government
Racial disparities seen in men’s health and access to care
NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted Oct. 15, 2012
Latino men have more problems obtaining health insurance than other minorities, but white men are more likely to drink alcohol excessively and smoke, a Kaiser Family Foundation report concluded.
In conducting a state-by-state analysis on the health and well-being of white and minority men, researchers found that minority men fell behind white men in nearly every state on various measures. “On some indicators and in some states, men of color fared poorly at rates that were two to three times that of white men,” according to the findings.
Nearly 50% of the Latino men surveyed didn’t have primary health care professionals taking care of them, and 46% didn’t have health insurance. New diagnoses of HIV/AIDs were much more prevalent among blacks than whites, and Alaskan native and Native American men experienced the highest rates of access and health problems on just about all health indicators.White men, however, had higher incidences of smoking and binge drinking than their minority counterparts.
In Wisconsin, for example, only 20% of minority men reported binge drinking, compared with 35% of white men, the study said.
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2012/10/15/gvbf1015.htm.
