Afro-Netizen

The incestuous circle of influence revolving around shaping health care reform

H/T to The Washington Post for this revealing (though not particularly surprising) charticle diagramming the "Sphere of Influence" that exists on Capitol Hill, particularly as it relates to the players once connected to the U.S. Senate who are shaping comprehensive health care reform.

It's funny, by acting more like USA Today, The Washington Post might jumpstart its slow recovery to legitimacy after its lobbyist-salon debacle.

A warrior woman: fighting for life against breast cancer, brother Troy Anthony Davis’ death sentence

By Margaret Summers
Guest Contributor
Courtesy of National Coalition for the Abolition of the Death Penalty (NCADP)
 
Martina Correia, a 42-year-old African American from Savannah, Georgia, is a “warrior woman,” inspiring death penalty abolitionists as well as women like her struggling with breast cancer.

Correia’s brother is Troy Anthony Davis, convicted in 1991 for the shooting death of white police officer Mark MacPhail. There is no physical evidence linking Davis to the crime.  No murder weapon was produced. Seven of nine witnesses who initially implicated Davis have since recanted, stating in sworn affidavits that they were pressured or coerced by police into naming him.   Davis’ attorneys are appealing his case before the U.S. Supreme Court.  The Court will determine whether or not to review Davis’ habeas petition on June 25, and make its decision public on June 26 or June 29. If the appeal is rejected, Davis will be executed.

The case has generated global attention. Former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, South African Bishop Desmond Tutu, the NAACP, and human rights organization Amnesty International, have called for Georgia Governor Sonny Purdue to grant Davis clemency. Former U.S. Representative Bob Barr, former FBI Director William Sessions, and several former prosecutors and judges, have filed an amicus brief supporting Davis’ plea.

Long before her brother’s involvement in the criminal justice system, Correia opposed the death penalty. An Amnesty International member since age 13, she resigned her U.S. Army nurse position when told she couldn’t express “political opinions” against capital punishment. Since her brother’s conviction, “I speak at universities, high schools and before community groups.  I talk about the injustices that lead to arrests of innocent people, why so many people of color get the death penalty, and how and why prosecutors select people for death sentences. I don’t just talk about my brother on death row, but the system that put him there.”

She didn’t know what to expect when Davis was tried. “I anticipated that my brother would get his day in court,” she explains. “But our judicial system is fraught with biases.    Until my brother was accused of killing a white police officer, I didn’t realize just how black I was.”

Watching Davis’ trial, “I felt like people were angry that my brother had attorneys from out of town,” says Correia.  “I thought he would have more time in the courtroom to argue his case, but he only got 20 minutes, and then a bell rang when he ran out of time.” Alarmed, Correia stepped up her fight for Davis’ exoneration.

Then in 2001, Correia was diagnosed with breast cancer. When chemotherapy treatments resulted in hair loss, she shaved her head and wore hats or scarves. The prison initially barred Correia from wearing head coverings during visits with Davis for “security reasons”; weapons could be hidden in headgear. Davis intervened. Correia was made an exception, “but whenever I wore a scarf the prison guards made me take it off to search it.”

Determinedly working through exhaustion, Correia’s only concession to debilitating chemotherapy is to request airfare from sponsors of appearances located more than five hours from her home. Otherwise, she drives herself, although chemotherapy makes her sleepy. “I have to try to stay awake while driving. When a speaking engagement’s over, I go home and rest, ”she says.  

Correia serves on the boards of death penalty abolition organizations like Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty and New Hope House.  She also participates in efforts to increase federal funding for breast cancer research. She is a lobby delegation team leader in the National Breast Cancer Coalition. She teaches health maintenance classes to women with cancer in Savannah’s St. Joseph’s/Candler Health System.

Somehow Correia balances her advocacy with raising her 14-year-old son Antone, an Honor Roll middle school student, whose winning social studies project in a state competition last year was entitled: “How Does the Troy Anthony Davis Death Penalty Case Impact Georgia?” Antone, who considers “Uncle Troy” a role model, wants to be a medical researcher when he grows up, and find the cure for breast cancer that has stricken his mother and thousands of women.

