CDC PLACES (Local Health Estimates)

CDC PLACES (Population Level Analysis and Community Estimates, formerly the 500 Cities Project) publishes model-based estimates of chronic disease, health behaviors, and prevention measures for small geographies — counties, places, ZIP codes, and census tracts. It is the source of the local health-prevalence indicators (obesity, diabetes, smoking, and similar) in this Commons.

Publisher

U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention open_in_new

License

Public domain

Coverage

Base Data Commons graph

Updates

Yearly

Source & License

Publisher: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the CDC Foundation.
Access: Published at cdc.gov/places; served into this Commons through the Google Data Commons base graph.
License: Public domain. A work of the U.S. Government, free to use and redistribute with attribution to CDC PLACES.

Methodology

Model-based small-area estimates: PLACES does NOT survey every county. It takes the CDC's Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) survey and, using multilevel regression with poststratification against Census population data, projects prevalence down to small areas. The numbers are statistical estimates, not direct counts.
What the estimates mean: a value is the model's estimate of the share of adults with a condition or behavior in that area, not a measured rate.
Vintage: released annually; each release is labeled by its data year and uses the most recent available BRFSS and Census inputs.

Coverage & caveats

Geographies: counties, incorporated places, ZIP-code tabulation areas, and census tracts.
Estimates, not measurements: because they are modeled from a national survey, PLACES values are best read as well-grounded approximations for small areas, and small differences between places may not be meaningful.
Adults only: measures are for the adult population (typically 18+).

Variables (3)

Variable	Source table
Adult obesity Percent of person (years 18 onwards, obesity). Population personMeasured percentStatistic measured valueage years 18 onwardshealth behavior obesity graph node	PLACES model-based prevalence
Adult diabetes Percent of person (years 18 onwards, diabetes). Population personMeasured percentStatistic measured valueage years 18 onwardshealth outcome diabetes graph node	PLACES model-based prevalence
Adult smoking Percent of person (years 18 onwards, smoking). Population personMeasured percentStatistic measured valueage years 18 onwardshealth behavior smoking graph node	PLACES model-based prevalence