Arizona: Asian-American Volunteers Trying to Help Underserved

The Phoenix-based grassroots group Asian Pacific Community in Action has joined the state Department of Health Services and medical professionals to help fight health disparities in Valley-area Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities. An APCA-hosted health fair held earlier this month at the Mountain Park Health Center East Phoenix featured free screenings, information booths, and seminars on topics including hepatitis B and cervical and breast cancer. Among the more than 200 volunteers speaking a total of 20 languages at the health fair was Ilin Chuang, who is with CDC and serves on a hepatitis B virus (HBV) task force. Asian Americans have a higher HBV infection rate than any other US ethnic group. Chuang estimated that Asian Americans account for more than half of the nation's 1.25 million cases of chronic HBV infection. "We want people to understand how to prevent and treat infection," said Chuang, who speaks English, Mandarin and Taiwanese.

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