Opinion

The UN Population Fund in a report on July 12 exposed that African-American women have been subjected to systematic racial discrimination historically in the field of public health in the US.

According to the report, African-American women are systematically ignored and abused in all aspects, ranging from health service to formulation and enforcement of health policies. It is said that they are insulted or abused in the course of treatment and even refused treatment itself. As a result, African-American women are at high risk of complications during pregnancy and are becoming more likely to die due to delayed treatment.

According to data recently released by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the probability of black women dying in pregnancy or childbirth is about 70 per 100 000, nearly three times that of women of other races. The high mortality of black mothers also leads to a much higher mortality of black infants.

ABC said that the number of black people suffering and dying from chronic diseases such as diabetes and hypertension is greater than that of other races, adding there are many historical restrictions in black neighborhoods and, accordingly, they cannot receive adequate medical treatment in time at medical facilities, which is the main cause of the high mortality of blacks in the US.

As widely known, black people and ethnic minorities living in the US are subject to all sorts of discrimination in all fields of social life and are forced to lead a miserable life.

The average income of black people is only 43.8% of white people, and the average property of black families is less than one tenth of that of white families. A company even has a working uniform that symbolizes white staff and a separate toilet for white people. Also, black staff are often called “black ghosts” and “monkeys” and whites are insulting blacks with racist remarks.

In the education sector, the probability that black students will be suspended or expelled from school is three times as high as that of white students. Black students are constantly subject to racial discrimination and maltreatment and even kill themselves as they are unable to control their indignation.

A university professor deplored that an ideological trend of clear division between blacks and whites exists in the US, though it is covered under the veil of “equality of all people”.

The police who allegedly maintain public security are also hunting blacks, and the legal bodies which have to control them are shielding the police’s killing of blacks under the pretext of “self-defense” and “execution of official duties”.

The proportion of African- and Asian-Americans and Latinos in the US workforce is only 36%, and most of them are concentrated in low-wage occupations such as agricultural workers, cleaners, and porters. The unemployment of black people is increasing by a factor of two compared to white people.

The number of hate crimes against people of color is constantly increasing. The livelihood of the people of color has become more disastrous during the pandemic crisis. Last year, the US National Institute of Public Health released the result of a survey conducted on the people of colour in the country about the COVID-19 infection from December 2020 to February 2021. According to it, more than half of the respondents asserted that they were subject to extreme discrimination from white people, even hearing such abusive remarks as “a nation that can easily be infected with the novel coronavirus”.

The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said that racial discrimination has systematically taken root in the US government organs for the past few centuries, threatening the security of nonwhite residents and violating not only their legal rights but also their economic, social and cultural rights.

The New York Times deplored that one can go unpunished after oppressing the life of people of color without any restrictions or killing them in the US and the state is not striving to reform such a system.

Nevertheless, the US is finding fault with other countries’ human rights issues in the international arena, turning a blind eye to its own human rights situation.

The US should deal with the issue of systematic racism and racial discrimination deep-rooted in its society before interfering in the internal affairs of other countries.