Vernellia R. Randall, Racial Discrimination in Health Care in the United States as a Violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, 14 University of Florida Journal of Law and Public Policy 45 -91 (Fall, 2002) (201 Footnotes Omitted)(Full Document)


vernelliarandall2015  “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and the most inhuman.”  Martin Luther King

 

Equal access to quality health care is a crucial issue facing the United States. For too long, too many Americans have been denied equal access to quality health care on the basis of race, ethnicity, and gender. Cultural incompetence of health care providers, socioeconomic inequities, disparate impact of facially neutral practices and policies, misunderstanding of civil rights laws, and intentional discrimination contribute to disparities in health status, access to health care services, participation in health research, and receipt of health care financing. This disparity in health care is doubly significant given the devastating racial disparity in health status that exists. The combination of racial disparity in health status, institutional racism in health care and inadequate legal protection points to serious human rights violations under the “International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination”(CERD or Convention).