I-News Network

Among the hurdles to attacking disparities in health between ethnic and racial minorities and whites is the confounding reality that some inequities have so far defied explanation and the differing views on what constitutes “fairness.”

Lucero Barrios is Latina and a new mother –circumstances that place her squarely in a group of people affected by a shocking reality in Colorado: A Hispanic baby born in this state is 63 percent more likely than a white baby to die in the first year of life.

In the 1960s, the giant CF&I steel plant on the southern end of Pueblo was the economic driving engine and racial equalizer for Colorado’s southernmost major city.

Angel Castro’s days teeter between determination and desperation. She is 28, impoverished, scarred from a chaotic childhood and adolescence, raising two young children alone.

By some of the most important measures of social progress, black and Latino residents of Colorado have lost ground compared to white residents in the decades since the civil rights movement.