Page 2 The Skanner September 27, 2017
®
Challenging People to Shape
a Better Future Now
Debunking the Myths Around Sickle Cell Disease
Bernie Foster
Founder/Publisher
Bobbie Dore Foster
Executive Editor
I
Jerry Foster
Advertising Manager
Christen McCurdy
News Editor
Patricia Irvin
Graphic Designer
Melanie Sevcenko
Reporter
Monica J. Foster
Seattle Office Coordinator
Susan Fried
Photographer
2017
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d ay ! • L i ke u s o
n the United States, sickle
cell disease (SCD) is con-
sidered rare, because it
affects only about 100,000
people nationwide. As such,
not many people in the U.S.
are aware of what SCD is, or
if they are aware, they have
limited experience with the
disease.
As with any disease, low
awareness can spur myths
and misperceptions and make
it more difficult for those af-
fected to obtain the care and
support they need. Through-
out my career, I’ve been asked
a number of questions about
SCD — many of which are
common myths.
In this article, I will share
some of the more common
myths, in an effort to separate
out the facts from fiction.
Sickle cell disease is a
“Black” disease.
Myth! It’s true that in the
U.S. more than 90 percent of
people living with SCD are of
African descent. SCD occurs
in one out of every 365 Afri-
can American births. How-
ever, it’s not exclusive to this
patient population. SCD is
also found in people of Indian,
Middle Eastern, Hispanic, and
Mediterranean ethnicities.
Sickle cell disease is conta-
gious.
Myth! You cannot “catch”
SCD — it is a genetically inher-
info@theskanner.com
to
y •
Opinion
Dr. Kevin
Williams
Chief Medical
Officer,
Pfizer Rare
Disease Unit
ited condition (passed down
from parent to child). For a
child to inherit SCD, both par-
ents must carry the sickle cell
trait (or have the disease) and
each must pass the sickle cell
gene to the child.
“
SCD occurs in
one out of ev-
ery 365 Afri-
can American
births
A person with the sickle
cell trait will automatically
develop sickle cell disease.
Myth! Sickle cell trait is dif-
ferent from SCD. Just because
a person carries the sickle
cell trait does not mean they
will have the disease. What’s
the difference? When a per-
son has only one copy of the
sickle cell gene, he or she will
have sickle cell trait. Someone
with SCD will have two copies
of the sickle cell gene.
A person with sickle cell
trait can, however, pass the
disease on to his or her child,
if the other parent also has
trait. That’s why testing for
sickle cell trait or disease is
incredibly important. Sick-
le cell disease (and sickle
cell trait) can be diagnosed
through a simple blood test.
In developed countries, like
the U.S., babies are now rou-
tinely screened at birth to de-
termine if they carry the trait
or have the disease.
People with sickle cell dis-
ease abuse pain medication.
Myth! Studies have shown
that there is no increased
substance abuse in patients
with SCD. The most common
symptom of SCD is excruciat-
ing, debilitating pain that of-
ten does not respond to over-
the-counter medications and
needs opioids to provide re-
lief. Over time, the body be-
comes used to the opioids—ul-
timately leading to high doses
being required to manage
SCD pain. This need for high
doses of opioids (which may
not even provide complete
relief from the pain), has un-
fortunately led to the percep-
tion that these patients are
“drug-seeking.”
A baby born with SCD will
die before reaching adult-
hood.
Myth! Until the 1990s, SCD
was considered a life-threat-
ening condition as many chil-
dren born with the disease
did not live to adulthood. In
developed countries, like the
U.S., this is no longer true,
with the majority of children
living to adulthood, thanks to
advances in SCD care.
However, the life expectan-
cy of someone with SCD in the
US is only between 40 and 60
years, compared to average
U.S. life expectancy of 78.74
years. There is still much
more work to do to improve
the outcomes of people with
SCD in the US and worldwide,
particularly in underdevel-
oped countries. Although the
disease was identified more
than 100 years ago, there are
still very few medicines avail-
able to help patients or ad-
dress SCD symptoms. While
there has been recent prog-
ress in this area, more still
needs to be done. At Pfizer
Rare Disease, we are work-
ing tirelessly to bring safe,
effective treatment options to
those in need.
