CLEVELAND — There are a lot of factors that can impact your health. But in some cases, making healthy lifestyle choices may not outweigh one important factor — where you live. In light of a new study from University Hospitals, CWRU and the Cleveland VA, we spoke with CWRU Associate Professor of Medicine and Sociology Dr. Adam Perzynski.
“Banks made, in the ‘30s, actual paper maps where they shaded entire neighborhoods red. And if you lived in one of those neighborhoods, you weren’t able to get a loan from the bank,” he said. Perzynski went on to explain CWRU research has found neighborhoods with Black families were 40 times more likely to be redlined. “The practice of redlining is a historically racist practice.”
Now a new study reveals those communities are still feeling the effects of the practices from nearly a century ago. News 5 Rob Powers spoke with two of the study’s co-authors, Dr. Salil Deo and Dr. Yakaov Elgundin. They looked at 80,000 Veterans who received VA health care from 2016 to 2019.
The study found veterans who live in redlined neighborhoods had a higher risk of heart disease.
“They also had higher risk of mortality and also higher risk of stroke, heart attacks, and adverse cardiovascular effects,” Deo said.
“We still see things that are consequences of what happened in the past,” added Elgundin.
While the study only looked at veterans because all the data was already there waiting for analysis, the findings have broad implications.
“The effect that we have observed in this study is equally generalized to the U.S. population,” said Deo.
“We can only imagine that the other aspects of people’s populations’ health, life expectancy, and all other elements are affected just as much," Elgundin said.
The doctors say these findings show now is the time to act.
“This is a message to think very carefully about our current public policy,” Deo said. “Because what we do right now is also going to affect generations in the future."
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