NCI Campaign to Reduce Health Disparities Will Save Lives

 

By Dr. Willarda V. Edwards

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) should be applauded for recently launching a project to educate African American men about the connection between eating more fruits and vegetables and avoiding life-threatening diseases.

This campaign will help save lives.

In African American communities across the country, African American men -- fathers, brothers, uncles and grandfathers -- suffer from many cancers, high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease. These diet-related diseases, which disproportionately strike African American men, may have been avoidable if they had eaten a healthier diet including more fruits and vegetables, over the course of their lives.

NCI recommends that African American men eat 9 servings of fruits and vegetables a day to reduce the risk of chronic diseases. NCI is working with organizations, such as the National Medical Association and the NAACP, to deliver that information to African American men, many of who are not even aware of the value of eating fruits and vegetables.

Indeed, studies show that African American men eat less fruits and vegetables than any other group in theUnited States. A national survey found that African American men ages 35 to 50 eat just 3.1 servings of fruits and vegetables a day, just one-third of the recommendation. The research found that less than a third of the men even knew about the general recommendations for all Americans to eat five to nine servings a day.

While African American men are not eating properly, they are developing diseases at alarming rates and researchers believe their diets are a contributing factor. African American men have a greater chance of developing prostate cancer, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and obesity than their white, Latino, Asian/Pacific and Native American brothers. Here are the facts that researchers have found:

African American men have the highest overall rate for cancer deaths. They are one and a half times more likely to get the disease – and twice as likely to die from it than Whites.

The rate of high blood pressure among African Americans in the United States is the highest in the world. Studies by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention have found that 36.4% of African American men ages 20 and older have high blood pressure, compared to 25.6% of white men.

An estimated 2.3 million African Americans have diabetes, with African American men twice as likely to have diabetes as whites of the same age. Mortality rates for African Americans with diabetes are 27% higher than Whites with the disease.

The mortality rate for African American men ages 35 to 44 with coronary heart disease is 82.6%, compared to 38.8% for Whites of the same age.
Clearly, the data shows there is a critical need for change. It’s time for African American men to recognize that what they eat – or don’t eat – is disabling, and killing them.

How can African American men do better?

How can they eat nine servings a day?

It’s easy. Drink 100% fruit juice in the morning. Bring an apple or orange to work for a snack. Try a fruit smoothie. Eat a salad with lunch. Have a couple of vegetables with dinner. All of these foods will bring you closer to the nine servings a day that NCI says is important for men to keep healthy.

NCI’s campaign is a great start. It will make people more aware that eating fruits and vegetables can help keep diseases away. But it should also serve as a wake-up call for African American men. It’s time for African American men to become more responsible for their health. It’s time they recognize that their eating habits are robbing them of a long and healthy life and often inflicting unnecessary burdens on their families.

Great civil rights leaders gave their lives so that African Americans could enjoy equal rights, the right to vote, sit in the front of a bus, eat at a lunch counter, all of the liberties that so many take for granted now.

What might they say today if they knew that millions of African American men are dying in the prime of their lives from diseases that are preventable? They would be appalled. They would compel African American men to do the right thing, which includes eating fruits and vegetables.

Perhaps part of the new civil rights campaign is a campaign for African American men to take hold of their own destinies, to eat healthier and be there longer for their families. That would build stronger families, stronger communities, and help ensure that the dreams of our leaders past can be fulfilled today.

(Dr. Edwards is Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the National Medical Association)

The National Medical Association (NMA) is the largest and oldest national organization representing African American physicians and their patients in the United States . Headquartered in Washington , DC , NMA is the collective voice of African American physicians and the leading force for parity and justice in medicine and the elimination of disparities in health.

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