By Roya Aboosaidi
As an effect of institutionalized racism in the United States and many other developed nations, racial minorities have become disproportionately faced with inferior medical attention. As of January 2021, the federal government passed policies to further the support and equity of marginalized groups, but almost a year later we have seen no substantial difference in some of the most fundamental changes that needed to be made. As physicians, most medical schools require in-depth equity training which can increase the productivity of said institution in the future, where productivity is defined by the degree to which the physician is able to use all resources necessary to treat the patient regardless of their racial background. However, it is unsuccessful when the system functions around one race being of more value than another, comparable to an explanation that Romeo Dallaire made in relation to the United Nations and genocidal interventions, where he said that we fail as a collective when we make “an assessment of the value of human beings not on the fact that we’re all equal”.
In the United States, the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) concluded that racial minorities receive a considerably subpar standard of medical attention compared to white-passing individuals. Where two were considered comparable on the basis of “insurance status, income, age, and severity of conditions”. Inadequate treatment of these groups has caused them to be disproportionately “sicker” on average. The inadequate treatment was not just in terms of the oral communication between physician and patient, but also the observable ways that reflect that sentiments imposed by systemic narratives have manifested into insufficient care. Black patients are more likely to receive older and cheaper methods of treatment than their counterparts, careless discharge from hospitals, and a lesser likelihood of receiving certain surgeries. For example, Black women are at an evidently lesser chance of receiving a mastectomy alongside radiation treatment than white women for breast cancer.
Where lifesaving treatment is denied on the basis of one’s skin color and replaced with a more cost and resource-efficient substitute that lacks the same effect, we see how little progress we have actually made as a society. Especially in countries that have been considered “developed” on an international scale, depending on their GDP rather than qualitative factors of development that roots in fundamental measures of equality. Only after we restructure the framework which provides the foundation responsible for abolishing the disparity between how marginalized groups are treated, are we able to solve secondary issues that have arisen. For example, mental illnesses in Black youth that have strong roots in the childhood trauma associated with having experienced racism first and second hand. The restructuring is only complete once institutions that have thwarted the success of equality reflect the cohesive agreement that no life is of more value than another, observable through policies, statistics, and feedback from those affected.
