Mississippi is making progress in several key public health areas but significant challenges remain, officials with the state Department of Health said Wednesday afternoon when unveiling their annual public health report card at the state capitol in Jackson.
State Health Officer Dr. Dan Edney, alongside his colleagues from MSDH and the Mississippi State Medical Association, used the 2025 Public Health Report Card to point to improvements in areas like decreasing opioid-related deaths and teen births while also showing areas like infant mortality and firearm deaths as categories that still rank worst in the U.S.
“We are encouraged by several areas in this report card, including the decreasing rates of opioid-related deaths, HIV, syphilis, congenital syphilis, teen births, and accidental deaths here in Mississippi,” Edney said. “Those significant decreases prove that our work is moving the needle in the right direction.
“We still have challenges to reduce preventable deaths in the areas of maternal and infant mortality, obesity, hypertension, and heart disease. We are making strides as our latest overall national health ranking puts Mississippi at 48, up from 50 just three years ago. While this new ranking shows promise, our goal is to not only get us off the bottom of national rankings, but to take us out of the conversation and become a model for how things can change.”
Positives
— The report card noted that opioid-related deaths are continuing to decline in Mississippi with a total of 301 in 2024. That number ranks Mississippi as the 10th-lowest in the nation for opioid-related deaths.
— Mississippi ranked third in the nation with its 2024-25 school-required vaccination rates being at over 97.6%.
— Teen births and accidental deaths are decreasing. Teen births went from 24.9 per 1,000 females in 2023 to 22.8 per 1,000 females in 2024. Accidental deaths went from 81.4 per 100,000 people in 2023 to 74.2 per 100,000 people in 2024.
— HIV decreased from 2023 to 2024, going from 21.3 cases per 100,000 people to 15.5 cases per 100,000 people. Syphilis decreased from 2023 to 2024, going from 30.1 cases per 100,000 people to 21.3 cases per 100,000 people. Congenital syphilis decreased from 2023 to 2024, going from 377.8 cases per 100,000 residents to 264.1 cases per 100,000 residents.
Negatives
— Heart disease remains the top killer in Mississippi, according to the report card, with 291.7 out of every 100,000 residents dying from it in 2024. That was a slight increase from the 287.5 mark in 2023.
— In 2024, more people died (35,245) in Mississippi than were born (33,471).
— In 2024, a total of 810 people died in Mississippi from firearm-related deaths, placing the state with the highest firearm-related mortality rate in the U.S.
— Tuberculosis increased from 2023 to 2024, going from 1.4 cases per 100,000 people to 1.7 cases per 100,000 people.
— Mississippi still ranks near the bottom in per-capita categories such as infant mortality (No. 50), maternal mortality (No. 49), obesity (No. 49), hypertension (No. 49), and diabetes (No. 46).