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Dear Colleagues,
The new Institute of Medicine report, "Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care," marks a turning point in the fight to eliminate inequalities that have long been obvious.
On one level, the IOM's findings free us to move forward. Researchers can stop spending their time proving that disparities exist, we're told. There's abundant, rock-solid evidence that health care inequalities are all too real.
On another level, the IOM report informs us that we may have to dig deeper than previously imagined to eliminate the disparities' root causes. There's more behind these inequalities -- and, ultimately, differences in rates of illness and death -- than differences in age or income or proximity to care. Prejudice and bias appear to play a role, too.
No matter how well-intended we are, the IOM tells us, unjustified negative attitudes can creep into our actions and decisions. No one involved in health care -- from administrators to practitioners to patients -- is removed from ethnic and racial prejudice that can translate into unequal treatment.
What was once merely a policy matter is now a moral question, going to the heart of what equality means. We are both privileged and obliged to find the answer.
Jessie Gruman, PhD
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