Multiple Sclerosis in the American Negro

Recently Steiner¹stated that a special study of multiple sclerosis as it occurs in the Negro race was desirable. Although this disease is known to occur in the Negro in the United States, it is regarded as affecting this race less frequently than the native and foreign-born white population. Bailey²found that multiple sclerosis accounted for only 3.5 per cent of cases of organic disease of the nervous system among the Negro draftees during the first World War, as compared with the 7.4 per cent obtained for the whole group of draftees. No one has presented figures on the actual incidence or prevalence of multiple sclerosis in a Negro population as compared with that in a white population living under similar circumstances. Indeed, no rates have been given for the race, nor has any attempt been made to analyze the clinical picture of the disease as it appears