Correia says her brother’s confinement on death row and her illness are difficult for her and their family but “I trust God, I have faith. It’s like Troy said when he was minutes away from execution (before the current U.S. Supreme Court appeal), ‘God didn’t take me this far to leave me.’ I pray for Troy and for Mark MacPhail’s family. I ask God to let me live to see my brother freed and my son graduate from school.  My biggest prayer is that my mother doesn’t continue to suffer. If Troy is executed it will break her heart.

“I’m going to fight this system until somebody says, ‘We made a mistake,’ she adds. “I know that the name Troy Anthony Davis is a name known all over the world by people who believe in truth, justice and fairness. That’s all I’m asking for, fairness.”

The NAACP and Amnesty International U.S.A. are co-sponsoring a “Week of Witness” for Troy Anthony Davis, June 19-26 2009. Faith communities are asked to pray for the Davis and MacPhail families during that week, sign a petition, ask their religious leaders to sign a clergy letter, or discuss Davis’ case during regular weekend worship services.  Additional information, please visit the “Week of Witness”.

“God sent the Shooter”: White Christian terrorism and the assassination of Dr. George Tiller

By Sikivu Hutchinson

Guest Contributor

“God sent the shooter,” the signs wielded by anti-abortion protestors at the funeral of slain doctor George Tiller proclaimed.  Last week’s assassination of abortion provider and feminist George Tiller in a Kansas church on the so-called holy seventh day was not only a barbaric act of religious cowardice but a terrorist assault on the rights of women.  Tragically similar to the 1998 murder of New York doctor Bernard Slepian, Tiller’s murder was the culmination of years of attempted murders, death threats, bombings and arson attacks waged against abortion providers by white Christian terrorists.

Despite the scope of this orchestrated campaign mainstream media rarely identify these acts or those who commit them as “terrorist.”  Those who invoke Christian fundamentalism as justification for their barbaric incursions against women and their allies are dismissed as aberrations, even though the profiles of the killers are always the same, the suspects—generally disaffected white middle aged males, aligned with a crackpot anti-government militia and/or fundamentalist ethos steeped in the bloody retribution of the Old Testament—virtually plucked from central casting.

These spasms of Christian fundamentalist violence are largely peculiar to the United States.  Anti-abortion activism in Western European countries such as Great Britain, France and Italy doesn’t inspire anywhere near the level of militant resistance seen here.  This virulent strain of fundamentalism was nourished by three theocratic Republican administrations that dismembered the Constitution and effectively sanctioned criminal campaigns against abortion providers.  So while the U.S. condemns Muslim religious fundamentalism and trumpets itself as a beacon for individual and civil liberties unbridled by theocratic intolerance it has become a breeding ground for the most dangerous Christian fundamentalist terrorist movement in the world.

Christian fundamentalism has always objectified women’s bodies as patriarchal property and territory for reproductive control.  It’s no surprise then that white men deem themselves to be Christian soldiers in the war over the wombs of Middle American and Southern white women.  It’s also no surprise that the Bible Belt, fount of hyper-religious public policy that demonizes sex education and contraception, has the highest teen pregnancy rates in the country. 

Christian fundamentalist dogma is about keeping ‘em barefoot, knocked up and in obeisance to a God that would rather see an impoverished 12 year-old incest victim carry her rapist father’s baby to term and suffer lifelong psychological trauma than undergo a safe legal abortion and have a reasonable expectation for a future.  And it is immoral, radically anti-woman positions like these which make the “pro-life” misnomer appropriated by the anti-abortion movement so infuriating. 

In the militant anti-choice universe the lives of real babies living in poverty and their real mothers and real families are of no consequence next to protection of the religiously decreed “rights” of the unborn.  White male anti-abortion terrorists can’t get similarly exorcised about cuts to women’s health care benefits and pre- and post-natal care to mothers in real time because it would mean ceding control to flesh and blood women.

Tiller’s assassination also dovetails with a dangerous shift in public opinion regarding the future of choice for American women imperiled by unwanted pregnancies.  Influenced by a decade of unrelenting right wing propaganda that equates abortion with murder and abortion providers with Nazi eugenicists, polls indicate that a growing majority of the American public has adopted a “pro-life” stance and is willfully ignorant about the life-giving and life-saving potential of legal abortion.  Dispatching shooters from “God,” the anti-abortion movement must accept responsibility for the murderous religious rhetoric that led to the assassination of George Tiller and the terrorist assault on the rights and lives of American women. 

