Quantcast

The DNAinfo archives brought to you by WNYC.
Read the press release here.

Child Asthma Rates Higher in Central Brooklyn Than Citywide Average: DOH

By Rosa Goldensohn | October 16, 2015 10:33am | Updated on October 18, 2015 3:59pm
 The area ranked worse than two-thirds of city neighborhoods for child asthma hospitalizations.
The area ranked worse than two-thirds of city neighborhoods for child asthma hospitalizations.
View Full Caption
Shutterstock

FORT GREENE — Central Brooklynites face childhood asthma, drug and alcohol hospitalization and premature death at higher rates than the rest of the city, according to city health department profiles released Wednesday.

But they drink less sugary soda and had a better infant mortality rate than the citywide average.

Here are other findings from the DOH's report:

► Downtown Brooklyn neighborhoods have worse air pollution rates than the city average and high child asthma rates — 50 child asthma hospitalizations per 10,000 children, as opposed to 32 in Brooklyn and 36 citywide.

The rate was 8 times that of the best-ranked neighborhood, Borough Park, according to a new neighborhood profile from the city health department.

► Locals drink fewer sugary drinks than the average New Yorker. Nineteen percent of residents drink one 12-ounce sugary beverage or more a day, compared to 27 percent citywide.

► Area residents had more drug-related hospitalizations and alcohol-realted hospitalizations than in other parts of the city.

► Preterm births were 80 percent more common in the area than in midtown Manhattan, the report said. But the infant mortality rate was better than the city average.

► Nineteen percent of locals are current smokers, a similar rate to the rest of the city.

► The premature mortality rate, signifying death before age 65, was higher in Fort Greene and surrounding areas than citywide, and almost three times worse than the top-ranked Financial District.

► One in five residents of Brooklyn’s community district 2, which encompasses DUMBO, Clinton Hill, Boerum Hill as well as Fort Greene and Brooklyn Heights, lives below the federal poverty level. (Poverty has been consistently linked with increased health problems in multiple studies.)

The area, which includes Brooklyn’s most expensive condo and its most expensive real estate listing, a $40 million mansion in Brooklyn Heights, ranks on par with they city's poverty average, 21 percent.

Check out the report on the health department's website.