That number has barely changed in 100 years.
A former ABC11 reporter just wrote a new book that explains why, and traces it back to a building in Raleigh that most people walk past without a second thought.
"I did not know Leonard Medical School. And I'm ashamed to say that," said Nicole Carr, former ABC11 reporter.
Shaw University's Leonard Med School opened in 1882, turning out some of North Carolina's and the nation's first Black physicians.
As Carr learned more about this long-gone medical school, Leonard's birth and destruction became Chapter 1 in her new book, "The Price of Exclusion: The pursuit of Healthcare in a Segregated Nation."
"What the story does is it takes you through policies and scenarios and people who have essentially built systems that result in generational damage," Carr said.
The book's central villain is Abraham Flexner, hired by the American Medical Association in 1908 to evaluate medical schools in the United States and Canada.
Flexner, who tried to shut Leonard down, did not even have a medical degree.
"He's quite underwhelming," Carr said. "Some of the criteria in the Flexner report includes bonus points or big points for whether the institution has at least a $600,000 endowment. Now, what Black schools in the early 20th century, in the decades post-enslavement would have a $600,000 endowment?"
Flexner's report results in the closure of nearly every Black med school in the country, including Leonard.
"When these closures happen, when this exclusion happens, we're not talking about just a current-day effect, we're talking about what will affect us for generations to come," Carr said.
Carr's great-grandfather is the book's human through-line. Dr. Lawrence St. Clair Ferguson graduated from Howard University Medical School in 1925 and became a beloved physician in his native Jamaica.
"The most surprising thing that I could find was a few people living who were his patients," Carr said.
On Wednesday night, Carr discussed her book in front of a packed crowd at Quail Ridge Books on Lassiter Mill Road in Raleigh.
"I do believe our ancestors are just waiting for us to find them," Carr said.
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