mississippi (1,270), Alabama (1,230) Georgia (1,220), Texas (1,130) Arizona (1,090) and Arkansas (1,010).
Isn’t it funny how the same states keep popping up in these surveys?
Yet the politicians in each of these states—not to mention congress and whoever may happen to be president—continue to ignore the real problems while appeasing campaign contributors and pandering to the latest hot button political issue, be it immigration, crime, drugs, border walls, a minimum age for strippers, kneeling during the national anthem, the latest quick fix for education, open carry legislation, or ramping up the next non-winnable war.
Yet they somehow manage to overlook the root cause of most of our problems: poverty.
Where there’s poverty, there’s crime; where there’s poverty, there’s unemployment; where there’s poverty, there’s low educational achievement; where there’s poverty, there’re major health issues.
Do you think it mere coincidence that Hammond and Monroe rank as the 4th and 6th most dangerous cities, respectively, in America, according to 24/7 Wall Street? Or that Monroe (11th) and Hammond (32nd) are among the poorest cities in the U.S., according to the same source?
Is anyone embarrassed by the fact that also ranked among the poorest cities in the nation were Shreveport-Bossier City (9th), Lake Charles (28th), Houma-Thibodaux (25th) and Lafayette (36th)?
And where it can be found anywhere, it seems that political corruption thrives best in an environment of abject poverty. Where there is an atmosphere of poverty and desperation, where people care only about where their next meal is coming from and little else, corruption is free to breed.
Nursing homes prosper when their beds are full of old people. Nursing home operators contribute generously to political campaigns and bills to encourage home care for the elderly stall.
Sheriffs and private prisons rake in the dollars that prison labor brings through the door. Businesses get cheap prison labor via work release, plus a $2,000 tax credit for each prisoner they work. Consequently, the war on drugs continues so we can keep our prisons and jails filled to maximum capacity. It’s all about the penalties for drug use, not the treatment for the problem. That doesn’t fill the jails.
Rather than address the core problem of crime, we arm our police to the teeth with military weapons meant for war and mass destruction.
Yes, I am keenly aware of what happened in Las Vegas, but did all that military firepower accessible to law enforcement there prevent the attack?
Might tighter gun control laws governing the purchase of the kind of weapons the killer had at his disposal have made it a little more difficult for him to have executed 59 people with such ease? We’ll never know. Lawmakers refuse to address the issue because they quake in the presence of the NRA and they grovel for NRA campaign cash. They’re the NRA’s bitches.
Arming the 22,000 concert goers, would, in all likelihood, have produced far more casualties but that’s the approach of lawmakers and the NRA: more guns for everyone!
“Poverty? What poverty? Where? We don’t need to increase the minimum wage. Anyone can feed a family on $7.75 an hour.”
Only trouble is, that’s being said by those who don’t have to and never had to.
Why is it when horrible incident like Vegas happens, certain people start hammering gun control. The guns sit dorment till some ill person pick it up and uses it for the wrong reason. I remember back when liberals started talking gun control a long time ago, a frase came if guns are outlawed then only outlaws will have.
Well, that would be because every time something like Vegas happens, we are reminded of our obsession with guns. We are reminded we are the only civilized nation without some kind of restrictions on the types of guns people, like mentally disturbed individuals, can purchase. We are reminded that we are a violent nation. We are reminded that we kill more people with guns than any other country. We are reminded that here is yet another mass killing in what is supposed to be the safest country on the planet.
I invite you, instead of regurgitating the platitude about outlaws having guns, you do a little research into statistics of gun deaths in this country as compared to others. Here is one Link for you (there are many more—and they are not fake news, by the way): http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2013/09/19/u-s-has-more-guns-and-gun-deaths-than-any-other-country-study-finds/
I might also suggest that you brush up on your spelling so that you can spell “dormant” correctly and I don’t really know what “a frase came if guns are outlawed” even means.
I am not advocating taking everyone’s guns away from them. I do not hunt but I would not deprive hunters of their right to own weapons for that purpose. But why does anyone need an automatic weapon that can fire a dozen rounds per second. That’s not quite fair to Bambi, now is it?
Citizen, why is it the “outlaws” don’t seem to have so many guns in Canada, Sweden, England, and other countries with sane gun laws?
Interesting that no one has ever addressed that statistic.
There’s no logical reason for owning automatic assault weapons. If you can’t bring down a deer in two shots, you need to go home and take up chess or cross stitching as a hobby.
Turning your question around, Mr. Citizen, why is it when something like Vegas happens, the politicians bought and packaged by the NRA always say, “Now is not the time to talk about his”?
Why don’t you enlighten us as to just when is the time to discuss it?
Outstanding work Tom!!!
Great article, especially about the information on poverty which seems to get overlooked during every legislative session. Another great health travesty is obesity. Louisiana has the highest obesity rates in the country that births disease and chronic illness. A lot of health organizations and companies-Big Pharma- are getting rich keeping people sick in this state.
You are on the money Dmack about the Big Pharma—Hillary Clinton was getting paid a very large amount of money to be a speaker at the Phama conferences during the last Presidental election. Wonder why she went out her way to do that?
I agree with you that everyone is staying sick from prescription abuse and that is because the doctors continue to write the scripts and the pharmacist has to fill it by law. The end result is the pharmacy companies reap the awards.
Drain the whole swamp dry!!!
Please cite the links that show Clinton took money for speaker fees during the election. I really don’t think you will find any.
However there is this showing she got donations from people in the industry.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2015/10/16/hillary-clinton-takes-big-money-from-drug-industry-even-she-seeks-cap-costs/NG7vw5SnNAgFocqvSWwu2K/story.html
There is nothing that forces an individual to go fill a script if they don’t wish to do so. You always have the option of tearing the thing up.