KALAMAZOO (WKZO-AM)– Despite decades of effort to reduce infant deaths in Kalamazoo, black babies are still much more likely to die in their first year than white babies.
The overall rate has declined but that disparity remains.
The Cradle Kalamazoo Initiative got a boost from Kalamazoo County Commissioners Tuesday night when Commissioners approved a resolution endorsing their new approach, to attack implicit racism in the healthcare community.
Several agency heads and pediatricians say subconsciously health care workers don’t give black mothers the same treatment white mothers get.
Board Chair John Taylor says the numbers don’t lie. “When wealthy African-American women are having higher [infant mortality rates] than poorer white women, then that is systemic racism”.
The regional United Way is committing $1.5-million to fund the effort to reduce the bias, and bring what they call “Cultural Competence” to healthcare workers.
Commissioner Stephanie Moore abstained from the vote saying it just doesn’t go far enough. That rather than just for a task force to address this narrow problem, that they address the issue of implicit bias against minority patients on a much larger scale.
