3 Steps To Address Diversity In Clinical Trials
By Ed Miseta, Chief Editor, Clinical Leader
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The COVID pandemic in 2020 brought to light the significant disparities that exist in healthcare. But those same disparities also exist in the way clinical trials are structured and conducted. White males are the primary participants in trials, while women, people of color, and the elderly are generally underrepresented. People of color make up 39% of the U.S. population but represent between 2% and 16% of patients in clinical trials. African Americans alone are about 12% of the U.S. population but make up just 5% of trial participants. Hispanics are about 16% of the population but only 1% of trial participants.
"There are men of character in the U.S. Congress, both House and Senate. There are women of character, too. But the evidence for 'character' needs to be
Biden’s tricky tango with Congress
“There are men of character in the U.S. Congress, both House and Senate. There are women of character, too. But the evidence for ‘character’ needs to be something other than the iteration of the word itself,” writes Marjorie Garber in her book “Character: The History of a Cultural Obsession.”
That is a useful frame for trying to make sense of the dramas that proliferated on Capitol Hill this week as Congress took up multiple nominations to President Joe Biden’s Cabinet and held its first hearing on the January 6 insurrection. As Garber notes, the translation of individual traits into a “national character” most often occurs at “times of stress, as a marker not so much of social progress as of social and cultural anxiety.”