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Niger Faces Major Food Emergency
The FDA Approves a Race-Specific Drug for the First Time
in History. Will it Address the Real Health Issues Facing
African-Americans?
Activist Damu Smith: Fighting Colon Cancer and Systemic Racial
Disparities in American Healthcare
Niger Faces Major Food Emergency
The African country of Niger is rarely mentioned in this
country. Among the only times you hear Nier mentioned is in
relation to the Wilson/Plame/Rove scandal. But today in Niger,
3.3 million people, including almost a million children, are
facing starvation after a drought and locusts wiped out last
year's harvest. We go to Niamey, Niger for a report from Doctors
Without Borders.
The African country of Niger is rarely mentioned in this
country. The only time we've heard it mentioned in the last
few years is in relation to the Wilson/Plame/Karl Rove scandal
- that the CIA sent ambassador Wilson to Niger to investigate
claims that Saddam Hussein sought to buy uranium from the
country. The claim was not true even though President Bush
said it was during his 2003 State of the Union address.
But the African country is facing an immense crisis of its
own. In Niger, 3.3 million people, including almost a million
children, are facing starvation after a drought and locusts
wiped out last year's harvest. It is listed as the second
least developed country in the world by the United Nations
development program. More than 25% of Niger's children die
before their fifth birthday. Jan Egeland, United Nations undersecretary
general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator,
said the emergency could have been prevented.
- Jan Egeland, UN Undersecretary General for Humanitarian
Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator:
"We have a full blown emergency in Niger, children
are dying from hunger, it was all predictable, the government
and we appealed in November last year, again in March, and
we had a huge flash appeal as we call it in mid-May. I met
with all of the donors here in New York on the 13th of May,
and only now these days in mid -July when the images come
on television of dying, starving children, do we receive
the funding we need."
In the last few days, the United Nations has more than doubled
the number of people it plans to feed in Niger. The U.N World
Food Program announced that it will now aim to provide emergency
rations to 2.5 million people. Last week, the agency's stated
goal was 1.2 million. Relief workers on the ground say the
UN and other agencies should have started the large-scale
emergency food aid much earlier. _Development agencies have
criticized the world media for not bringing the crisis to
the attention of the public despite numerous efforts from
these agencies to get the story in newspapers and on television.
The Chief Executive of the Disaster Emergency Committee, Brendan
Gormley told Scotland's Sunday Herald, “the whole push
of G8 and Live8 was to get away from chronic images of African
starvation and Niger didn't fit. It risked falling in the
"old" Africa. The public and politicians weren”t
looking because of the emphasis on reaching a long term resolve
for Africa. Sadly, People are hungry now.”
The FDA Approves a Race-Specific Drug for the First
Time in History. Will it Address the Real Health Issues Facing
African-Americans?
The Food and Drug Administration has recently approved the
first drug specifically for African-Americans. The new drug
BiDil has raised concerns among some doctors and medical ethicists.
We host a debate about this new trend of race-based drug making
and marketing.
In June, the Federal Drug Administration approved the drug
BiDil to treat heart failure in black patients. It is the
first time ever that a medication has been targeted to a specific
racial group. On July 5, NitroMed inc., the maker of BiDil,
began stocking pharmacies and doctors' sample closets. It
hired 195 new salespeople to begin making calls on 10,000
selected physicians in Philadelphia, Atlanta, New York and
Washington and other cities with large African-American populations.
African-Americans suffer from heart failure at almost twice
the rate of whites. NitroMed expects BiDil to be prescribed
to between 10 and 15 percent of African Americans with congestive
heart failure, who number between 250,000 and 750,000 nationwide.
But many have criticized this race-based approach to drug
making and marketing. They ask how BiDil will affect society's
understanding of the cardiovascular health of African-Americans
and whether it will detract from focus on systemic issues
like socioeconomic status, residential patterns of segregation,
diet and stress from discrimination.
- Jonathan Kahn, law professor at Hamline University. His
article "How a Drug Becomes 'Ethnic': Law, Commerce,
and the Production of Racial Categories in Medicine,"
was published in the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law,
and Ethics last year.
Activist Damu Smith: Fighting Colon Cancer and Systemic
Racial Disparities in American Healthcare
Longtime activist Damu Smith is the founder of Black Voices
for Peace. He has fought war and racism for decades. Now he’s
fighting for his life. He has colon cancer. We speak with
Damu Smith about his struggle with cancer and for equitable
healthcare in this country. [includes rush
transcript]
Damu Smith is a pillar of the peace and anti-racism movements
in the United States. He founded Black Voices for Peace and
the National Black Environmental Justice Network. He hosts
the program Spirit in Action on Pacifica station WPFW. He
was a key leader in the anti-Apartheid movement and has fought
police brutality in Washington, DC and around the country.
Now, Damu Smith is fighting for his life. He was in Israel-Palestine
earlier this year for a peace march when he collapsed and
was taken to a hospital. Doctors there found polyps on his
colon and a tumor in his liver. They told him he had three
to six months to live. Damu is 53-years-old and has a 12-year-old
daughter.
This year the American College of Gastroenterology issued
new guidelines urging African Americans to be screened for
colon cancer beginning at age 45—five years earlier
than other people. African Americans have the highest rates
of mortality from heart failure, cancer, and AIDS out of any
racial or ethnic group in the United States. People of color
face a lower overall quality of health services than white
people and lack access to routine medical care.
Damu Smith is using both natural and pharmaceutical medications
to fight the cancer and told the Washington Post "I’m
going to be the poster child for twice-a-year screenings."
We’re joined now in our Washington DC by Damu Smith.
We’ll talk about his years of activism and his battle
today for his life. And we will also speak with Dr. Joseph
Betancourt, an expert on racial disparities in healthcare.
But first, we go to a an excerpt of a speech by Damu Smith
delivered at Plymouth Congregational Church in Washington,
D.C. on January 21st, 2005, one day after the inauguration
of George W. Bush.
- Damu Smith, speaking at Plymouth Congregational Church
in Washington, D.C. on January 21st, 2005, one day after
the inauguration of George W. Bush.
An initiative launched last month by Boston Mayor Thomas
Menino will address racial disparities in healthcare head
on. A city-sponsored study found that Black men in Boston
die on average five years sooner than white men. Black people
are twice as likely to die from diabetes and four times more
likely to contract HIV. The new initiative will funnel one
million dollars into detailed tracking of racial differences
in patient care and cultural awareness training for healthcare
providers.
- Dr. Joseph Betancourt, senior scientist at the Institute
for Health Policy at Massachusetts General Hospital. He
was part of the panel for the Institute of Medicine that
published “Unequal Treatment," a 2003 study examining
racial disparities in health care.
- Damu Smith, founder, Black Voices for Peace and executive
director of the National Black Environmental Justice Network.
To donate money for Damu Smith’s healthcare fund,
go to damusmith.org
or call (202)-265-4919.
For a copy of today’s program, call 1 (800) 881 2359.
Our website is www.democracynow.org.
Our email address is mail@democracynow.org.
Democracy Now! is produced by Mike Burke, Sharif Abdel Kouddous,
Ana Nogueira, Elizabeth Press, Jeremy Scahill and Parvez Sharma.
Mike Di Filippo is our engineer.
Thanks also to Uri Galed, Angela Alston, Orlando Richards,
Simba Russeau, Johnny Sender, Rich Kim, Joe Murgio, John Randolph,
Chris Zucker, Karen Ranucci, Denis Moynihan, Eric Rweyemamu,
Jenny Filipazzo and Isis Phillips.
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