Health secretary to act on racial bias in effectiveness of medical devices

Sajid Javid has said medical device manufacturers should check their products work well for people of all ethnic backgrounds, citing problems that those with dark skin have experienced when using pulse oximeters.

Several studies have found oximeters are not as good at identifying hypoxia in people with darker skin. The devices have been widely used during the covid pandemic to monitor people at risk of deteriorating at home. They are meant to trigger a response when needed. Official guidance was updated this summer to encourage caution in their use. 

The health and social care secretary has identified health inequalities as one of his priorities. He gave the issue as an example of racial bias in healthcare when speaking at the Conservative party conference on Tuesday evening.

He said: “It turned out that pulse oximeters, all of them that exist in the world, were giving often the wrong reading for people with dark skin, because they were designed by companies where basically all they were thinking about were white people. Why is that? Because the companies, their market was white countries with a majority of white people.”

Mr Javid, who has a British Pakistani background, continued: “They just weren’t thinking whether these things could work on people with a skin colour like mine or just darker skin, and that’s not right.

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Source: HSJ, 6 October 2021