Sikivu Hutchinson is the editor of BlackFemLens.org and a commentator for KPFK 90.7FM.

“God Sent the Shooter”: White Christian terrorism and the assassination of Dr. George Tiller

By Sikivu Hutchinson
Guest Contributor

“God sent the shooter,” the signs wielded by anti-abortion protestors at the funeral of slain doctor George Tiller proclaimed.  Last week’s assassination of abortion provider and feminist George Tiller in a Kansas church on the so-called holy seventh day was not only a barbaric act of religious cowardice but a terrorist assault on the rights of women.  Tragically similar to the 1998 murder of New York doctor Bernard Slepian, Tiller’s murder was the culmination of years of attempted murders, death threats, bombings and arson attacks waged against abortion providers by white Christian terrorists.

Despite the scope of this orchestrated campaign mainstream media rarely identify these acts or those who commit them as “terrorist.”  Those who invoke Christian fundamentalism as justification for their barbaric incursions against women and their allies are dismissed as aberrations, even though the profiles of the killers are always the same, the suspects—generally disaffected white middle aged males, aligned with a crackpot anti-government militia and/or fundamentalist ethos steeped in the bloody retribution of the Old Testament—virtually plucked from central casting.

These spasms of Christian fundamentalist violence are largely peculiar to the United States.  Anti-abortion activism in Western European countries such as Great Britain, France and Italy doesn’t inspire anywhere near the level of militant resistance seen here.  This virulent strain of fundamentalism was nourished by three theocratic Republican administrations that dismembered the Constitution and effectively sanctioned criminal campaigns against abortion providers.  So while the U.S. condemns Muslim religious fundamentalism and trumpets itself as a beacon for individual and civil liberties unbridled by theocratic intolerance it has become a breeding ground for the most dangerous Christian fundamentalist terrorist movement in the world.

Christian fundamentalism has always objectified women’s bodies as patriarchal property and territory for reproductive control.  It’s no surprise then that white men deem themselves to be Christian soldiers in the war over the wombs of Middle American and Southern white women.  It’s also no surprise that the Bible Belt, fount of hyper-religious public policy that demonizes sex education and contraception, has the highest teen pregnancy rates in the country. 

Christian fundamentalist dogma is about keeping ‘em barefoot, knocked up and in obeisance to a God that would rather see an impoverished 12 year-old incest victim carry her rapist father’s baby to term and suffer lifelong psychological trauma than undergo a safe legal abortion and have a reasonable expectation for a future.  And it is immoral, radically anti-woman positions like these which make the “pro-life” misnomer appropriated by the anti-abortion movement so infuriating. 

In the militant anti-choice universe the lives of real babies living in poverty and their real mothers and real families are of no consequence next to protection of the religiously decreed “rights” of the unborn.  White male anti-abortion terrorists can’t get similarly exorcised about cuts to women’s health care benefits and pre- and post-natal care to mothers in real time because it would mean ceding control to flesh and blood women.

Tiller’s assassination also dovetails with a dangerous shift in public opinion regarding the future of choice for American women imperiled by unwanted pregnancies.  Influenced by a decade of unrelenting right wing propaganda that equates abortion with murder and abortion providers with Nazi eugenicists, polls indicate that a growing majority of the American public has adopted a “pro-life” stance and is willfully ignorant about the life-giving and life-saving potential of legal abortion.  Dispatching shooters from “God,” the anti-abortion movement must accept responsibility for the murderous religious rhetoric that led to the assassination of George Tiller and the terrorist assault on the rights and lives of American women. 

Sikivu Hutchinson is the editor of BlackFemLens.org and a commentator for KPFK 90.7FM.

Living well with lupus: One woman's journey

By Imani Perry
Guest Contributor

It began on May 23, 1996. A searing pain shot through my right hip as I stepped into a car. The pain spread into the other hip and my knees by nightfall.

