Surprise surprise. Our beauty or appeal to men isn't as valued. That's a bad thing to some. A good thing to others. Women are more than their bodies. I wonder if the study collected data on the amount of family support in comparison to the choice not to reconstruct. Or self esteem before and after in comparison to reconstruction. Something to think about…

It doesn't help that some insurers don't cover reconstructive surgery.

Women who don't feel that they can afford the surgery aren't, you know, likely to pursue it.

I suspect that the reasons for the disparity are:

- Black women are less likely to have health insurance

- or if the're insured, they have bargain basement coverage like Medicaid, which doesn't cover a lot of stuff (like, for instance, plastic surgery)

- bias on the part of White and/or Asian oncologists and plastic surgeons, who are less likely to see a Black woman as a sexual being who has a psychological need to have her breasts reconstructed (especially since, on average, Black women are heavier than White or Asian women, and White and/or Asian doctors might be more likely to see their large bodies as "not attractive" and therefore not worth reconstructing)