The Use of Race in Medical Research

IS RACIAL research in medicine racist? Publications about comparative racial research number in the thousands. A review of the English-language medical literature reveals that there is a predilection for making comparisons between black and white patients, particularly with diseases associated with promiscuity, underachievement, and antisocial behavior. Reports on studies of sexually acquired diseases,¹⁻⁶suboptimal intellectual performance,⁷⁻⁹drug abuse,¹⁰,¹¹violence,¹²⁻¹⁴and sexual assault¹⁵⁻¹⁷are common. Other topics of racial comparison are differences in incidence of renal and cardiovascular¹⁸⁻²¹diseases and presumed racial differences in anatomy,²²,²³physiology,²⁴⁻²⁶and psychology.²⁷ See also pp 259 and 268. When race is used as a variable in research, there is a tendency to assume that the results obtained are a manifestation of the biology of racial differences; race as a variable implies that a genetic reason may explain differences in incidence, severity, or outcome of medical conditions.