Sturgis is the largest community in Meade County. In a 2013 wellness report, the University of Wisconsin’s Population Health Institute ranked Meade County 34th of 57 South Dakota counties studied. The primary care physician to patient ratio was 1,696:1, far below the national benchmark of 1,067:1. Nineteen percent of adults reported themselves as smokers. Residents reported similar rates of poor physical and mental health days when compared to the state average. Rates of adult obesity and excessive drinking were well below the statewide average. The teen birth rate was just below the statewide rate. Like the state as a whole, 14 percent of the adults in Meade County did not have health insurance. To compare Meade County data to other counties, visit the site created by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin.

County-level health statistics are also available from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services and allow you to compare Meade County to similar counties in the United States and to the national median.