At a Kaiser Family Foundation forum on health care disparities today in Washington, health policy experts suggested the business community could effectively press for policies to improve health care equity for racial and ethnic minorities given its role as a consumer of health insurance and its vested interest in a healthy workforce. John Nelson, M.D., immediate past president of the American Medical Association, said the business sector “should be a strong ally” in the fight to eliminate health care disparities because of the inconvenience and cost associated with sick workers and training their replacements. Kevin Fiscella, M.D., a physician and professor at the University of Rochester School of Medicine, said businesses should be alarmed if they contract for health care and some employees get worse care than others. The event focused on lessons learned since the release of the first National Healthcare Disparities Report in 2003. Dora Hughes, M.D., a health and education policy advisor to Sen. Barack Obama, D-IL, said the annual report has raised awareness about the issue in Congress.