Rethinking the Use of Race in Medicine

The COVID-19 pandemic has shined a spotlight on racial disparities in health and health care, but disparities are hardly new. They have been driven by longstanding inequities within and beyond the health care system that are rooted in racism.

KFF Vice President Samantha Artiga, who directs the Racial Equity and Health Policy Program, in this new video discusses how the medical system continues to use race in ways that may perpetuate disparities, including through provider and institutional bias, clinical guidelines, and medical education and training approaches. She also discusses the growing efforts within the medical community to reevaluate and revise how race is used in health care to move toward race-conscious versus race-based medicine.

This is the latest video in our series “In Focus with KFF,” featuring insights from our experts on health care issues in the news.