A Generation Behind

"The average length of a Negro's life in the South at present is 35 years. It should be 50 years. . . ."

This modest hope was expressed 32 years ago by the late Booker T. Washington. As medicos this week marked the 33rd annual observance of Booker Washington's "National Negro Health Week," his wish had come true: today the life expectancy of U.S. Negroes (North & South) is 57 years.

But the U.S. Public Health Service, taking its annual inventory, found little reason for complacency. Negro health still lags a full generation behind that of U.S. whites (life expectancy: 66 years). Items:

P:The death rate of Negroes is 33% higher than that of whites; the Negro infant death rate is 63% higher.

P:Most of the major killers--tuberculosis, kidney disease, pneumonia--are far more prevalent among Negroes. Heart disease and cancer are the killers that cause a higher percentage of deaths among whites; but the cancer rate among Negroes is rising.

P:Kept out of many hospitals, Negroes have only 124 hospitals of their own (many of them substandard), with a total of 20,800 beds (national total: 1,700,000 beds).

P:There are some 3,800 Negro physicians --one for every 3,377 Negroes, as against one doctor for every 750 persons in the general U.S. population. In the past decade, while the Negro population rose 8%, the number of Negro doctors dropped 5%.

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