How Racism – And Silence – Could Hurt Your Health

Short Wave

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🗓️ 16 December 2024

⏱️ 16 minutes

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Summary

Racism is often covered as a political, cultural, or news story. But how is it affecting people's health? That's the question Cara Anthony, a KFF News reporter, wanted to answer: not just on an individual scale, but on a community-wide one. So for the past few years, she's been reporting on a small town in the Midwest that illustrates that health issue: Sikeston, Missouri. Today on the show, Cara walks host Emily Kwong through Sikeston's history — and what locals and medical experts have to say about how that history continues to shape the present.

For more of Cara's reporting, you can check out KFF Health News' documentary and four-part podcast series, Silence in Sikeston.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This message comes from Wondery.
0:02.4	Tis the Grinch holiday podcast is back.
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0:10.1	Follow Tis the Grinch holiday podcast on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
0:15.2	One quick note before we begin, Shortwavers.
0:17.9	This episode talks about racial violence and references a lynching.
0:23.1	You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.
0:28.8	Hey, Shortwavers, it's Emily Kwong, and today I am joined by one of KFF Health News's Midwest
0:33.9	correspondents, Kara, Anthony. Kara, it is really good to have you here.
0:37.8	Great to be here. For a few years now, you've been reporting on how racism can make a person sick.
0:43.6	And I think it often surprises people when we focus on racism as a health story, right?
0:47.7	Definitely, for sure. I mean, I'm a health reporter and I'm also a black woman. So when I look at an issue, those are two of the lenses I'm looking through.
0:56.0	Totally, yeah. I started reporting for KFF Health News in 2019. That same year, a group of researchers
1:03.1	found that black men in the United States are about two and a half times more likely to be killed by
1:09.4	police than white men.
1:11.7	On average, they found that a young black man had a one-and-one-thousand-one chance of being killed by police,
1:18.7	making it one of the top six causes of death for them.
1:22.1	It ranked just behind heart disease and cancer.
1:25.6	Gosh, that's really devastating.
1:27.1	Okay. And the immediate impact of that number is clear for young black men. heart disease and cancer. Gosh, that's really devastating.
1:27.7	Okay.
1:31.5	And the immediate impact of that number is clear for young black men.
	...

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