Stroke Belt

The Stroke Belt, also called Stroke Alley, is a region of the southeastern United States identified by public health researchers for its persistently elevated rates of stroke and cardiovascular disease, typically comprising 11 states, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia, with Texas inclusion debated and North Florida and East Texas sometimes added on the basis of similarly high stroke mortality. The name follows the pattern of other American belt regions such as the Snowbelt and the Sun Belt, and the coastal plain of the Carolinas and Georgia, where stroke incidence is highest, is sometimes called the stroke buckle. In 1980 these eleven states had age adjusted stroke mortality more than 10 percent above the national average, and CDC data from 1991 to 1998 found South Carolina rate, at 169 per 100,000, far above New York 89 per 100,000. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/