PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island has the lowest rate of relying only a wireless service for their telephone calls in the nation, at 12.8 percent, tying only New Jersey.
According to “Wireless Substitution: State-level Estimates From the National Health Interview Survey,” 17.8 percent of Rhody residents rely only on their landlines and 27.8 percent have both a landline and a wireless service; 1.5 percent have no telephone service.
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The survey, highest rates of wireless-only consumers were in Arkansas, 35.2 percent, Mississippi, 35.1 percent, and Texas 32.5 percent.
Ranking just ahead of Rhode Island and New Jersey was Connecticut at 13.6 percent for wireless-only households. Other Northeastern states with wireless-only prevalence below 17 percent were: New Hampshire, 16 percent, Pennsylvania, 16.5 percent, and Massachusetts, 16.8 percent.
One in four U.S. households, 26.6 percent, had only wireless telephones, an eightfold increase in just more than 6 years.
“The prevalence of such ‘wireless-only’ household now markedly exceeds the prevalence of household with only landline telephones, 12.9 percent, and this difference is expected to grow,” said the study, which was produced by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention on April 20. The survey’s latest estimates were from July 2009 through June 2010.
The prevalence of wireless-only households in Rhode Island has increased from the 5.3 percent as seen in 2007 as well as from the 2009 rate, at 11.9 percent.
