How Healthy Is Tampa Bay?

A regional economic development group on Wednesday unveiled what may be the first of its kind: an eight-county assessment of the state of health in the greater Tampa Bay area.

That alone is a great contribution to the area. But the goal of the Tampa Bay Partnership's regional health project is not limited to improving the quality of people's health. Ultimately, the group hopes to be able to pitch Tampa Bay as a healthier place full of trimmer, more energetic people and use that message to recruit businesses.

We have some work to do.

The report — How Healthy Is Tampa Bay? — is compelling, and often alarming. The good news? Our regional death rate for stroke is much lower than the nation's. The more abundant bad news? Deaths in Tampa Bay from suicide and lung cancer are greater than the state and the nation. More Tampa Bay residents are diagnosed with diabetes than people are nationally. Motor vehicle deaths, plus pedestrian and bicycle traffic deaths are all "alarmingly high," says Denise Remus, BayCare Health System chief quality officer, who is involved with the regional health assessment.

Finally, the new report finds the ranks of the uninsured are much higher in the Tampa Bay area, at 28 percent, than for the nation, at 22 percent.

"Tampa Bay is failing in some key areas of health, and that comes at a great cost to our personal and economic history," says Tampa Bay Partnership president Stuart Rogel. . 

To get regional feedback, Lynda Leedy, project manager for the regional heath assessment project, helped survey 150 area companies.

Three survey responses most struck me:

• 74 percent of employers said they have a responsibility to improve the health of their workers. (That's good!)

• Stopping smoking and losing weight are the two most common targets of employer programs. (That makes sense.)

• When asked — "Comparing 2009 to 2007, has your organization documented any improvement in employee health?" — almost four of five companies, 79.1 percent, answered "No."

Let that be a reminder of how tough it is to affect health on a large scale in short order.

Lately, the Tampa Bay Partnership is best known for supporting attempts to fund a regional light rail and bus system in Hillsborough County and backing the planned high-speed rail project from Tampa to Orlando. Both projects fizzled.

Still, the partnership did not decide to conduct a regional health assessment out of the blue. It is part of a long-term "visioning" effort dubbed One Bay that seeks ways to improve the quality of life, including jobs, housing, education and health by the middle of this century.

Next, the partnership will reach out to community groups to rally support for better health.

Will it work? At minimum, the health report gives Tampa Bay a baseline to measure gains, or losses, in regional health in the coming years.

More than a few of us won't be around by 2050 to see if One Bay delivers on making Tampa Bay a place so healthy that it will attract new businesses. But it's a first step.