# Colon Cancer Rates Worse for Black Americans -- AP



## overitnow (Nov 25, 2001)

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/081215/...olon_cancer_gapBy Mike Stobbe, The Associated PressATLANTA - The racial gap in colon cancer death rates is widening, a new report says, and experts partly blame blacks' lower screening rates and poor access to quality care.Colon and rectal cancer death rates are now nearly 50 per cent higher in blacks than in whites, according to American Cancer Society research being released Monday.The gap has been growing since the mid-1970s, when colon cancer death rates for the two racial groups were nearly equal."We have seen this enormous progress in whites. We could be seeing the same progress in blacks, if we could overcome disparities in access to health care," said Elizabeth Ward, who oversees surveillance and health policy at the cancer society.Colorectal cancer is the third leading cancer killer in the United States. About 50,000 Americans will die of the disease this year, the cancer society estimates.


----------

