According to the American Heart Association, the prevalence of hypertension in African Americans in the United States is among the highest in the world.

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the first use of alcohol typically begins at age 12.

African Americans make up about 13 percent of the U.S. population but comprise 32 percent of patients treated for kidney failure, giving them a kidney failure rate that is 4.2 times greater than that of white Americans.

As a regent, I hope to bring that important perspective of a typical family visitor in combination with my background as a Member of Congress and a proponent of the Smithsonian's efforts to reach all Americans.

As of 2002, two million Latino adults had been diagnosed with diabetes.

But 18 years after the passage of the Civil Liberties Act, there still remains unfinished work to completely rectify and close this regrettable chapter in our Nation's history.

Diabetes occurs at twice the rate in the African American community as it does in white Americans.

February 19, 1942, is the year in which Executive Order 9066 was signed, and this was the order that called for the exclusion and internment of all Japanese Americans living on the west coast during World War II.

Given that early kidney disease has no symptoms, most people do not realize that they are in danger of kidney failure.