Inequalities in Cancer Occurrence

As the late Congressman Tip O'Neil once said “All politic are local”, I say, “All health is local.” Therefore, national incidence and mortality data should not only be view in terms of national data sets, but also regionally and locally. On a national basis, we are well aware of the discrepancy between survival rates from cancer among racial/ethnic groups. However, we fail to take into account variations that occur due to different regional and geographical factors. For instance, we generally compare health disparities in a white other racial/ethnic group comparison. However, if we look at cervical cancer rates in Appalachia we will find that the rates are high for poor whites, even when compared with the African American population in that same region. It is often stated that the breast cancer incidence rates are lower in African American women when compared to white women. Yet in Houston both the incidence and mortality rates from breast cancer are higher for both when compared with white women in the area. The American Medical Association recently commented on the fact that we have had no success in reducing the health disparities gap over the last two decades. Although national data has indicated that cancer rates are going down for some populations, we will show that there are pockets where that is not occurring and make strong recommendations that unless we change our approaches, that not only the cancer disparities gap will start to increase, that the overall health care gap as well.