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It is a bitter but basic fact in health research: Black Americans die at higher rates than whites from most causes, including AIDS, heart disease, cancer and homicide. But a recent trove of federal data offered some good news. The suicide rate for black men declined from 1999 to 2014, making them the only racial group to experience a drop. Infant mortality is down by more than a fifth among blacks since the late 1990s, double the decline for whites. Births to teenage mothers, which tend to have higher infant mortality rates, have dropped by 64 percent among blacks since 1995, faster than for whites. (Tavernise, 5/8)

When Hee-Soon Juon asked her physician a few years ago whether she needed to be screened for exposure to the Hepatitis B virus, he told her, "You don't need to be. You're in the U.S.A." But Hepatitis B is widespread in Asian and sub-Saharan African countries, including Juon's native South Korea, and many immigrants have brought it with them to the United States. (Jablow, 5/6)

Electronic cigarettes have sickened rising numbers of young children, a study of U.S. poison center calls has found. Most cases involve swallowing liquid nicotine. While most kids weren't seriously harmed, one child died and several had severe complications including comas and seizures. "This is an epidemic by any definition," said lead author Dr. Gary Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. (Tanner, 5/9)