ABSTRACT
The health of a community or of a nation is generally measured by a number of indicators accounting for data on mortality, morbidity, birth rates, life expectancy, and, more recently, comparative data on the types and degrees of selected health disparities among the healthy and unhealthy segments of a population. In most instances, the unhealthy are economically disenfranchised and tend to overrepresent members of various racial and ethnic minority populations, including American Indians and Alaska Natives (AIANs). At the center of most disparity is longstanding poverty, an economic determinant that often overshadows other determinants that are social, environmental, cultural, etc.
