by Joe Piasecki
Pasadena Sun
It takes more than medicine to keep a city healthy, according to a report issued Monday by the Pasadena Health Department.
The 2012 Pasadena/Altadena Quality-of-Life Index examines a broad range of health indicators, from the availability of fresh vegetables to unemployment rates, and from air pollution to the number of library books in circulation.
“What makes you healthy isn’t simply what you eat," Public Health Director Eric Walsh said Monday. "It isn’t how much you walk or run. It isn’t the genes you were born with. It’s all the things around that: How far is it for you to get to healthy food? How safe are the parks you play in? How good is the education system? How easy is it to find a job and, once you get that job, what are the wages?”
Among more traditional health indicators, the report states that about 25% of adults in Pasadena between the ages of 18 and 64 lack health insurance, straining area health care agencies and exceeding national uninsured rates by 4%.
