An American health dilemma: a history of blacks in the health system.

The present black health crisis is a continuum. After 346 years of neglect, flawed efforts were made to admit black Americans to the "mainstream" health system. Gains were significant from 1965 to 1975; however, since then black health status has eroded. Since colonial times, the racial dilemma that affected America's liberal democratic system also distorted medical relationships and institutions. There are clear connections between campaigns to defeat bills that would improve the health of blacks and other disadvantaged groups and acquiescence with the present reassignment of them to the underfunded, overcrowded, inferior, public health-care sector. Physician leadership helped to establish the slaveocracy, create the racial inferiority myths, and build the segregated health subsystem for blacks and the poor. Clearly, if the history-based health disparities are to be resolved, black physician leadership will be necessary. Without justice and equity in health care, the dream of Martin Luther King will never become a reality for African Americans.     

Environmental factors influencing public health and medicine: policy implications

Environmental health threats are increasing throughout the United States, particularly in low-income populations and in communities of color. Environmental science researchers are investigating plausible associations between the environment and human health. As a result, the role and responsibility of the primary care physicians and other health care providers are changing. This paper highlights selected lines of evidence suggesting that clinicians should now consider interactions between humans and their environment as central to providing effective primary care. Subject areas include: exposure to environmental agents, reproductive toxicity, pulmonary disease, neurobehavioral toxicity, endocrine disruptors, mechanisms of environmental disease, and cultural competence. Concerns about these and other environmentally related issues influence the manner in which primary care is practiced now, and will be practiced in the future. Biomedical technology and community awareness demand that physicians pay more attention to advances in environmental medicine. Ironically, one of the least taught subjects in medical school is environmental medicine. To effectively respond to growing concerns about the role of the environment in human health, clinicians, researchers, educators, public policy officials, and the general public must join together to reduce the risk of environmental health threats and improve quality of life.