How does that make it meaningless? Yes, certain segments of the population are even more underserved than others, but that’s just more evidence for the fact that we’re doing a crap job of keeping people healthy.
For one thing, it makes the title a bit deceptive. If the variance in lifespan is actually caused by something other than location, then where you live doesn’t actually affect your lifespan.
Because race is genetic and genetic variations lead to wildly disparate "outcomes." Your zip code is one of the weakest influences on your health and lifespan, relative to other scientifically proven factors.
> How does that make it meaningless? Yes, certain segments of the population are even more underserved than others, but that’s just more evidence for the fact that we’re doing a crap job of keeping people healthy.
Because by not breaking out the single largest compounding factor, it's masking the real problem underlying this issue: there's a massive disparity in outcomes for people of different races.
Race in fact does play a big factor in health disparities. For example, African Americans are at much higher risk for heart health related issues. And when heart disease is the number 1 killer of people of all races.. well that just doesn't bode well for the life expectancy of AA.
And it's not just because minority populations have worse access to healthcare. There are in fact genetic components that predispose different races to different diseases.
Japanese people, Glaucoma.
AA, heart disease.
White people, Celiac.
Basically there's multiple components: Race, Healthcare access, Poverty, Education, Local Cultural proclivities for: diet, exercise, etc.