The Key to Longevity? Your ZIP Code

The stark differences in life expectancy between Black, Latino, and white Americans have been well documented, but despite medical advances, that gap is widening. 

But the likely cause isn’t DNA — it’s your ZIP code. 

For the third consecutive year, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data show stark fluctuations in life expectancy based on where people live. While life expectancy increased for all major racial and ethnic groups, Black Americans still have a life expectancy of 72.8 years, compared to 77.5 years for white Americans and almost 85 years for Asian Americans. 

Research has found that life expectancy can vary by roughly 20 years depending on an individual’s race, ethnicity, and the economic conditions where they live.  

Getting a Bird’s Eye View By ZIP Code

Those kinds of health disparities drove the Equality Health Foundation to seek newer ways to solve this longstanding problem. 

“It’s important to have health insurance coverage. It’s important to be known by your doctor, or your healthcare provider. But your health assessment doesn’t start with a stethoscope. It starts with your address,” says Tomás León, the organization’s president. 

When EHF became aware of a 14-year life expectancy gap between affluent parts of its home state, Arizona, and the state’s most underserved area of South Phoenix, they launched a pilot that created the Zip Code Exam. 

The interactive online tool uses CDC and U.S. Census data to map health disparities across more than 30,000 U.S. ZIP codes. Individuals can input their ZIP code and see how socioeconomic factors, like income, education, and access to groceries and healthcare, are affecting their life expectancy.

“It’s all about pointing people to solutions as well, ” León says.  “So, we’re building out that section on the website, on the landing page for the ZIP Code exam to access resources and solutions. ” 

RELATED: Study: Life Expectancy of Black People Shortens

The community-specific data can be used to address problems like lack of access to healthcare, housing, and education. In its first week of use, the Zip Code Exam drew more than 200,000 visits and triggered 10,000 Community Health Reports sent directly to local officials. In cities such as Phoenix and Queens, New York, officials have already pledged to use the tool to help make public health planning and budgeting decisions. 

“In South Phoenix, for example, there’s not enough groceries that are affordable and accessible,” says León. “So, we are going to have to work with the local growers and farmers and distributors and grocery companies to create those solutions there in that community.”

There’s [also] a healthcare desert in South Phoenix. So, we need more access to community health centers,” León adds.

Dr. LaWanda DuPree, executive director of Family Tree Healthcare, believes the ZIP code information will help her better serve South Phoenix. The community health center works with underserved communities, experiencing firsthand the healthcare challenges her clients face — many of whom are low-income or have low educational attainment. 

Using Data for Grassroots Action

“Family Tree actually started in 2017 in my church,” DuPree says. “I was a new nurse practitioner. I had no intention of starting the clinic so soon. Unfortunately, what I found when I graduated with my family nurse practitioner degree is that there are a lot of predatory providers out there.”

DuPree found a building down the street from the church and opened the clinic there. 

“We exist because there are some major, major gaps in healthcare, and it is always for the brown and the Black skin that doesn’t sit well with me,” DuPree says. “I was raised by a nurse. There are people that just need help, and I was raised to help.”

The clinic’s located in a food desert, and diet-related diseases like diabetes and obesity are prevalent. So, DuPree’s approach to healthcare is hands-on. 

“When I say ‘care’ I’m talking about actual care where somebody will sit down, look at everything you have going on, treat the person, not just the symptoms, understand what medications you have,” she says.

As one of the most underserved regions in the country, and the most underserved in Arizona, finding startup funds was difficult. 

 She says she was “offered a lot of money to move our clinic to Scottsdale,” a higher-income area.

“Nothing about that interests me,” she says. “If I can be honest with you, it infuriated me, because why will you pour money into a place that doesn’t need money, but you refuse support into the communities that need it?” 

DuPree intends to use the ZIP code data to share information with local officials. 

“With the ZIP code project, there is an opportunity for us to take that power away from the shot callers, if you will, and to put that power back into [our] communities by saying, ‘No, we’re not going to Scottsdale. They don’t need another provider who is just going to cater to that population. What does this zip code need?’”

Both León and DuPree also worry about the impact of potential Medicaid cuts on preventive care and the need for grassroots efforts to address healthcare disparities. But they hope to help guide community members through any future changes.

“We’re putting powerful data into the hands of every American and giving them the tools to do something with it, and pointing them to solutions,” León says.