Study Shows When Violent Crime Rates Fall, Heart Disease Death Rates Drop, Too
While people are often encouraged to get healthier, the social determinants of health — conditions in which individuals are born, grow, live, work and age that are shaped by factors of oppression and privilege — can make that challenging. These conditions have been shown to contribute to health disparities, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).Now a new study, published on July 14 in the Journal of the American Heart Association, illustrates how exposure to violent crime can affect heart health.For the study, researchers looked at death rates for cardiovascular disease, stroke, and coronary artery disease in the 77 community areas of Chicago from 2000 to 2014, and compared them with violent crime rates in each area over the same period. During that 14-year period, researchers noticed a…