The state of African American health is grim and getting grimmer every day. Many African Americans are beset with illiteracy, high rate of unemployment, poverty and hunger. These problems create a situation that causes many African Americans young and old to live in some of the poorest communities in the U.S.
Life in the Black Ghetto of America is a cruel and brutal life, which exposes people living there to a daily life and death set of circumstances that risks their lives from moment to moment.
Intertwined in this life of poverty and daily struggle to survive is a high rate of medical problems that African Americans are afflicted with that go both undiagnosed and untreated most of the time.
Among the medical diseases that many African Americans suffer from are:
Hypertension
Sexually Transmitted diseases (STD)
Coronary heart disease
Drug addiction
Congestive heart failure
Alcoholism
Stroke
Depression
Obesity
Hepatitis C
Diabetes
Hepatitis B
High cholesterol
Cirrhosis of the liver
End stage kidney failure
Sickle cell disease
Cancer
Iron deficiency
COPD
Lupus
Low vitamin D
Rheumatoid arthritis
Low vitamin B12
Osteoporosis
Emphysema
Fetal alcohol syndrome
Asthma
High postpartum maternal deaths
AIDS
High infant deaths
Dementia
Making the situation worse is the fact that many poor African Americans have no health insurance. In addition, many of those who have health insurance don’t go to physicians for medical care and when they do go, they usually present with medical conditions that are too far advanced to be cured.
