Dr. Kevin Stephens wrote a great op-ed on April being National Minority Health Month and disparities in Louisiana. Take a look at Louisiana: The unintended pregnancy rate is a whopping 58 percent. Louisiana’s teen birth rate is higher than the national average. Louisiana ranks in the top three for rates of infection for Chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis. And New Orleans has the third highest rate for new HIV diagnoses in the nation. Baton Rouge is second. Louisiana ranks high in cancer cases as well. Last year about 60 Louisianans a day received a cancer diagnosis. Despite recent decreases, the combined mortality rate for Louisianans with cancer is about 30 percent higher than the national average. In fact, Louisiana has the sixth-highest rate of cervical cancer deaths in the country. African-American women are twice as likely to lose their lives to cervical cancer as white women. And among women diagnosed with breast cancer, African-American women are most likely to die from the disease.
Posted on: Wed, 16 Apr 2014 15:07:52 +0000
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