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County community health associations of net voting shift in the 2016 U.S. presidential election

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  • Jason H Wasfy
  • Charles Stewart III
  • Vijeta Bhambhani

Abstract

Importance: In the U.S. presidential election of 2016, substantial shift in voting patterns occurred relative to previous elections. Although this shift has been associated with both education and race, the extent to which this shift was related to public health status is unclear. Objective: To determine the extent to which county community health was associated with changes in voting between the presidential elections of 2016 and 2012. Design: Ecological study with principal component analysis (PCA) using principal axis method to extract the components, then generalized linear regression. Setting: General community. Participants: All counties in the United States. Exposures: Physically unhealthy days, mentally unhealthy days, percent food insecure, teen birth rate, primary care physician visit rate, age-adjusted mortality rate, violent crime rate, average health care costs, percent diabetic, and percent overweight or obese. Main outcome: The percentage of Donald Trump votes in 2016 minus percentage of Mitt Romney votes in 2012 (“net voting shift”). Results: Complete public health data was available for 3,009 counties which were included in the analysis. The mean net voting shift was 5.4% (+/- 5.8%). Of these 3,009 counties, 2,641 (87.8%) had positive net voting shift (shifted towards Trump) and 368 counties (12.2%) had negative net voting shift (shifted away from Trump). The first principal component (“unhealthy score”) accounted for 68% of the total variance in the data. The unhealthy score included all health variables except primary care physician rate, violent crime rate, and health care costs. The mean unhealthy score for counties was 0.39 (SD 0.16). Higher normalized unhealthy score was associated with positive net voting shift (22.1% shift per unit unhealthy, p

Suggested Citation

  • Jason H Wasfy & Charles Stewart III & Vijeta Bhambhani, 2017. "County community health associations of net voting shift in the 2016 U.S. presidential election," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(10), pages 1-11, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0185051
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0185051
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Christopher Ojeda, 2015. "Depression and Political Participation," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 96(5), pages 1226-1243, November.
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    1. Wasfy, Jason H. & Healy, Emma W. & Cui, Jinghan & Stewart, Charles, 2020. "Relationship of public health with continued shifting of party voting in the United States," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 252(C).
    2. Gollust, Sarah E. & Haselswerdt, Jake, 2021. "A crisis in my community? Local-level awareness of the opioid epidemic and political consequences," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 291(C).
    3. Gregori Galofre-Vila & Maria Gomez-Leon & David Stuckler, 2021. "A Lesson from History? The 1918 Inuenza pandemic and the rise of Italian Fascism: A cross-city quantitative and historical text qualitative analysis," Documentos de Trabajo - Lan Gaiak Departamento de Economía - Universidad Pública de Navarra 2102, Departamento de Economía - Universidad Pública de Navarra.

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