Subject: Americans' Health Improves but Blacks Suffer Higher Death Rates Than Whites 
Date: Published: 6/26/92 (57 lines)
Source: Wall Street Journal. Copyright Dow Jones & Co. Inc.

    Technology & Health:
    Americans' Health Improves but Blacks
    Suffer Higher Death Rates Than Whites
    ----
    By Hilary Stout
    Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

    WASHINGTON -- The health and longevity of Americans has
 improved significantly over the past 20 years, but the death
 rates for black people in almost every fatal disease far
 exceed whites, a new government report indicates.
    The life expectancy for Americans rose to 75.3 years in
 1989 from 74.9 years in 1988 and 70.9 years in 1970, the
 Department of Health and Human Services said in its annual
 report on the health of the nation.
    But the life expectancy of black males slipped for the
 sixth year in a row, falling to 64.8 years in 1989 from 64.9
 years in 1988 and 65.2 years in 1987.  The increase in
 homicides of young black men was largely to blame, health
 officials said.  Black females' life expectancy edged up to
 73.5 years from 73.4 years in 1988, but that was still
 slightly lower than the 1987 life expectancy of 73.6 years.
    The report, a massive compilation of statistics on
 everything from health insurance coverage to AIDS to
 childhood gum disease, shows that in almost every area
 minorities aren't as healthy as white citizens of the U. S. 
    For example, between 1970 and 1989, the age-adjusted death
 rate for heart disease in the U. S. dropped 39%.  But the
 racial disparity was huge.  The death rate for heart disease
 per 100,000 population in 1989 was 205.9 for white men, and
 272.6 for black men.  Among women, it was 106.6 for whites,
 172.9 for blacks.
    The nation's infant-mortality rate declined to a record
 low of 9.8 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1989.  But the
 mortality rate for black babies was more than twice that of
 whites -- 18.6 vs. 8.1.  "This is not acceptable to me or
 anyone else in this country," Secretary of Health and Human
 Services Louis Sullivan said at a news conference.
    The AIDS death rate for black men was three times that of
 white men, and for black women nine times that of white
 women, the report said.
    Nearly 79% of white infants received prenatal care in the
 first trimester in 1989, compared with 60% of black babies.
    Between 1985 and 1989, the homicide rate for black males
 aged 15 to 24 leaped 74% to a record 114.8 deaths per 100,000
 people, according to the report.  The homicide rate for all
 black males was 61.5 in 1989, compared with 8.1 for white
 males and 9.4 for all Americans.

[This article is made available here by Dow Jones Co. for the
 personal and non-commercial use of callers to this bbs, in the
 hope that it will be of some help to those who are suffering
 from the disease and others who are seeking to help them.]