Dr. Harold Freeman got angry when he heard that cancer patients in Tennessee were dying because they could not afford to pay for the treatments that could save their lives. Freeman was responding to testimony from Gordon Bonnyman, managing attorney of the Tennessee Justice Center, a public interest law firm in Nashville, who reported that several of his clients had died of cancer because they did not have insurance coverage or otherwise were unable to pay for their treatment.
Poverty is one important barrier to good cancer care.
But there are disturbing differences in cancer death rates among racial and ethnic groups that income alone cannot explain, experts told the panel. The three-member panel is holding meetings throughout the country to investigate problems that cancer patients have obtaining quality care, and will report directly to the president next year. Genetic, cultural and lifestyle factors, as well as income and access to care, may play a role. But until these factors are better understood, very little can be done to reduce the glaring health-care gap between whites and minorities, and the rich and the poor, said Freeman, a former cancer society president. Fortunately, efforts are under way to bridge that gap.