The day before I had completed a year of intensive study by taking (and passing) comprehensive exams, a critical point in my path toward earning my Ph.D. I was jubilant and exhausted. Normally, I might have shrugged off a little discomfort after a tiring semester, but this was different, deeper and more intense than anything I had felt before.

By August, right before I was to begin law school, I was diagnosed with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) or just lupus.

My diagnosis came so quickly due to the persistence of my mother with the doctors at my HMO (she insisted that they keep seeing me until I had an answer), my family history of the disease, and the fact that I presented with so many of the symptoms so quickly. I had the arthritis, fatigue, skin rashes, mouth sores, high positive ANA test, pleurisy, hair loss, and photo-sensitivity.

The diagnosis was a relief and also terrifying. I had watched a brave aunt struggle with the disease for many years. Through her example, I knew it was possible to accomplish much with SLE, but I was unsure whether I had the strength to do what she had done.

And also, lingering in the back of my mind, appearing mostly in my nightmares, was the story of my great aunt who had died from the disease prior to the use of life-saving steroids. It is an illness that is very treatable, but nevertheless holds real dangers.

Anyone who has lupus will tell you that it can also be a depressing diagnosis and condition. Both the disease and the treatments can make you feel crummy, look different, behave differently, fall into despair.

I have both gained 30 pounds in a couple of months and withered down to frailty, my afro-textured hair has turned straight, or fallen out. I have, at times, been barely able to speak because of the large ulcers in my mouth.

I spent most of my first year of law school in bed, barely able to move and devastated when not a single “friend” in my section would share his or her class notes with me.

But I made some critical decisions early in my diagnosis. I decided I was going to learn everything I could about my disease from books and articles. I decided I was never going to assume that any rheumatologist knew my body better than I did. And finally, I was going to always listen carefully to those who had something to teach me about the disease -- either because they’d had it, or they knew about it. Not all the input I got was useful. But some was golden.

An elderly woman with SLE told me “The best way to live a long life is to get a chronic disease and take care of yourself.” I have lived by that piece of advice ever since. What I took from what she said was that an autoimmune disease is a constant reminder. Every time you fall off the wagon of ample sleep, good nutrition and stress management your body will give you a signal to get back on track and you’d better heed it.

Within six months of my diagnosis I began acupuncture and vitamin infusions. At various points in the past 13 years I have also used massage, craniosacral therapy, yoga, dietary supplements, Chinese medicine, thoughtful nutrition (using a modified version of the Okinawa diet), and meditation as ways to treat my illness. I would never replace conventional medicine. It is absolutely necessary to go to a physician on a regular basis when you have been diagnosed with lupus.  But I will always credit complementary health care for allowing me to maintain a high quality of life with Lupus. It has kept my body as strong as possible in order to fight the disease, and it eases symptoms phenomenally.

About 10 months ago, my doctor, who blends conventional and holistic medicine, had me do IgG food hyper-sensitivity testing. After eliminating foods to which the tests shows I had hypersensitivity to, I have seen at least a 75-80% reduction in arthritic pain.

But it is not just health care practitioners and eating habits that have allowed me to live well with Lupus. It has also been a product of understanding and working on the relationships in my life. Lupus is one of those diseases that can breed insensitivity very easily. Often a person with SLE does not “look” sick, and therefore people around him or her will expect that they have no impediments. On the other hand, some people will assume that you are incapable of living a normal life. You can often live a normal life with SLE, with some modifications. But you have to remember not to try to meet the expectations of those who assume you are able join in any and all activities as long as you are not flaring, nor can you allow anyone to put you into a little “sick box.”

I continue to learn my limit. But by now I know that I sometimes have to disappoint my friends and family.

I cannot talk on the phone at all hours of the night because I have to rise early to care for my kids. I cannot jet set across the country non-stop because the air pressure changes on airplanes usually leave me with a day or two of arthritic pain. I can’t be around a lot of toxic people. Nastiness, mean-spiritedness and cattiness are not part of my healthy living plan. I was astonished by the number of people who said really mean things to me once they learned about my disease. But I consider myself fortunate to have learned their true colors.

