News
New Reports Provide Compelling Data on Senior Health and Retirement Preparedness
Looking for data to support your programs and advocacy efforts? United Health Foundation released the fifth America's Health Rankings Senior Report, which provides a comprehensive analysis of senior population health on a national and state-by-state basis across 34 measures of senior health.
The report is intended to promote widespread awareness of where states stand on important public health measures and to drive action toward activities proven to improve population health.
Accompanying this report, and in partnership with the Alliance for Aging Research, the Foundation also released a new analysis on current and future seniors' preparedness for health care costs in retirement.
Among the key findings:
- Seniors are seeing notable improvements in care quality and outcomes since 2013, including declines in preventable hospitalizations, hospital readmissions and hospital deaths.
- About three out of four non-retired adults age 50-64 and 62 percent of retired seniors age 65+ have less in total retirement savings than what experts recommend saving for health care costs alone.
- Half of retired seniors age 65+ and 36 percent of non-retired adults age 50-64 are unsure about how much to save to cover both anticipated as well as unexpected health care costs.
- Minnesota ranks as the healthiest state for seniors, followed by Utah (2), Hawaii (3), Colorado (4), and New Hampshire (5). Mississippi ranks as the state with the greatest opportunity for improvement this year, followed by Kentucky (49), Oklahoma (48), Louisiana (47), and Arkansas (46).