4 minute read
Black Men and Health
Education Doesn’t Improve Black Men’s Health, Experts Say
By John Burton Jr.
Racism persistently and negatively affects Black men’s health, health researchers say. This is true even as Black men are becoming more educated. Between 2000 and 2010, total Black undergraduate enrollment increased by 73 percent from 1.5 million students to 2.7 million. According to the National Center for Education Statistics in 2019, 28 percent of Black men ages 25 – 29 had a bachelor’s degree or higher.
Although a May 2021 article in Kaiser Health News points to studies that show life expectancy is higher for educated Black men than those who haven’t finished high school, obtaining a better education for many Black men in the U.S. does not always lead to better health.
Black men are still dying four years earlier than white men. “No matter how far you go in school, no matter what you accomplish, you’re still a Black man,” Derek Novacek, a clinical psychologist, who is researching Black-white health disparities at UCLA, told Kaiser Health News.
Researchers who study the health of various ethnic groups and the social factors that influence health outcomes believe this to be concerning. Their findings suggest the power of discrimination to harm the lives of Black men may be more persistent than many previously understood; therefore, improving Black men’s health is complicated, debunking the generations-old notion that education was the central solution.
Many would associate higher education with obtaining a higher-paying job which leads to better health care and longer life expectancy. But Black men are more likely to die from heart disease, diabetes and cancers — like prostate cancer — than
— Derek Novacek
their white male counterparts. Early detection of some of these ailments could be prevented if earlier medical attention were sought.
Nonhealth factors should also be referenced, including social pangs like racism and geography. “At every level of income and education, there is still an effect of race,” said David Williams, Professor of Public Health and chair of the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
A study by the “Annals of Internal Medicine” underscores Williams’ statement saying “structural racism, including in housing and health care, plays a role in harming the health of Black people. “Historically, Blacks had lower life expectancy compared to white Americans, mainly due to discrimination practices denying services to people based on their race. “What has surprised me is how powerfully and consistently discrimination predicts poor health,” said Williams.
Researchers found health disparities vary among states. They further discovered widening disparities within the Black community.
“The interaction of race, ethnicity and geography is really profound and explains a lot of the gaps in health that we see in the United States,” said Dr. Greg Roth, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Washington School of Medicine. For Black men, the average life expectancy in Rhode Island was about 81 years, and about 67 years in Washington, D.C. In North Carolina, the State Center for Health Statistics found that Black men have the lowest life expectancy at birth about 68 years and white women have the highest at 79.6 years.
The mental health of Black men is also an integral part of the equation of life expectancy. The psychological pressures educated Black men often endure tend to have less of a financial and social safety net than white men, which results in stress, according to some researchers. The undue pressures of climbing the corporate ladder, acquiescing convivially, while trying not to abandon their cultural identity can be emotionally taxing and socially isolating. “The cumulative effect of discrimination, even the anticipation of it, takes both a physical and psychological toll,” said Williams.
Sadly, higher education hasn’t brought about the health equity many experts once touted. This is certainly true when it comes to Black men. P The mental health of Black men is also an integral part of the equation of life expectancy. The psychological pressures educated Black men often endure tend to have less of a financial and social safety net than white men, which results in stress, according to some researchers.
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