Racial Disparities in Health - Essay Example

"Racial Disparities in Health" is a perfect example of a paper on medical ethics. Racial/ethnic disparities in health refer to the differences in health status, beliefs, and practices among people from various cultural backgrounds. In order to solve various health issues in the country, the United States government design health programs and interventions that would help improve the health conditions of its society. However, as the population of the United States continues to become more and more diverse, it is necessary to identify these disparities to develop a more suitable and more efficient health program or campaign that would resolve such issues. By identifying racial/ethnic disparities in health, health intervention theories may be generated, which would serve as a guide in developing an effective health intervention strategy.

Q2.      There are several key factors identified to be contributors to the health disparities concerning different races and ethnic minorities. Generally, “discrimination, social exclusion, lack of access to resources, higher exposure to environmental risk, and higher prevalence of poverty (Edberg, 2007)” greatly influence how people perceive health care and its practice. As a whole, these experiences may be divided into three general categories as vulnerability, circumstance, and response, which constitute the key factors in health disparities. Some examples of such experiences were exhibited by African-American and Central American patients’ apprehensions among doctors and the use of scientific testing of blood in a public health clinic to identify the presence of HIV diseases. In addition, African-Americans and Hispanics also viewed exercising simply to be a daily activity that is only associated among the rich and not among those who live in poverty. Lack of knowledge on diseases such as cancer and its prevention is also prevalent among Mexican-Americans. Moreover, Asians and Pacific Islanders are apparently reluctant in talking about diseases associated with sex such as HIV/AIDS, thus making them unaware of the consequences these diseases could bring them.

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