One way to help address
this is to encourage participa-
tion in clinical trials. To date,
there have been several chal-
lenges in securing adequate
participation of African
Americans in clinical trials,
which has been one of the key
barriers to the development
of new SCD medications.
Read the rest of this commentary at
TheSkanner.com
Don’t Let ‘45’ Take Credit for President Obama’s Economy
T
he income, poverty and
health insurance data
released by the Census
Bureau on September
13 confirms what many of
us already knew. President
Obama’s last year was one of
economic improvement for
many individuals. The medi-
an income rose from $57,230
in 2015 to $59,039 in 2016, an
increase of 3.2 percent. Black
income rose 5.4 percent, from
$37,364 in 2015 to $39,400 in
2016, while White income
rose from $63,745 to $65,041,
an increase of two percent.
The income gap narrowed
very slightly, with African
Americans making 58 per-
cent of White earnings in
2015 and 60 percent of White
earnings in 2016. This income
ratio typically hovers around
60 percent, and this situation
has not improved, since 1967.
Despite an absolute improve-
ment in incomes, the racial in-
come disparity remains.
Fewer than 1 in 10 whites
earned less than $15,000 per
year, compared to 20 percent
of African Americans at that
low earning level. While 18
percent of Whites earned
less than $25,000 a year, fully
one-third of African Amer-
icans earned so little. At the
same time, while 7.4 percent
of Whites earned more than
$200,000 a year, only 2.8 per-
cent of African Americans
Julianne
Malveaux
NNPA
Columnist
had similarly high earnings.
At the top, there was signif-
icant improvement for Af-
rican Americans—we didn’t
cross the 1 percent line on
high earning until 1997, and
“
were 800,000 fewer African
Americans in poverty in
2016 than in 2015. That’s good
news. Child poverty was also
overwhelming. With 15.1 per-
cent of White children living
in poverty there were nearly
twice as many Black children
living in poverty at 29.5 per-
cent. Among elders, 8 percent
of White seniors were poor,
compared to 18.5 percent of
African American seniors.
And when Black women head-
ed households, 34.2 percent
This gap will not be closed unless
there is some intervention, some
form of reparations, or some spe-
cial program that will empower
African Americans
now our percentage has more
than doubled. Still, it would
take hundreds of years, at the
rate we are going, to close the
gap with Whites.
With incomes as low as they
are, it is unsurprising to find
African Americans more
heavily represented among
the poor than Whites, but
again, President Obama’s last
year in office saw a real drop
in the poverty level. The pov-
erty rate dropped from 13.5
percent in 2015 to 12.7 percent
in 2016, and the Black poverty
rate dropped from 24.1 per-
cent to 22.0 percent. There
of those households lived in
poverty.
While these numbers make
a clear case that President
Obama improved the situ-
ation for all Americans, it
is also clear that his unwill-
ingness or inability to target
programs toward the African
American poor maintained
the size of the income gap,
and maintained the fact that
African Americans experi-
ence twice as much poverty
as Whites, earning only 60
percent of the incomes that
Whites do. This gap will not
be closed unless there is some
intervention, some form of
reparations, or some special
program that will empower
African Americans. If that
didn’t happen in the Obama
administration, it is unlikely
to happen in during the cur-
rent one.
President Obama’s singular
success, of course, was health
care. More than 93 percent of
Whites, 92 percent of Asian
Americans, 89.5 percent of
African Americans and 84
percent of Hispanics had
health care in 2016, continu-
ing an upward trend that be-
gan in 2011 with the introduc-
tion of the Affordable Care
Act (ACA). Of course, Repub-
licans have promised to “re-
peal and replace” Obamacare.
They have been unsuccessful,
because so many Americans
like the program and use it,
even though it has flaws. The
program should be tweaked,
but not replaced, but we’ll
see what happens in coming
months.
Despite improvements in
income data, too many Amer-
icans aren’t feeling the im-
provements. That’s how “45”
was able to manipulate people
into believing that they were
worse off than they had ever
been, and that he was going to
improve their quality of life.
Read the rest of this commentary at
TheSkanner.com
nt •
lo c a l n e w s •
eve