These Are the States With the Healthiest Pets. Is Yours One of Them?

Fact: Animals make our lives infinitely better.

(Think about it: Have you ever seen a cute kitty Youtube video that didn’t fill you with joy?…Didn’t think so…)

If you aren’t a pet parent, you might brush this off as biased hyperbole. But we’re not just saying this because we love pets: we’re saying this because SCIENCE. Case in point: recently, researchers have discovered that:

• Having a pet makes us happier and healthier humans;
• We actually get more satisfaction from our relationships with our pets than we do with other humans (hence why your brother seems to spend wayyy more time with Sir Fuzzytoes than with you); and,
• We feel the same amount of grief over the loss of a pet as we do over the loss of a human loved one…and sometimes even more so. 

Now, if you are a pet parent, you’re sitting there going, “Well…duh.”

In your eyes, your pet is your baby, your soulmate and your best friend all rolled into one. And, in return for all the love your pet gives you, you try to keep her as happy and healthy as possible — whether it’s by taking her out on regular walks, by feeding her good, nutritious food, or by enrolling her in a doggy day care to help her blow off some steam with her buddies during the day.

The question is: Are you living in a place that makes it easy to do this?

To figure this out, Care.com analysts looked at the data on pet care in each state, and ranked them across four different categories: an “Illness” rank, an “Access to Vet Care” rank, a “Healthy Environment” rank, and a “Total Pet Spend” rank. Then, the analysts combined these metrics into one all-encompassing “Pet Health” rank. The states that ranked the highest had a low prevalence of pet illnesses, higher access to veterinary care, healthier environments for pets, and higher pet-related spending (that didn’t involve the vet).

And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for…

Here are the 10 states with the healthiest pets!

Don’t see your state on that list? Then take a look at the chart below to see how it fared across each rank:

State	Prevalence of Illness Rank	Access to Vet Care Rank	Healthy Environment Rank	Total Pet Spend Rank	Overall Pet Health Rank
Montana	1	2	3	17	1
Nebraska	9	1	27	15	2
Colorado	2	6	45	2	3
New Mexico	6	6	33	28	4
New Hampshire	28	5	6	1	5
Idaho	13	3	38	36	6
South Dakota	2	16	20	46	7
Wyoming	13	8	12	26	8
North Dakota	2	38	17	28	9
Kansas	27	4	37	22	10
Minnesota	8	20	22	11	11
Wisconsin	11	14	25	20	12
Vermont	28	9	5	16	13
District of Columbia	20	44	1	9	14
Alaska	13	22	4	7	15
New Jersey	16	35	2	5	16
Connecticut	23	18	9	3	17
Maryland	22	15	23	8	18
Virginia	25	12	31	6	19
Illinois	10	29	26	14	20
Iowa	24	10	18	33	21
Massachusetts	20	26	11	4	22
Arizona	7	26	46	24	23
Nevada	5	41	39	34	24
Oregon	32	13	14	19	25
Utah	12	38	49	13	26
Maine	28	17	18	21	27
Rhode Island	17	48	15	12	28
Michigan	18	42	13	42	29
Hawaii	18	50	7	41	30
Washington	37	30	10	10	31
Missouri	36	23	28	27	32
California	31	30	50	25	33
Indiana	35	28	43	18	34
New York	33	47	8	28	35
Oklahoma	43	11	30	44	36
Pennsylvania	34	43	35	37	37
Kentucky	38	20	51	45	38
Delaware	42	35	16	23	39
Florida	43	19	29	35	40
West Virginia	25	51	21	50	41
North Carolina	46	24	36	32	42
Ohio	39	37	34	40	43
Georgia	40	30	41	39	44
Texas	41	34	44	38	45
Tennessee	47	33	42	43	46
Arkansas	43	49	24	49	47
South Carolina	48	45	47	31	48
Louisiana	50	38	32	48	49
Alabama	51	25	48	47	50
Mississippi	49	46	40	51	51

Methodology

This study considers all 50 states of the United States and the District of Colombia. The “Overall Pet Health Rank” was based on scores in four categories: Prevalence of Illness, Access to Vet Care, Healthy Environment, and Total Pet Spend:

• “Prevalence of Illness” includes the prevalence of the following diseases per 10,000 pets: Diabetes, Heartworm, Dental Disease, Ottis Externa, Fleas Tickets, Roundworm, Hookworm, Tapeworm, and Whipworm. Average lifespan is also included in this category. Data is from the Banfield State of Pet Health Report 2016.
• “Access to Vet Care” includes the number of veterinary offices and number of veterinary employees per household with pet. These data are based on the Census Bureau.
• “Healthy Environment” includes percent of protected land, percent of sheltered animals per household with pets, air quality, number of parks per household with pets, and WalkScore. These data come from United States Geological Survey, Shelter Animals Count, the American Lung Association: State of the Air 2016, StateParks.com, and WalkScore.com
• “Total Pet Spend” includes the number of pet businesses per household with pets, non-vet pet spending per household with pets, and average monthly pet insurance cost. With the exception of pet insurance cost, the more spending on pets and the higher the number of pet businesses per household with pets contribute to a higher ranking in this category. All dollar amounts are divided by the median income in the state to account for differences in the cost of living. These data are from the Census Bureau, and PetInsuranceQuotes.com.

Metrics in these categories were normalized on a scale from 0 to 100, and combined using a weighted average with the following weights: Prevalence of Illness (40%), Access to Vet Care (30%), Healthy Environment (20%), Non-Veterinary Pet-Related Expenditures (10%).

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