I also had to make some very difficult decisions about curbing relationships with people who I genuinely like but who drain my spirit. And I haven’t yet fully recovered from the friends who decided not to be my friends anymore after I got sick, but I know it is for the better that they aren’t in my life.

It is hard to disappoint and be disappointed by others. But that is all part of life anyway, right?

It has been my great fortune to have parents, a spouse, extended family and friends who will listen and accept what I tell them about what I need and what my limits are. This is not easy for them, I know. It is painful to watch a loved one suffer and sometimes there is a tendency is to lash out at the very person who is suffering.

For those of you who have loved ones with SLE, I urge you to do whatever you can to restrain yourself from expressing anger, frustration and insensitivity towards that person and instead seek their assistance in figuring out how you can provide support to him or her. Also, you must  find your own support network if you are caring for someone with SLE.

In the 13 years since I was diagnosed I completed a Ph.D. and a law degree.

I  have pursued a successful career as a professor. I got married, had two beautiful sons, and am living in a vibrant and nurturing neighborhood in Philadelphia. This was possible because of my efforts and those of the people who have had to courage to continue loving me well through this disease.

Recently, a family friend who is a physician told me, “All disease is a metaphor.” When I think of SLE, it seems to be a metaphor for all of the things that all of us do in our lives to attack ourselves- we run ourselves ragged, we internalize others’ meanness, we put ourselves down, thinking we aren’t ever good enough. When SLE and the other autoimmune diseases allow for your immune system to attack your body, it can seem as though everything is stacked against you.

But I believe that those of us with SLE bear a special gift because we have the opportunity to devote ourselves to being models for undoing the self-attack by practicing self-care.

Not everyone with SLE is able to follow his or her dreams. It is an unpredictable disease. It is not enough to plan, you have to be flexible enough to change the plan when your body demands it.

On those days when I flare, and yes they come occasionally, I push back against the disease with hot cups of tea, lots of anti-inflammatory fruits and vegetables, long hot baths in lavender scented water and sleep. I do not feel perfect when I wake up, but I feel very good about who I am.

I am living well with lupus.

Imani Perry is a professor of law at the Rutgers School of Law-Camden, and is a regular contributor to Afro-Netizen on issues of race, gender, identity, popular culture and the law.

Afro-Netizen recommends visiting the following sites:

Ad Council press release on lupus:
http://www.adcouncil.org/newsDetail.aspx?id=265

“Could I Have Lupus” website:

http://www.adcouncil.org/newsDetail.aspx?id=265
Ad Council commercials on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=adcouncil&view=videos&query=lupus

Clinton Global Initiative 2008 Focuses on Global Health

By Mary Dillard

Guest Contributor

Today is the third day of the 2008 Clinton Global Initiative.  This year I decided to focus on listening to the global health panels, which have emphasized the goal of expanding the global health workforce. 

One statistic that was mentioned yesterday is that Africa has 11% of the world’s population, over 20% of the world’s disease burden, but only 3% of the world’s health workers.  This has not always been the case and there are a number of reasons the numbers of health care workers have diminished so precipitously over the past thirty years. These include the Structural Adjustment Programs imposed on a number of African countries during the 1980s and 90s that forced African governments to decrease the amount of money that went into public health.

A second factor was the so-called brain drain- a controversial term referring to the migration of skilled professionals from developing countries to fill human resource needs in wealthier countries.  This process began in the 1970s but accelerated due to the decline in working conditions for health workers in the 1980s and 90s.   

Over the past two days, several panel participants have called for private investors to pay more attention to partnering with the public sector, thus challenging the legacy of structural adjustment.  The clearest call for this came yesterday from Paul Farmer, co-founder of Partners in Health who reminded the audience that the CGI goals (Poverty Alleviation, Energy and Climate Change, Education and Global Health) are particularly relevant for impoverished countries in the global south. 

While Farmer was technically on the panel to speak about global health, he emphasized that the recent devastation that Haiti has faced is due to climate change.  Although this has been little reported in the U.S. corporate press, Haiti has been battered by four hurricanes in the past two months.  These storms have resulted in the deaths of over 1000 people and displacement of close to a million people. 

