“Pervasive racism in the medical profession” is to blame for the fact that three times as many Black mothers die in child-birth as whites,” said Dana-Ain Davis, author of “Reproductive Injustice: Racism, Pregnancy and Premature Birth.” Bad medical outcomes will continue for Blacks until the medical structure “is able to acknowledge that racism permeates the system,” said Davis, director of the Center for the Study of Women and Society at the City University of New York.