Racial and Ethnic Categories in Biomedical Research: There is No Baby in the Bathwater

Abstract

There are deep divides over the use of racial and ethnic categories in biomedical research and its application in both medical and non-medical contexts. On one side of a roughly described dividing line are practitioners who need to use every piece of information at their disposal to solve pressing, realworld problems in real time, such as making clinical diagnoses or identifying perpetrators of crime. On the other side are scientists and policy makers committed to meeting a scientific and social need for accuracy and thus trying to avoid miscategorization.As Jay Cohn describes in this issue, medical practitioners in particular have used racial and ethnic categories to “enhance diagnostic and therapeutic precision.” He argues for retaining this practice. The plea, motivated by genuine concern for patients, is to avoid “throwing the baby out with the bathwater.” However, Cohn and others mischaracterize the nature of the debate. The argument is not about whether differences among populations exist, or even whether differences among “races” exist.