AAMC Article: "Curing Health Care of Racism: Nikole Hannah-Jones and Ibram X. Kendi Call On Institutions to Foster Change"

Photo by Laura Zelaya

"When Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones needs medical care, she tries to seek out a Black doctor. 

"She knows that, historically, Black people have been the subjects of unethical experiments and have been mistreated by physicians. She knows that studies show that many doctors don't believe Black people feel pain as much as White people and they are less likely to prescribe certain treatments to Black patients. And she knows that her father and uncle, like a disproportionate number of Black Americans in general, died prematurely.

"'We see this manifestation in painful ways all the time,' Hannah-Jones, who created the New York Times Magazine's 1619 Project, told attendees during Learn Serve Lead 2020: The Virtual Experience on Monday, Nov. 16. 

"But finding a Black physician is not so easy, she pointed out, since just 5% of physicians in the United States are Black.

"At the root of the disparities is stage 4 metastatic racism, said Ibram X. Kendi, the bestselling author of How to Be an Antiracist, founder of the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research, and a cancer survivor. 

"Hannah-Jones and Kendi, both celebrated voices on racism in America, spoke candidly with AAMC President and CEO David J. Skorton, MD, during a plenary session Nov. 16 entitled "Is There a Cure for Racism?" For almost two hours, they discussed racial disparities in health care and education, and the distrust of medicine - including a COVID-19 vaccine - among communities that have experienced oppression. But they also addressed ways that individuals and institutions can work toward 'curing' the racism that plagues American society."

Click here to read the full article.

**All credit for this post and the included image is given to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC)**