Health indicators show broad improvement in '90s, but gaps remain

ATLANTA -Americans made advances in the 1990s against a broad list of diseases, but significant gaps remain for racial and ethnic minorities, says a government study that provides a snapshot of the nation&#39;s health. <br> <br> The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study, released Thursday, looked at 17 key ``health indicators&#39;&#39; statistics on everything from infant mortality to suicide to stroke, broken down into racial and ethnic groups. <br> <br> The encouraging news: For all but one of the indicators, the statistics improved in the &#39;90s for the U.S. population. Stroke deaths dropped by 9 percent. Car crash deaths fell by 15 percent. Homicide was down more than one-quarter. <br> <br> Only the percentage of babies born at low birth weight rose during the decade. <br> <br> Of more concern to health officials are lingering gaps, some of them glaring, for racial and ethnic minorities. Even when those groups saw improvements in the 1990s, whites in some cases managed to improve faster. <br> <br> Take breast cancer. From 1990 to 1998, the number of women killed fell 4 percent among blacks and 13 percent among Hispanics. For whites, the death rate dropped 18 percent. <br> <br> For federal health officials, who have set the lofty goal of eliminating these gaps by 2010, the study shows a lot of work ahead. <br> <br> ``In many ways, Americans of all ages and in every racial and ethnic group have better health today,&#39;&#39; Surgeon General David Satcher said. ``But our work isn&#39;t done until all infants have the same chance to thrive, all mothers have equal access to prenatal care, and all Americans are equally protected from cancer, heart disease and stroke.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Researchers pointed to national syphilis figures as a particular success story. Cases per 100,000 people dropped from more than 20 in 1990 to less than 3 in the 1998. <br> <br> Still, rates for the sexually transmitted disease among blacks are still nearly eight times higher than whites. <br> <br> Among the other alarming gaps were tuberculosis cases, eight times higher for blacks and six times higher for Hispanics, and homicide, 10 times higher for blacks and four for Hispanics. <br> <br> Reaching the 2010 goal of smoothing out the differences won&#39;t be easy. Researchers say the reasons for the gaps are different for each disease, even for different parts of the country. <br> <br> ``There&#39;s a tremendous range of factors that are associated with these differences,&#39;&#39; said Ken Kettel, a CDC statistician. ``Certainly some are due to social and economic factors, and others behavioral factors.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> A separate report on cancer, released Thursday, provided a similar result. <br> <br> The CDC found death rates from lung, breast, colorectal and prostate cancer fell during the 1990s. Researchers credited less smoking and early detection, although they urged more study to figure out why prostate cancer deaths dropped. <br> <br> But death rates for blacks were significantly higher than for whites. <br> <br> ``We have to talk about equal access to care for all populations access to preventive services, to effective screening and diagnostic tools and effective treatment as well,&#39;&#39; said CDC cancer expert Dr. Phyllis Wingo. <br>