African American Women & Where They Stand

NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams is running an interesting series this week called "African American Women: Where They Stand." The series covers areas like the role that black women will play in the upcoming presidential elections, the progress of African American women in education, the black family structure, health concerns and more.

Some alarming statistics that the report mentions are as follows:

• Nearly two-thirds of African-American college undergraduates are women. At historically black colleges and universities, the ratio of women to men is 7 to 1.

• In the past fifty years, the percentage of African-American women between 25-54 who have never been married has doubled from 20% to 40%. (Compared to just 16% of white women who have never been married today).

• Black women with breast cancer are nearly 30% more likely to die from it than white women. Premenopausal black women are more than twice as likely to get a more aggressive form of the disease.

• African-American women are 85% more likely to get diabetes, a major complication for heart disease.

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