Racism in American health care has a long history, and it still shapes who gets believed, treated and insured today. Read together, these five pieces from The New York Times Magazine, ProPublica and STAT give a full picture.
They start with the myths about Black bodies that doctors made up to defend slavery, and why the U.S. never built universal health care. Then they follow Black mothers dying at three to four times the rate of white mothers, sickle cell patients left waiting in pain, and the race “corrections” still built into the tools doctors use.
1. Myths about physical racial differences were used to justify slavery — and are still believed by doctors today
Villarosa traces how slavery-era doctors made up ideas about Black bodies to defend slavery. Two of those myths, that Black people feel less pain and have weaker lungs, still shape medical care. In a 2016 survey, half of white medical students and residents believed at least one.
2. Why doesn’t the United States have universal health care? The answer has everything to do with race.
Interlandi follows Black exclusion from health care, from the Freedmen’s Bureau to a 1946 law that let new hospitals stay segregated. She shows how the fight against national health insurance, and states refusing to expand Medicaid, keep those gaps alive.
3. Nothing Protects Black Women From Dying in Pregnancy and Childbirth
Shalon Irving, a CDC epidemiologist, died weeks after giving birth. Her degrees and income didn’t protect her. The story shows how dismissed symptoms and weak care leave Black mothers dying at three to four times the rate of white mothers.
4. ‘Every time it’s a battle’: In excruciating pain, sickle cell patients are shunted aside
Sickle cell patients are often treated as drug seekers in the ER. Begley shows them waiting in severe pain while many doctors avoid them. At one hospital, they waited 60% longer for pain medicine than patients in less pain.
5. Doctors use problematic race-based algorithms to guide care every day. Why are they so hard to change?
Race corrections are still built into everyday tools doctors use to decide care. Researchers found at least 40. Palmer and McFarling explain why no one owns the fix, and show a children’s infection calculator rebuilt without race that stayed accurate.
- Written by
- Team ARD
- First published
- in Anti-Racism Daily
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