Bridging the Divide: A Call to Action By the Congressional Black Caucus to Eliminate Racial Health Disparities

Floor Speech

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Ms. KELLY of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleagues and my classmates, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Beatty), my friend, and the distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Jeffries), for leading this important conversation about bridging the divide to eliminate racial health disparities.

But I can't weigh in on that topic until I first address the horrific events of yesterday in Orlando, Florida. Our Nation is horrified and heartbroken by the tragedy in Orlando. We are disgusted by this brutal attack. We will not tolerate terrorism or hate in any form against any group of people because this is just not our way.

These ideas of hate will not endure because there is not strength to them. We will win the battle against terrorism and intolerance.

We will hold leaders accountable who put their NRA score ahead of the need to keep guns out of the hands of terrorists. We will stand with the LGBTQ community and value their lives, their health, and their security from the threat of violence and hate. And we will work to see that all Americans enjoy the very same freedoms and protections.

We have done a lot of moments of silence, but I believe in showing respect through action, not silence, and that is why we are here this evening to discuss what divides us as a country in a health sense.

For 45 years, the Congressional Black Caucus has been out front in Congress in fighting for these freedoms and protections. And when it comes to the matter of health equity, I have worked to champion the health policy concerns of vulnerable communities as my predecessors in the Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust, the Honorable Louis Stokes and Dr. Christensen, have done.

Some of my colleagues here know this, but I want to repeat it for anyone who doesn't. Before he was killed, Martin Luther King, Jr., was quoted as saying: ``Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.''

I couldn't agree more, and as the chair of the Health Braintrust, I have worked with many of the people in this room to focus on advancing this critical phase of the human rights and civil rights struggle: health equity.

When Benjamin Franklin created the Nation's first public hospital, The Pennsylvania Hospital, he did so in order to establish the promotion of public health as a core American value. He did so to care for our Nation's diseased and sick poor.

Nearly 300 years later, the Affordable Care Act cemented health care as a fundamental right for all Americans. Yet, today, we find ourselves at a crossroads in health care. Health disparities in communities of color continue to be intractable hurdles in the quest to achieve health equity in America.

African Americans are infected with HIV at a rate that is 8 times that of White Americans.

While White women are more likely to have breast cancer, African American women are 40 percent more likely to die from the disease.

African Americans, Latinos, Asians, and Pacific Islanders, as well as Native Americans, are diagnosed with lupus two to three times more frequently than Caucasians.

More than 13 percent of African Americans aged 20 or older have diagnosed diabetes. And people of color are two to four times more likely than Whites to reach end-stage renal disease.

This grim snapshot illustrates that, despite the gains we have made since the days of Ben Franklin and the ACA, there is still much ground to cover in closing the health equity gap.

Last year, I drafted a comprehensive report, The Kelly Report on Health Disparities, an official Congressional analysis of the state of minority health in the U.S. that offers a blueprint for reversing negative health trends in communities of color.

The Kelly Report brought Members of Congress together, medical professionals, and public health thought leaders to examine the root causes and impact of health disparities in America, and provide a comprehensive set of legislative and policy recommendations to address them.

The whole can only ever be as healthy as its parts. For America to achieve true health equity, lawmakers, community leaders, and industry stakeholders must come together and aggressively work to reduce disparities nationwide. We all have a part to play in creating a healthier America.

We must take heed of Dr. King's words: ``Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.'' And we can and we must fix that.

Again, because of what happened in Orlando, and I want to say it is the mass shooting that we are talking about, and it is tragic, but the night before, one person was shot. And I often liken this to a 747 crash as we talk about that, but we don't talk about the two-seater. And that two-seater, the person that died alone in that club after she sung Friday night has a brother, a mother, a father, and their pain is just as harsh. So let's not forget that young lady that lost her life. And she did not lose her life to someone that was Muslim or someone that believed in ISIS. She lost her life to an American young man, a Caucasian.

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