Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Cancer Rates Among Black People Drop, But Gap Remains
AP: Cancer Deaths In Black People Drop; Still Higher Than Others
Cancer death rates have steadily declined among Black people but remain higher than in other racial and ethnic groups, a U.S. government study released Thursday shows. Cancer deaths have been dropping for all Americans for the past two decades because of lower smoking rates and advances in early detection and treatment. The rates among Black people fell 2% each year from 1999 to 2019, from 359 cancer deaths per 100,000 to 239 deaths per 100,000, according to the report published online in JAMA Oncology. (Tanner, 5/19)
USA Today: Black Cancer Death Rates Are Falling But Remain Higher Than Others
Epidemiologist and lead author Wayne Lawrence and his colleagues studied national death certificate data for Black people 20 and older between 1999 and 2019. The cancer death rate for Black Americans decreased about 2% a year. The decrease was larger among men – 2.6% – than among women, who saw a 1.5% decrease. The greatest decreases were found in deaths from lung cancer among men and stomach cancer among women. Among both, lung cancer deaths saw the largest decline per 100,000 people, which experts attribute to a decrease in smoking – from 24% in 1999 to roughly 15% in 2019. (Hassanein, 5/19)
On Black maternal mortality rates —
Iowa Public Radio: Black Iowans Face A Startlingly High Maternal Mortality Rate, And It's A Systemic Problem
Sofia DeMartino almost died due to complications from childbirth. Twice. DeMartino was a 15-year-old living in Iowa City when she had her first child. The day she had her son, she’d gone to school to turn in her entry for an essay contest (which she won). She went into labor during her first period class, then went to the hospital. “I had a really hard time with people taking me seriously, with people listening to me, with people understanding some of the challenges that I was going through.” At the hospital, she was given Oxytocin, a hormone that is used to induce labor. “And my son actually ended up arriving into the world so fast that I burst two blood vessels, and I had two hematomas, one the size of a grapefruit and one the size of an apple.” (Troutman, Nebbe and Alvarez, 5/19)
Politico: Why Louisiana’s Maternal Mortality Rates Are So High
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said Louisiana’s maternal mortality rate — one of the worst in the nation — does not tell the whole story of maternal health in the state because of its large Black population and the uncommonly broad definition Louisiana uses. “About a third of our population is African American; African Americans have a higher incidence of maternal mortality. So, if you correct our population for race, we’re not as much of an outlier as it’d otherwise appear,” Sen. Bill Cassidy said in an interview with POLITICO for the Harvard Chan School of Public Health series Public Health on the Brink. “Now, I say that not to minimize the issue but to focus the issue as to where it would be. For whatever reason, people of color have a higher incidence of maternal mortality.” (Owermohle, 5/19)
