Data: Sioux City residents have the shortest life expectancy in Iowa

Sioux City residents have the shortest life expectancy of any city in Iowa, according to data collected by 24/7 Wall Street.

In a report published Wednesday, 24/7 Wall Street — a website that covers news about business, politics, and technology — said the average life expectancy in Sioux City is 78.8 years. That's the same as the national average, per the National Center for Health Statistics, despite declining last year for the first time in more than two decades.

Across Iowa, however, the average length of life is 79.7 years, 24/7 Wall Street said — 16th best in the U.S.

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When collecting data for the report, 24/7 Wall Street said it reviewed 2014 county-level life expectancy at birth figures provided by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. Researchers also used death records from the National Center for Health Statistics and estimated age-specific mortality rates for U.S. counties from 1985 to 2014.

Next, 24/7 Wall Street said it mapped counties to corresponding metro areas and calculated the average life expectancy. Those estimates were then weighted by five-year population figures from the 2014 American Community Survey, it said.

According to 24/7 Wall Street's report, life expectancy is at its highest in Naples-Immokalee-Marco Island, Florida, at 83.4 years. It's at its lowest in Gadsden, Alabama, at 73.9 years.

You can read the full report here.

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