Improving Quality and Reducing Disparities in Breast Cancer Mortality in Metropolitan Chicago.

This report came out in October 2007. Statistics were showing that the incidence of breast cancer in black women are increasing and running at a 67% higher rate than with white women. In 2003 the rates of breast cancer were almost the same for white women and women of color. And the rates in Chicago are higher than other places in the country. In New York the differential is 11%, nationwide is it 37%. And those rates remain fairly constant while the differential in Chicago is getting wider.

Obviously this is a major health issue for all women especially black women in Chicago. The Metropolitan Chicago Breast Cancer Task Force was formed to study this situation. Then in October 2007 the report was issued. A copy of that report is available as a PDF download at the bottom of this page.

The basic conclusion of the report is:

"It is important to note that the disparities seen in Chicago are not the result of biological differences in breast cancer between Black and White women, although recent studies have noted that there is biological variability in the presentation of breast cancer. The comparisons with New York City and the entire U.S. make it clear that biology cannot be blamed for the disparity in mortality rates in Chicago. We suggest the answer lies in the system – a system of care in Metropolitan Chicago that has failed in the most basic of
ways to preserve the health of Black women. The system must be repaired, and this may best be accomplished by focusing on the recommendations in this Report offered by the Task Force.

Three Hypotheses Explaining Breast Cancer Disparities
1. Black women receive fewer mammograms;
2. Black women receive mammograms of inferior quality; and
3. Black women have inadequate access to quality treatment once a cancer is diagnosed."(1)

A lot of people and healthcare institutions were involved with the report. No doubt a lot of money was spent to explain the reason black women have a higher rate of mortality from breast cancer is due to their lack of access to better medical care. The report is quite extensive at 133 pages. There is not one word about what the possible causes of this might be. Although I hesitate to belittle this report and acknowledge the availability of health care to all minorities is less than it is to white people, there is not ONE mention in this report about what might be causing breast cancer in the first place. Is breast cancer an inevitable result of living in Chicago especially if you happen to be a black women? It is also prevalent in white women as well, just more wide spread in black women.

The rate of mortality for breast cancer in Chicago in 2003 is:

Allow me to add another piece of information. What parts of the US have the highest mortality rates of breast cancer for black women from 1970 to 1994?

Isn't that curious? The rates are highest in the middle of the country including Illinois and Chicago. Rates are lowest on the coasts.

Now I am not going to say the Chicago report is wrong. Of course it is not. If a women has the luxury of finding out they might have breast cancer early, then medical care can be provided to keep it from becoming a mortality statistic. But the best way to fight cancer is not to get it.

Allow me to make an alternative suggestion. Dark skin people need 5-6 times the exposure to sunshine to get the same amount of Vitamin D as a light skin person. Places like Minneapolis, Chicago and middle America have a large portion of the year where the available sun is not enough. If almost all of us are deficient in Vitamin D even during the summer what happens in the winter? Studies have shown that almost all black children are sorely deficient in Vitamin D at birth. Some are so deficient they are born with rickets (soft bones).

Isn't is strange that about October and November of each year people start coming down with colds then later in the year with flu. Is this because when these months come someone takes the cold and flu bug from the refrigerator and releases it? No. These germs are around all year round. But what does happen is most of us are so deficient in Vitamin D that when what little sun exposure we gets suddenly becomes even less, our immune systems become even more weak and can't fight off the invaders.

This may sound almost too simple. Do I mean that simple sun exposure can have an impact on our health? Read Doctor preaches wonder cure: Vitamin D. Dr. Greg Plotnikoff, medical director of Abbott's Center for Integrative Medicine in Minneapolis, MN, is an advocate on the health benefits of Vitamin D. According to Plotnikoff "there is an epidemic of vitamin D deficiency, especially among the obese, the elderly and dark-skinned people living in the sun-deprived north. In fact,  most Minnesotans are likely deficient in winter, unless they take supplements, because they live too far north to get enough vitamin D from the sun. Deficiencies have been linked to 17 kinds of cancer, autoimmune diseases, chronic pain, heart disease, depression and ADHD. In fact, there is almost nothing that vitamin D can’t help, and that’s Plotnikoff’s point. It reduces death. It reduces pain. It reduces illness. And it’s free from the sun." (2)