CAP is proudly taking part in the Health Equity Can’t Wait! blog carnival celebrating National Minority Health Month. Participating bloggers are health, consumer, civil rights, and provider advocates committed to promoting health equity. You can find all the posts for the carnival here.

In America today, an African-American baby is still twice as likely as a white baby to die before her first birthday. More than 30 percent of Latinos in the U.S. are uninsured, compared to 12 percent of non-Hispanic whites. Despite advances in HIV prevention and treatment, gay and bisexual men and transgender women of color are still disproportionately likely to become infected with HIV and to die from AIDS.

Clearly, race and ethnicity matter in health. So do gender, poverty, and ability. So too do sexual orientation, gender identity, and other characteristics linked to discrimination or exclusion.

And according to Senator Daniel Akaka, who introduced the Health Equity and Accountability Act yesterday in the Senate to build on the advances of the Affordable Care Act, “glaring health disparities based on racial and ethnic identity alone…are further exacerbated by factors such as socioeconomics, geography, and sexual orientation and [gender] identity.”

Areas of intersection between sexual orientation, gender identity, and other disparity factors include mental health concerns linked to minority stress, such as depression, anxiety, and suicide; higher rates of smoking and other substance use; and greater risk of contracting HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. Fear of mistreatment from health care providers who are not familiar with culturally competent care for different minority populations also prevents many people from accessing vital health services and compounds the seriousness of conditions such as heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.

Read more

Missouri Rep. Steve Cookson (R) — the sponsor of the state’s “Don’t Say Gay Bill” — is complaining that his legislation to prohibit discussion of sexual orientation outside of health class is being misconstrued as an attack on gay people and insists that he is merely seeking to shift the discussion of sexuality from the classroom to the family. In an interview with a local CBS affiliate, Cookson reveals that he has received death threats and hateful email concerning the legislation:

COOKSON: I just think those are better left outside of the curriculum…I want to bring families back into education, and for those that don’t have that support, we’ll deal with those…. We need to keep the focus on [math and science] for the student body, and not on other things that can be distracting.

Watch it:

But as Mark Jones, the political director for the Missouri National Education Association explained, banning discussions of gay people — who exist in the schools whether Cookson likes it or not — would only “further ostracize children who are exploring their sexual orientation.” “This would really tie the teacher’s hands when they go to help children when they are being bullied because of their sexual orientation,” he said and noted that since students spend numerous hours a day with teachers, educators need the freedom to discuss any problems they encounter.

The American Academy of Pediatrics has also condemned Cookson’s bill as “clearly harmful to the best interests of the children of Missouri.” “All children and teenagers need to feel safe in their schools, and HB 2051 takes that assurance away from them.”

In 2001, Robert Spitzer — a prominent psychiatrist who led the charge to declassify homosexuality as a mental condition — released a controversial study showing that some gay people could change their sexual orientations and become straight. Spitzer’s findings bolstered the ex-gay movement and helped advocates find acceptance in the heart of conservative anti-gay politics. But earlier this month, the 80-year-old scientist dealt a devastating blow to his loudest proponents. In an interview with The American Prospect, Spitzer retracted his own ex-gay study, noting that “The findings can be considered evidence for what those who have undergone ex-gay therapy say about it, but nothing more.”

Last night, Rachel Maddow examined the consequences of Spitzer’s denunciation of his own reparative therapy study on the Proposition 8 case, which relied on its conclusions to argue that gay people are not entitled to marry someone of the same gender because sexual orientation is a mutable characteristic. NYU constitutional professor Kenji Yoshino explained the significance:

YOSHINO: I think it`s a big deal. So, first of all, the reason immutability is important is because under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, there’s a standard called heightened scrutiny. And there are certain classifications like race, national origin, sex, nonmarital parentage, lineage (ph) that get that scrutiny. The $64,000 question of this case is whether or not sexual orientation is going to be added to that list. And one of the criteria that`s been looked at to determine whether or not a group gets heightened scrutiny is immutability, as you mentioned. So, the fact that Spitzer retracting this and the fact that the testimony in the Prop 8 trial was overwhelming for the fact that sexual orientation is very hard to change could figure into that analysis.

Watch it:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Yoshino also suggested that Spitzer’s apology could impact Defense of Marriage (DOMA) litigation, which relies on a similar gays-can-change claim.