Farmer argued that with the splintering of NGO groups, it has been more difficult than ever to coordinate efforts or to share best practices of health care delivery but that it is crucial for people to pay attention to what is happening in Haiti in order to avoid an increasingly dire humanitarian crisis.   

Given the fact that there are many immediate healthcare crises occurring in the world, it may seem strange to focus the theme of the Global Health panels on recruiting healthcare workers.  However, this need was echoed by most panel participants over the past two days.  Yesterday, Dr. Nancy Aossey, President and Chief Executive Officer of the International Medical Corps (IMC) argued that this is a crucial priority for post-conflict and active conflict zones where IMC works including Chad, the Central African Republic, Liberia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Today was “policy-wonk day” on the health panels.  Most of the speakers on the smaller panels were very well versed in health policy and there was a clear emphasis on practical, replicable solutions to challenges facing health care workers around the world.  This morning’s global health panel featured Craig R. Barrett, Chairman of Intel Corporation,
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Minister of Health, Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, 
Aruna Uprety, Director, Rural Health and Education Service Trust of Nepal and Dr. Lola Dare, Executive Secretary of African Council for Sustainable Health Development (ACOSHED).

The Ethiopian Minister of Health reported on initiatives that his government is doing to expand the medical corps.  According to Minister Tedros, when the government set priorities,  “We decided to focus on trying to reach the Millennium Development Goals, particularly the goal of ending poverty by 2015.”  Ethiopia’s per capita health expenditure is only one dollar per person.  With such limited funds directed towards the healthcare, increasing the numbers of low and mid-level providers (traditional birth attendants, nurses, physicians assistants) became a priority and the Ministry decided to strategically allocate resources. 

The current national health plan focuses on what he calls  “Flooding and Retention”.  Flooding refers to exponentially increasing the number of trained doctors, while retention refers to efforts to keep trained healthcare professionals employed in that capacity.  In too many impoverished countries, salaries for health care providers are so low that people cannot afford to work in the sectors where they were trained.  This contributes to skilled workers either leaving the country or finding other employment.  The largest outlay of funds in the health budget will go towards “Flooding” with  the hopes that at least a fraction of the doctors trained will continue to live and work in Ethiopia. It’s a risky strategy but clearly one that the government believes it must take.

Dr. Lola Dare made one of the most compelling arguments to not only increase the number of health care providers but also to provide those workers with the necessary supplies. She reminded the audience, “I worked in pediatric health and I left because I had no supplies in order to do my job.”  Her comments highlight the fact that the best intentions mean nothing to workers on the ground unless they have the supplies necessary to provide the kind of care that they were trained to provide. 

Africa has the highest disease burden but also has the lowest number of health workers.  Clearly the Continent has faced tremendous challenges in providing adequate health care over the past thirty years.  Since CGI is about creating “political will” my hope is that one day we will see real progress, by convincing governments around the world to make their health budgets more important than their military budgets.

Mary Dillard is Associate Professor of African History at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York.

A Black-White Diabetes Divide

By Laura  Blue

 Time Magazine

 

Black patients with diabetes do worse than white patients — even when they're getting treatment from the same doctor. That's the message of a new study published this week in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine. It's not the first paper to document health disparities between black and white diabetics, but it breaks new ground: By looking at the outcome discrepancy among a group of patients with access to the same health facilities — 90 Massachusetts physicians working in 14 health centers — the new study rules out the explanation that black patients, by virtue of being poorer, are excluded from seeing the better quality doctors to which their white counterparts are more likely to have access.

Even when they were being treated by the same pool of physicians, whites were more likely than blacks to meet the commonly accepted cut-off point for long-term control over blood pressure (30% v. 24%), over "bad" cholesterol (57% v. 45%), and over the blood-glucose measure, hemoglobin A1C (47% v. 39%). The researchers approached their data mindful of the need to ensure that any discrepancies were not simply the effects of what they term "socio-demographic factors": Comparing apples with apples — patients of the same gender, income-range and age — the white patients still fared far better.

The cause of the discrepancy, however, remains a mystery.

Although the researchers adjusted their data for factors such as obesity levels, these did not affect the racial disparity. Some might be tempted to see the data as reflecting racial discrimination among doctors, but that would probably result in a different pattern among different doctors. Instead, the discrepancy was common among all of the doctors, irrespective of how many black patients they saw or how good their overall performance rates were.

