Steven Woolf, David Satcher, and others estimated that from 1991 to 2000, medical advances averted 176,000 deaths, but equalizing mortality rates between whites and African-Americans would have averted 886,202 deaths. Am J Pul Hlt 2004;94:2078.
The most enlightening new account is Doug Massey’s on the history of how and why the US failed to temper the sharp inequalities and poverty that capitalism brings, while other countries did. European Socio Review 2009:25:9-23. Try http://www.brynmawr.edu/Acads/GSSW/schram/masseyglobal.pdf.
The term, “health disparities,” pushes clear thinking about inequality, racism, and discrimination into a vague soup. It’s a term we should stop using, like “wellness” which also depoliticizes and beclouds illness, injury and their harsh consequences by focusing on an upper middle class professional view of subjective well-being.
[Source: communique from Donald W. Light]
Filed under: General
Greetings,
My name is Barbara O’ Brien and my blogging at The Mahablog, Crooks and Liars, AlterNet, and elsewhere on the progressive political and health blogophere has earned me the notoriety of being a panelist at the Yearly Kos Convention and a featured guest blogger at the Take Back America Conference in Washington, DC.
I’m contacting you because I found your site in a health reform blog search and want to tell you about my newest blogging platform —the public concern of health care and its reform. Our shared concerns include health reform, tort reform, public health, safe workplaces, and asbestos contamination.
To increase awareness on these important issues, my goal is to get a resource link on your site or even allow me to provide a guest posting. Please contact me back, I hope to hear from you soon. Drop by our site http://www.maacenter.org/blog in the meantime.
Thanks,
Barbara O’ Brien
barbaraobrien@maacenter.org