EXISTENCE OF ALASKA NATIVE HEALTH DISPARITIES/JONES RESPONDS

There is no evidence this disparity is decreasing. 3 The first report of cancer mortality among Alaska Natives (1960-1969) found that cancer mortality rates among Alaska Natives were slightly lower than among the US Whites population but higher than among other American Indian groups.4 A study by the National Cancer Institute of all racial/ ethnic groups in the United States (1988- 1992) reported cancer death rates were highest among Alaska Native women and third for Alaska Native men.5 Cancer has been the leading cause of death among Alaska Native people since the mid-1990s. Over the last six decades, the IHS has worked consistently to overcome this deficit, from its first field health surveys in 1956 to its extensive data collection today.1,2 Population-wide data remain invaluable to the IHS, revealing the persistence of wide disparities between American Indians and Alaska Natives (AIAN) and the general population even as overall health conditions improved among all groups in the United States. When the IHS began collecting health data, it found lower rates of cancer (and heart disease) in American Indians and Alaska Natives than in the general population; infectious diseases remained prevalent among the AIAN population. 1 This pattern fit well with popular notions that American Indians and Alaska Natives remained an underdeveloped society and did not share the burden of chronic disease that afflicted Whites in the United States.