Furthermore, at least the initial patient-doctor interaction appeared to have been similar for all patients: rates of testing for blood-sugar control and for cholesterol, for example, were the same. "That suggests the physicians are implementing standard treatment plans," says Thomas Sequist, lead author of the study and an internist at Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates. It's only later, when it comes to treatment and, especially, outcomes, that a disparity is evident.

Sequist, for his part, has a hunch. He doesn't think most doctors discriminate at all. "I feel like the issue may more be that the doctors are treating all the patients the same — and if you treat all the patients the same you won't get the same outcomes because patients don't face the same challenges," he says. "We're not tailoring our counseling to the needs of our patients."

That's why Sequist did a follow-up study with the same group of physicians, asking whether they thought racial disparities were a problem in diabetes care. About 90% said there's a problem in the U.S. nationally, but less than half of that number believed the problem affects their own practices. Now, Sequist is giving those doctors reports on their treatment performance based on the race of the patient. He's also experimenting with what he calls "cultural competency training": lessons designed to help doctors recognize when patients may not share the same assumed health conditions, or when patients may face constraints that make the standard dietary and exercise guidance tougher to follow.

Sequist emphasizes that these lessons are not aiming to teach doctors "what a black patient thinks," but to get doctors to find out what their patients actually do think. Results of the trial won't be available until later this year. But, if it works, it could be a huge boon to treatment for all kinds of chronic conditions. "I think the issues are all the same," Sequist says. "They're around medication adherence and patient engagement."

The Global Clinton Summit in Review

By Mary Dillard
Guest Contributor

I once saw an interview with Bill Clinton where he was asked “What do you think of the American people?”  His response was, “Give them enough time and they always get it right.”  That struck me as wildly optimistic, but stayed in my mind because I felt that it gave real insight into the man.  Witnessing two days of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI)  reminded me of that interview.  Former President Clinton seems determined to use his political capital in order to bring attention and resources to bear on some of the world’s most serious problems. And he’s as optimistic as ever. 

The idea behind CGI is to get a range of people together discuss global issues, come up with action plans and steps towards action.  Each morning began with a plenary session followed by working group meetings in which CGI members and invited guests met to brainstorm action items, make suggestions and most importantly, make commitments.

While the press was not allowed in the working sessions, we were able to watch video feeds of the panel discussions. I chose to watch the feeds on education in order to see what would be discussed about Africa.  I knew that Bill Clinton has been extremely inspired by Kenya’s efforts at providing Universal Primary Education to all of its school age children. Kenya’s Education Minister George Saitoti reported on the popularity of the school program and what his country is doing to ensure its success.

Kenya is emphasizing teacher training, parental involvement in budget decisions and multi-age classrooms so that older students don’t feel segregated and stigmatized.  Since this initiative was first announced in 2003, enrollments have skyrocketed and Minister Saitoti mentioned that the countries oldest primary school enrollee is 75 years old! At a time when over 100 million school age children around the world are not in school, this is an ambitious undertaking and Kenya’s efforts are being watched closely to see whether its program can be replicated. 

On Friday’s panels, Andre Agassi touted the success of his charter school in Las Vegas which serves a 96% African American student population.  Dr. Fazle Hasan Abed, founder of Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC), spoke of BRAC’s expanded initiatives in Uganda, Tanzania and Southern Sudan and John Wood of Room to Read discussed his organization’s efforts to create 10,000 bilingual libraries around the world by 2010.  Author Toni Morrison attended the working sessions on education, while actor Jeffery Wright participated in the special sessions on poverty alleviation and highlighted his efforts to support the recent elections in Sierra Leone.

There seemed to be particular interest in supporting the rebuilding of the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans.  On Thursday, President Clinton personally pledged $500,000 as a matching grant to support housing construction for displaced residents.  By Friday, Brad Pitt’s “Make it Right” campaign increased the money directed towards New Orleans by an additional $5 million.  In making his announcement, President Clinton stated, “Anyone who wants to return home to New Orleans ought to be able to do so, and we want to do everything that we can to make that possible.”

