Report: Grim statistics on King County's Pacific Islanders

Local Pacific Islanders are more likely than other King County ethnic groups to smoke, to have babies who are premature and unhealthy, and to die young, according a study that isolates the demographic for the first time. They're also more likely to be obese and poor.

The King County Public Health report, announced Saturday at a cultural festival in White Center, is the first to study the county's 15,000 Pacific Islanders as a distinct group. Previously, they were categorized with all Asians, which researchers said tended to bury the alarming figures.

Festival organizers said the report will help rally the community to improve health behaviors and to advocate for special resources and support.

"Before, our health issues were invisible," said Pastor Mabel Fatialofa-Magalei, director of PASEFIKA, a social-service agency that sponsored the festival. "Now we can clearly see the health disparities that exist in our community."

Compared with other King County residents, adult Pacific Islanders are 1 ½ times more likely to smoke and twice as likely to be obese, the report says. Pacific Islander children are twice as likely to live in poverty, and also are more likely to smoke and be overweight.

Pacific Islander infants more frequently have unusually low or high birth weights, are born prematurely or born to teen mothers, and receive late prenatal care or none at all.

Also, the annual mortality rate for local Pacific Islanders is 60 percent higher than the county population as a whole, the study says.

Compounding these risks, 17 percent of Pacific Islanders lack health insurance, compared with 13 percent of all King County adults.

"A lot of us don't go to the doctor for that reason," said festivalgoer Tonu Moe, a custodial worker and mother of eight, who said she is insured.

The availability of statistics specific to Pacific Islanders was made possible by revised federal guidelines for how to collect racial and ethnic data.

Because the change is only a few years old, there was not yet enough data for some indicators, such as infant mortality.

Alongside booths hawking fried Pacific specialties, two clinics had set up stations to take people's vital signs and help them find access to care.

"Today will be the last day we go eat all that food," Fatialofa-Magalei said, "and then tomorrow is a new day."

Isaac Arnsdorf: 206-464-2397 or iarnsdorf@seattletimes.com