Fun with local health statistics

How healthy are the residents in the county where you live? Do the local residents eat lots of fruits and vegetables? Is there a low incidence of obesity? What percentage of the local population smokes? You can easily find this information through several health statistics web sites. The Community Health Status Indicators (CHSI) site allows users to view data for any county in the United States. The site is a partnership between federal agencies and several private non-profit organizations. The data is obtained from a number of federal agencies including the Department of Health and Human Services, Environmental Protection Agency, Census Bureau, and Department of Labor. You can even easily generate a 12-page booklet with the data and graphics for your county. After selecting the state and then the county you which to examine, select the Print Full Report option on the right side of the screen and your booklet will automatically be formatted!

Another site that makes a game out of comparing one city (really the county) against another on several health and quality of life measures is Community Clash, provided by MeYou Health, a private well-being company that encourages people to pursue, achieve and maintain a healthy life through education and fun. Play Community Clash and see how your city compares to the rival city of your choice!

There's an App for the OECD Factbook 2010

Several weeks ago we noted that the World Bank Group opened their data to all. Now the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is making their OECD Factbook 2010 freely accessible through a downloadable app available for your mobile device. The OECD Factbook is arranged by 12 themes such as population and migration, macroeconomic trends, and globalization. Each indicator includes a table showing the latest available data for the 30 OECD countries, and data for Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Russian Federation and South Africa where available. The data in the OECD Factbook are available in several formats. The mobile app for the OECD Factbook 2010 can be freely downloaded at the App Shopper site.

[image and information from OECD and App Shopper sites]

World Bank Group opens data to all

The World Bank Group now provides free access to more than 2,000 financial, business, health, economic and human development statistics that had mostly been available only to paying subscribers in the past.

This means that researchers, journalists, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), entrepreneurs and school children alike will be able to tap into the World Bank's databases via a new website at data.worldbank.org

The World Bank's open data initiative has the potential to stimulate more evidence-based policymaking in developing countries by bringing more researchers and innovative analysis into the development process. The move might also stimulate demand for data and increase countries' capacity to produce it.

For the first time, data will also be available in languages other than English, with an initial 330 indicators translated into French, Spanish and Arabic. Read more at http://go.worldbank.org/MZ29WQLWK0

Image from Wikimedia Commons