HPI News

PRESS RELEASE: Joint Center Receives $3.6 Million Grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation

March 1, 2010

WASHINGTON, DC -- The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington-based research and policy institution that focuses on the concerns of African Americans and other people of color, has received a three-year, $3.6 million grant to fund its economic research and the work of its Health Policy Institute (HPI).

Experts Identify Why Women and African Americans Face a Greater Risk of Dying From Heart Disease Than White Men

PR Newswire     February 16, 2010

The Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) today announced an educational event for the public highlighting the gender and racial disparities in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease. The "Know What Counts" educational program titled, "The Path to Health Care Equity: Identifying and Solving Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Disparities in Health Care in the New Century," will feature a distinguished physician panel, along with a keynote address by U.S. Senator Ben Cardin. The event, which is co-sponsored by the Association of Black Cardiologists, Mended Hearts, and WomenHeart: The National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease, will be held Tuesday, March 2, from noon to 3 p.m. at the U.S. House of Representatives inWashington, D.C.

Blacks Less Likely to Survive Cancer Than Whites in Large N.J. Study

Health Behavior News Service     February 2, 2010

A New Jersey study found that African-Americans with cancer are less likely to survive it than whites, and residents of poor neighborhoods less likely to survive than are those in wealthier areas of the state.

The racial disadvantage diminishes when socioeconomic status is a consideration, but does not disappear, according to the study in the February issue of the Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved. 

Report: Too Few Minority Doctors After Decades of Discrimination

Health Behavior News Service     January 27, 2010

Although the number of minorities in the medical profession has risen in recent years, decades of discrimination still leaves them drastically underrepresented in the field, as chronicled in new report appearing in the February issue of the journal Academic Medicine.

The U.S. Surgeon General says mentoring is one solution.

"There is no doubt that much progress has been made in the past 100 years with regard to minorities' representation in the medical profession," said report co-author IIana Suez Mittman, Ph.D. "Unlike the turn of the twentieth century, currently there is heightened awareness to issues of injustice and inequity, where discrimination is unlawful and minorities are able to attend any medical school of their choosing."

Blacks and Hispanics Still the Biggest Losers in Health Care Reform Bill Gut

New America Media     December 28, 2009

President Obama, every Democratic and Republican senator and House member, the private insurers, major pharmaceuticals, liberals, progressives and many conservatives are virtually unanimous in claiming that the big reason for waging the health care reform war is to insure all, most, or many of the estimated 50 to 60 million uninsured Americans. Blacks and Hispanics have the most to gain from real reform. They make up more than half of America's uninsured. Private insurers, pharmaceuticals and major medical practitioners fought a seven-decade battle against national health care regulation in large part out of horror at having to treat millions of uninsured, unprofitable, largely unhealthy blacks and Hispanics.

Beyond the Spin: The high cost of inequality

The Philadelphia Inquirer     December 25, 2009

If Congress is serious about lowering health-care costs in this country, it must address racial and ethnic disparities that cost thousands of lives and millions of dollars each year.

The report "Equal Health Care for All," published this month by the Center for American Progress, notes, "Health-care disparities generate a significant human and economic cost that is borne directly by the individuals involved and indirectly by all Americans. As minorities become an increasing percentage of the American population, ... the costs of failing to tackle health-care disparities will result in higher total health care spending."

Preventing disparities at forefront of health care reform

Contra Costa Times     December 14, 2009

Federally funded security guards at dangerous neighborhood parks. Federal grants to poor neighborhoods to build grocery stores or to keep school gyms open after hours.

These are the types of unprecedented - yet uncontroversial - disease prevention initiatives whose inclusion has been lost in the rancorous debate over health care reform legislation working its way through Congress.

Preventive Care Gaps Send Blacks to Hospital Earlier Than Whites

December 1, 2009     Health Behavior News Service

Receiving prompt treatment for common health problems like diabetes, pneumonia and high blood pressure can save patients trips to the hospital and thousands of dollars in medical care costs.  However, African-Americans with preventable conditions often fail to get adequate care, resulting in hospitalizations years earlier than whites with the same conditions, results from a new study suggest.

Caucuses address racial disparities

November 2, 2009     Politico

After years of falling short, Del. Donna Christensen (D-Virgin Islands) and the House's three minority caucuses finally achieved success in adding to the House reform bill billions in federal aid to fix racial disparities in health care.

Reforms Across Multiple Policy Areas Key to Eliminating Health Disparities, Experts Say

October 21, 2009     Diverse Education

WASHINGTON - A panel of health policy experts Tuesday told congressional staff members and policy professionals that, while health care reform could play a powerful role in reducing health disparities between minorities and Whites, major policy reform in areas such as housing, transportation, agriculture and labor will also prove necessary to close the health care gap.

Fathers must take responsibility before birth

October 22, 2009     The Tennesseean

OK, men, and especially black men, it's time to ante up. As Dr. Kimberlee Wyche-Etheridge, director of the Bureau of Family, Youth and Infant Health for the Metro Public Health Department, told me Tuesday, it's crucial that men step up and fulfill their responsibilities to fatherhood. And those responsibilities start before a child is born. Wyche-Etheridge is one of 15 members of a new Commission on Paternal Involvement in Pregnancy Outcomes to raise public awareness of how greater involvement by expectant fathers can improve maternal and child health. The commission was convened for the first time Monday by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a leading public policy and research institution based in Washington whose work focuses primarily on African-Americans and other communities of color.

PRESS RELEASE: Joint Center Commission Will Focus on Role of Expectant Fathers in Healthier Pregnancies and Babies

October 19, 2009

WASHINGTON - The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies today convened a new Commission on Paternal Involvement in Pregnancy Outcomes to raise public awareness of how greater involvement by expectant fathers can improve maternal and child health.

The Commission is co-chaired by Michael Lu, M.D., MPH, an Associate Professor of obstetrics and gynecology and public health at UCLA's Schools of Medicine and Public Health in Los Angeles, and Willie J. Parker, M.D., MPH, Medical Director of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington, D.C.