“To preserve health is a moral and religious duty, for health is the basis of all social virtues. We can no longer be useful when not well.” – Samuel Johnson
We decided to highlight a few vital statistics for 2014’s for this year’s Movember/No-Shave November and highlight Afrovember to show some of the statistics around African American’s men’s health:
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African American male life expectancy is 71 years – WORST AMONG ALL GROUPS IN AMERICA.
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The top 3 causes of death for African American males are heart disease, cancer, and unintentional injuries.
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Percent of African American men 18 years and over who currently smoke cigarettes: 23.7%
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Percent of African American men 20 years and over who are obese: 37.9%
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Percent of African American men 20 years and over with hypertension: 39.9%
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Birth rates for African American men declined 1% to 58.2 births per 1,000 men aged 15–54 — a new record low for the group.
Source: Center for Disease Control
Unfortunately, it appears that there is very little data being collected on African American men’s health. An opportunity certainly for an HBCU research center to be formed that focused in on the collection of such data. Given the reluctance especially among African American men to engage doctors (and with good historical reason) a measured approach and strategy to bringing in interaction could go a long way into finding ways to improve African American men’s health.
Check out just a few organizations contributing to the improvement of African American Male Health:
HBCU Money 