Warren County bumped up a few places in the 2019 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s County Health Rankings and Roadmaps.

Out of Kentucky’s 120 counties, Warren County ranked 13th for overall health outcomes – up from 21st in 2018.

It’s not because residents are suddenly eating more vegetables and riding bikes to work, however.

The health outcome ranking is separated into two categories: length of life and quality of life. From 2018 to 2019, Warren County’s estimated number of premature deaths – which is the sole length of life indicator – increased slightly from 7,600 to 7,700. But that increase was slower than other counties around the state – leading to a ranking boost.

“During the past five years, Warren County has been holding steady, whereas other counties have been (reporting) more premature deaths,” said Amanda Jovaag, the Rankings Team director at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Warren County is actually “doing a little worse than Kentucky as a whole for quality of life,” Jovaag said, but she added that the county might be poised for better health in the future with active measures.

In addition to the obvious factors of smoking, drinking and obesity, health influencers such as clean air, clean water, high-quality housing and access to active transit (walking or biking) contribute to the quality of life ranking.

“Ranking is important. What it does is draw attention to the multiple factors that influence health,” Jovaag said. “It’s kind of an annual checkup.”

Warren County retained several quality of life indicators: 19 percent of adults smoke, 32 percent of adults are obese and 15 percent of adults excessively drink – and 28 percent of driving-related deaths involved alcohol. More than 80 percent of adults still drive to work alone, and 16 percent of residents experience severe housing problems.

There were several worsening measures. Sexually transmitted infections increased, access to exercise decreased from 64 percent to 55 percent and air pollution increased.

And there were improvements. The food environment index (ranked up to 10) increased slightly, the rate of uninsured dropped from 8 percent to 6 percent, the high school graduation rate increased from 93 percent to 96 percent – which matches the best in the nation – and the number of children in poverty decreased from 23 percent to 19 percent.

It takes measures from across the spectrum to boost healthy lifestyles in Warren County. Western Kentucky University professor of public health Cecilia Watkins believes offering health services through workplaces – especially small businesses with limited resources – is one way.

If people learn how to eat better and exercise at work, they’ll take that information home to their families and triple or quadruple the efforts, according to Watkins.

“If you look at the big picture, look at how many people work. You’re going to reach so much of the population,” she said.

For many of the health issues, such as obesity and smoking, Kentucky lacks the necessary healthy policy or access to health services to see significant improvement. “We have a lot of challenges in this state,” Watkins said.

But slowly, “things are happening,” she added.

– To view the entire report, visit countyhealthrankings.org/kentucky.