Race and Population-Based Medicine: Drug Development and Distributive Justice
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Race and Population-Based Medicine: Drug
Development and Distributive Justice
MICHAEL LAUFERT*
INTRODUCTION
Racial and ethnic minorities have significantly poorer health compared to the
United States population as a whole.' Compared to the general population,
African-Americans are more likely to die from diseases such as diabetes, heart
disease, and AIDS.' These disparities can be attributed to several factors,
including but not limited to racism, socioeconomic status, social networks, health
beliefs, and biology.3 Because of these disparities, the Department of Health and
Human Services and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have implemented
programs designed to help close the health status gap by promoting studies that
target diseases affecting particular racial communities.4 Though the life
expectancy gap between African-Americans and whites has been narrowing. in
recent decades, life expectancy at birth for African-Americans is 5.2 years shorter
than for the whites.' The age-adjusted mortality rate is still over 30% higher for
African-Americans than for whites.6 More must be done to decrease health status
disparities between racial groups in the United States.
Population-based medicine, a medical approach that establishes best medical
practices for groups of individuals with similar characteristics, can help reduce
health status disparities.7 A population-based approach works by defining a
* J.D., Georgetown University Law Center (expected May 2009). I would like to thank Professor Patricia
King for her guidance and support, and my wife, Megan, for her encouragement and patience.
1. See generally David B. Resnik & Gerard Roman, Health, Justice, and the Environment, 21 BiOET-Ics 230,
231 (2007); Giselle Corbie-Smith et al., Closing the Circle Between Minority Inclusion in Research and Health
Disparities, 164 ARCHIVES INTERNAL MED. 1362 (2004).
2. See CDC Statistics, Highlights in Minority & Health Disparities, Feb. 2007, http://www.cdc.gov/omhd/
Highlights/2007/HFeb07.htm. Compared to the general population, age adjusted death rates for African-
Americans are 29% higher for heart disease, 23% higher for cancer, and 96% higher for diabetes. Id.
3. See Joanne M. Churak, Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Renal Transplantation, 97 J. NAT'L MED. ASS'N
153, 154-56 (2005).
4. Resnik & Roman, supra note 1, at 235; Dorothy E. Roberts, Legal Constraints on the Use of Race in
Biomedical Research: Toward a Social Justice Framework, 34 J.L. MED. & ETHICS 526, 528 (2006).
5. U.S. DEP'T OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVS., HEALTH, UNITED STATES, 2007, wrrH CHART BOOK ON TRENDS
IN THE HEALTH OF AMERICANS 8 (2007) [hereinafter HEALTH STATISTICS].
6. Id. (stating that between 1990 and 2004 the life-expectancy gap between African-Americans and whites
decreased from 7.0 years to 5.2 years and the age adjusted mortality rate difference decreased from 37% to
31%).
7. See AM. MED. Ass'N, ROADMAPS FOR CLINICAL PRACTICE: A PRIMER ON POPULATION BASED MEDICINE 14
(2002) [hereinafter PRIMER].](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/geojlege21&div=43&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Race and Population-Based Medicine: Drug Development and Distributive Justice
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