Published November, 2018

Structural racism and health inequities in the USA: evidence and interventions, Zinzi D Bailey et al., The Lancet (2017)

Despite the fact that racism in its many forms contributes to poor health outcomes, health professionals and policymakers have yet to employ concrete anti-racism measures to address persistent health inequities in the United States.

Bailey et al. focus specifically on inequities in housing and in health care access as factors in poor health outcomes for Black Americans and argue that solutions that focus on structural racism will create durable solutions for communities in the United States. Residential segregation and the uneven distribution of health care facilities and providers have created communities within which chronic and infectious disease thrive, and incident rates continue to grow.