Racial health disparities in Chicago and the US – No progress

Introduction: One of the overarching goals of Healthy People 2010 is to eliminate health disparities. This analysis examines whether disparities between non-Hispanic Black and non-Hispanic White persons have widened, narrowed, or stayed the same from 1990 to 2005. Methods: The current analysis examined fifteen health status indicators overall; ten measures of mortality, three measures of birth outcome, and two measures of communicable disease. Data was age-adjusted and comparability-modified as necessary to create valid comparisons. Disparity was defined as having widened, narrowed, or remained unchanged between 1990 and 2005 by examining the percent difference in rates between non-Hispanic Black and non-Hispanic White populations at both time points and at each location. Results: Results revealed that Black:White disparities widened for 6 of 15 health status indicators examined for the U.S. (5 significantly). Improvement was noted for 8 of the remaining indicators (6 significantly), while in one instance the level of disparity remained constant. Conversely, in Chicago the vast majority of disparities widened (11 of 15, 5 significantly) during the same time period. Conclusion: Overall, progress toward meeting the Healthy People 2010 goal of eliminating health disparities in the U.S. and in Chicago remains bleak. With over 15 years of time and effort spent at the National and local level to reduce disparities, the impact remains small. We view this paper as a wake-up call for us to mobilize ourselves to produce a genuine movement and strategy for reducing disparities.