WHEREAS, the League of United Latin American Citizens is this nation's oldest and largest Latino organization, founded in Corpus Christi, Texas on February 24,1929; and

WHEREAS, LULAC throughout its history has committed itself to the principal that Hispanic Americans have equal access to opportunities in employment, education, housing, and health care, and

WHEREAS, LULAC has supported the principle of equal opportunities for economic development, political influence, civil rights, and the general welfare for all Latinos in the United States; and

WHEREAS, the health status of the Hispanic community in the United States has improved slightly; however, there remains serious challenges. In light of the growth of the Hispanic population and increasing needs for quality health care, Hispanics continue facing historic and systemic barriers to access, availability, and affordability of health care.

WHEREAS, Hispanics do not have adequate access to the health care delivery system. Evidence suggests that Hispanics are the largest group of uninsured in the United States, with two out of five Hispanics under the age of 65 uninsured. Over 30 percent of Hispanics do not have a family doctor or clinic to visit when they need care. Hispanic children have the lowest physician visit rate in the past year, and Hispanic have three times the rate of whites and two times the rate of blacks for no regular source of care. Moreover, there are unique barriers to health care among Hispanic women, children, elderly, immigrants, and the U.S. Mexico border population.

WHEREAS, the Hispanic community is experiencing a widening racial disparity in health characterized by lack of health insurance, lack of culturally and linguistically competent health systems and health education information, increasing numbers of cancer and diabetes cases, critical levels of alcohol addiction, and alarming statistics of HIV/AIDS infection. Clearly, Hispanics face serious health conditions that are having a drastic effect on the well being of our community. For example,

- Diabetes type 2 is three times higher among Hispanics than non-Hispanics;
- Cervical cancer is the highest among Hispanic women;
- Hispanic women have a poorer survival rate from breast cancer than do white non-Hispanic women, mostly due to the advanced stage of the disease at time of diagnosis;
- Hispanic men diagnosed with prostrate cancer have lower five-year survival rates than white men;
- Lung cancer and alcoholism are very serious health problems in our community;
- HIV is the third cause of death among Hispanics in the United States, and Puerto Rico has the second highest HIV rate in the country.

WHEREAS, this situation is more severe among Spanish-speaking populations due to the shortage of bilingual and bicultural physicians and other health and mental health professionals. Due to health care providers' lack of familiarity with the culture and language of Hispanic patients, Hispanics do not receive the state of the art treatment that the American health care system is capable of providing.

NOW THREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the 2001 National Assembly of the League of United Latin American Citizens convened in Phoenix, Arizona on June 3-9, 2001 vote to create a commission of LULAC Healthcare Professionals to advocate for the Latino community on these issues. That we encourage NIH, AHRQ, and CDC to adequately address and substantially increase funding for research that examines Hispanics and other minority populations and research that facilitates comparisons across sub-group populations. That we support the efforts of NIH to develop a center for Research on Disparities in Health and for AHRQ and CDC to increase efforts to support increase study of Hispanics and their subgroups.

Submitted by:
Mary L. Fimbres, Arizona LULAC State Director
Teri Martinez, Arizona State VP for Women
Richard G. Fimbres, LULAC National VP for the Far West
Ana Valenzuela Estrada, President Council 1001

Approved this 9th day of June, 2001.

Rick Dovalina
LULAC National President