amna: Doctors, nurses,
hospitals, and many others are
concerned about how the supreme
court's ruling, striking down
affirmative action in college
admissions, could affect the
medical profession.
Currently just 5.7% of doctors
in the U.S. Are black and nearly
7% are hispanic, while 64% are
white.
Black and Latino applicants
still make up a small percentage
of those who go to medical
school.
And there's worry about what
this ruling could mean for the
pipeline of who eventually
provides health care.
For more on these concerns I'm
joined by Dr. Utibe essien, an
internal medicine physician and
assistant professor of medicine
at UCLA.
Before we get into the details
of the ruling, I have to ask,
what was your initial reaction?
>> Sadly while we were expecting
the news it was pretty much a
, gut punch.
And it was really devastating to
see that despite years of proof
that affirmative action does
improve diversity and
-- diversity in undergraduate
and medical schools, that the
court has decided to let go of
this decision, and so that was
pretty devastating on Thursday,
I know a lot of my friends and
colleagues were as well.
Amna: So those numbers we just
mentioned in the introduction
that was even with affirmative
action in place.
Why are those numbers so low?
Help us understand.
>> So it's really important to
appreciate that this is not just
at random.
A paper that my colleagues and I
published led by one of my
friends showed that some of the
reasons for the low numbers are
related to just the journey
towards applying to medical
school.
So higher rates of medical and
premedical school loans and less
likelihood to be able to pay for
the preparatory materials to be
able to get into medical school,
even having parents who are less
likely to have a college
education.
Some of these are factors.
As for what drives black and
hispanic and native American
lower rates of physicians, much
less some of the systemic and
structural challenges that we
have around education here in
the U.S.
Amna: Just to underscore some of
those numbers when you look at
the 2022 and 2023 school year in
terms of first year R rollees in
medical school, these are the
numbers we have.
Black students made up just 10%
of first year medical students.
Latino students made up just 12%
of medical school students.
But a few states had already
banned affirmative action at the
state level.
Did you see an impact in terms
of that in those states in terms
of who ends up going to medical
school and diversity of those
classes?
>> Absolutely.
We're here in California.
They banned affirmative action
back in 1996.
And we've seen that here in
California the rate of black and
hispanic individuals going into
undergraduate and medical
schools really significantly
dropped since that ruling in
1996.
We had a paper that came out
last year that showed not just
here in California but in seven
, other states that had
affirmative action bans, the
number of individuals from
minorities groups continues to
drop in medical schools.
So we have precedents for what
is going to happen now that this
is federal policy and not
national, not just state policy,
and it's really devastating for
the future of the health of our
communities.
Amna: Help us understand that a
little better.
In medical in the medical field
in particular, why is that
diversity of doctors so
important in terms of providing
health care?
>> Absolutely.
I think it's important to
realize this is not just a moral
imperative the right thing to
do, but that diversity really
does save lives.
We have studies that show that
having a doctor who looks like
you, it makes you more likely to
take preventive screenings such
as flu vaccines, or more likely
to go for more invasive
procedures like heart
Catherine isolations --
catheterizations.
In a study published back in
April, it showed that for every
10% of increase in black primary
care doctors within a county
there is a 30 day increase in
life expectancy for black
individuals so again, literally
having diverse doctors save
lives.
And my concern is that this
policy this decision is going to
take us backwards.
Amna: So what now?
In a post affirmative action
America what specific steps can
, institutions take to still
work towards that same diversity
in medical schools and the
medical profession?
>> That is the question that we
are all asking right now.
There are three things that my
colleagues and I kind of put
forward then last week around
this, and the first is really,
strengthening holistic review,
really focusing on the journey
that our patients are our
students rather take towards
becoming physicians and not
wholly focused on the M cat
scores.
We have to ensure that those who
are reviewing applications
actually are anti racist and
their approach and are able to
capture the full breath of our
students journeys to go in
towards medicine.
And lastly, we have to eliminate
some of the economic cost.
That test that I mentioned
earlier cost $320 to take to get
into medical school.
Those costs of medical school
itself is exorbitant.
I left school with $250,000
worth of loans, and those are
some of the steps that we need
to take to be able to increase
the diversity of our medical
school.
Amna: In the few seconds I have,
I have to ask you, what's your
greatest concern if this problem
isn't addressed?
>> As I mentioned, we have a
disparities issue in our
country.
We didn't just see that with
covid but over the last year we
, see a seven year gap in life
expectancy between white
Americans and black American.
My worry is that that gap is
going to widen in this post
affirmative action world, and I
hope that will be able to
advocate for the reversal of
some of these policies that were
just made.
Amna: Thank you so much for