It is difficult to describe the range of emotions that I felt at this event. The energy of the conference was electric.  It was exciting to hear world business, governmental and non-profit leaders talk enthusiastically about their commitments to create social change. I left Thursday’s sessions buoyed by a “Clintonesque optimism”.  Each day he announced more commitments from CGI partners and pledges to date total over $10 billion. At the same time, I couldn’t help wondering what happens next?  How does CGI insure that the commitments that are made reach the organizations that need them? How many times have global conferences inspired pledges only to find that the funds never materialized six months later?

At home, while I was turning these questions over in my head, I turned on the TV and there was Clinton again!  This time at the Apollo theater in Harlem, announcing the creation of CGI-U, an initiative directed towards college students.  I decided at that moment that I would suspend my academic cynicism and get my students on board.  I guess optimism is contagious. Plus, it will give me an opportunity to blog some more and see firsthand how these initiatives are working. 

Segregation Affects Blacks' Nursing Home Care

(September 11, 2007) -- ABC News reports on a study which indicates regional segregation affects the quality of care for African Americans in nursing homes. The study is published in the journal, Health Affairs.

Researchers from Temple University and Brown University found problems not in the South, but in the Midwest which was found to be the most segregated.

“The South was actually the least segregated, with nursing homes there more likely to have racially mixed resident populations.” The report continues:

“Study co-author Jacqueline Zinn, professor in the Fox School of Business at Temple University, notes that the differences in the care received by black nursing home residents and their white counterparts were not ‘within-home’ differences.

‘The care provided within the facility is consistent,’ she said. ‘It's just differences across [regions] with regard to the degree of segregation.’"

 

African Americans are half of U.S. homicides in 2005

By David Whettstone
For The Afro-Netizen Newswire

Washington, DC (Aug. 9) - Troubling news came in a report Black Victims of Violent Crime from the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), a division of the U.S. Department of Justice.  It states:

"Blacks were victims of an estimated 805,000 nonfatal violent crimes and about 8,000 homicides in 2005." 

This would amount to 49 percent of all U.S. murder victims during that year and 15 percent of all non-fatal violent crimes -- the latter category includes victims of rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault and simple assault.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, African Americans numbered about 35 million -- just over 12 percent of the total population -- in 2005. Males made up 85 percent of all Black murder victims.  Another demographic indicated that more than half (51%) of Black homicide victims were between the ages of 17 and 29.

The report indicates that 93 percent of Black murder victims and 85 percent of White murder victims (in single victim/single offender matches) were slain by someone of their own race.

It states, “About four-fifths of Black victims of nonfatal violence perceived the offenders to be Black.  About 12 percent of Black victims perceived the offender to be White, while about eight percent thought the offender was neither Black nor White.”

Violence in America has the remarkable characteristic of being done by those who are close to us.  Prevailing perspectives are not always founded on solid perceptions. Crime for the most part is intra-racial (not inter-racial, as many fears and false reports present). The report indicated that Blacks (78%) were more likely to be victims of intraracial violence than Whites (70%).

It also stated:

“Black males were more likely to be violently victimized by strangers than Black females.  Black female victims of violent crime were more likely than Black male victims to be victimized by an intimate partner. Intimate partner violence accounted for 21 percent of violent victimizations against Black females, compared to about five percent of victimizations against Black males. The gender disparity for intimate partner violence among Blacks was similar to that for other victims [of other races].”

A conclusion from the BJS five-year study (2001-2005) of non-fatal violent crimes is: Black folk who were either younger, never married, low income earners, or urban residents were more subject to violent victimization than their counterparts who were either older, folks of other marital status, high income, or rural or suburban dwellers. In this period, about 55 percent of all violent crimes committed against Blacks were reported to police.

News of the BJS report will no doubt become the concern of many.  Within its 12 pages, the report is a “sea” of short comments with a lot of numbers.  The persistence of violence in African-American communities and perpetrated against individuals throughout the land is cause for further needful reflection, understanding, engagement, and action.

David M. Whettstone is a Washington, DC-based public policy advocate and writer, who works on national and local issues (including civil rights and criminal justice) and with religious and community-based organizations.