Realty Times: Cell Phone Only Households Vs. Others

June 4, 2007

Cell Phone Only Households Vs. Others
by Broderick Perkins

The Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently checked households for cell phone use, but not because of fears over the radio frequency energy they emit.

The survey also wasn't to advise households to have a hard-wired land-line for emergencies -- something emergency preparedness experts do advise in case an emergency knocks out cell phone transmitters.

The CDC checked households to determine if they used only cell phones as a practical matter, for the sake of accuracy in gathering statistical data. CDC reasoned, given the growing numbers of homes that only use cell phones, if cell phone owners aren't included in health studies (or other surveys, for that matter) conducted by phone, the results could be skewed.

In 2003, only 1 out of every 28 adults lived in wireless-only (cell phone) household, by the end of 2006, one out of every eight adults lived in wireless-only households.

Given the startling health-related differences between households that use only cell phones and those that don't, it's a good thing the CDC bothered to check.

The Center's statistical arm, the National Center for Health Statistics, in "Wireless Substitution: Preliminary Data from the January-June 2006 National Health Interview Survey" compared "wireless-only households," (those with no working landline phones) and "landline households," (those with just landlines or cell phones and landlines) for the period between July through December 2006.

Household telephone status information was obtained for 13,056 households, which included 24,473 adults aged 18 years and over and 9,165 children aged 17 years or younger.

The study found that adults in wireless-only households were more likely than those in landline households to say they binge drink, smoke, don't have health insurance, experienced financial barriers to obtaining health care and don't have a regular place to go for health care.

Despite those admitted habits, adults in wireless-only adults were also more likely than landline users to report that their health status was excellent or very good, that they aren't obese and that they have not been diagnosed with diabetes.

By the numbers, the report found;

The prevalence of binge drinking (five or more alcoholic drinks during one day during the past year) among wireless-only adults was 35.9 percent, twice as high as the prevalence among adults living in landline households, 17.2 percent.

Nearly 30 percent of wireless households contained smokers, compared to 18 percent of landliners.

More than 29 percent of landline households had adults who received a flu shot during the past year compared to 14.8 percent of wireless phone households.

More than 86 percent of landline households said they had a usual place to go for medical care, compared to 67.1 percent among wireless households.

Nearly 7 percent of landline households failed to obtain needed medical care because of cost, compared to 14 percent of wireless households.

While more than 85 percent of landline households carried health insurance, only 68 percent of wireless households did likewise.

Appearing to run counter to claims about their health care habits, the healthiness of adults in wireless households was more often reported, by adults in those households, as better, on some counts, than the health of those in landline households.

Among wireless-only households, 34.4 percent said they engaged in regular physical activity, compared to 30.4 for landline households.

More than 68 percent of wireless households said their health is excellent or very good, compared to about 60 percent of landline households.

Only 22.3 percent of wireless households acknowledged obesity in adults in the home, compared to 27.9 percent of landline households.

However, wireless households appeared more concerned about HIV -- 46.8 said they were tested for HIV, while only 34.6 percent of landline households had adults tested for HIV.

The study gave no reason for the disparity in health issues and concerns in landline households vs. cell phone households, but demographics may be a key.

Approximately 26 million adults and 8.5 million kids live in households with only wireless telephones.

More than one-half of all adults living with unrelated roommates (54.0 percent) lived in households with only wireless telephones.

Adults renting their home (26.4 percent) were more likely than adults owning their home (5.8 percent) to be living in households with only wireless telephones.

One-half of all wireless-only adults were less than 30 years of age. One in four adults aged 18-24 years (25.2 percent) lived in households with only cell phones.

Nearly 30 percent of adults aged 25-29 years lived in households with only wireless telephones.

Men (13.1 percent) were more likely than women (10.5 percent) to be living in households with only wireless telephones.

Adults living in poverty (22.4 percent) were more likely than higher income adults to be living in households with only wireless telephones.

Adults living in the South (14.0 percent) were more likely than adults living in the Northeast (8.6 percent) to be living in households with only wireless telephones. In the Midwest it was 11.4 percent and 11.0 percent of those in the West lived in wireless households.

Non-Hispanic white adults (10.8 percent) were less likely than Hispanic adults (15.3 percent) to be living in households with only wireless telephones. For blacks the number was 12.8 percent, for Asians 11.8 percent of those surveyed lived in wireless households.

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