Sen. Daniel Akaka is scheduled to attend a Steering and Outreach Committee hearing on health disparities on Wednesday.

The focus of the hearing will be on disproportionately higher rates of disease and lower access to care by populations including minorities, LGBT, the elderly and residents of rural areas.

Here is some of what Akaka plans to say in the hearing, according to remarks provided by his spokesman: 

“We cannot ignore the fact that, unless more is done, health disparities will widen… The indigenous people of Hawaii, the Native Hawaiians, suffer the highest rates of mortality in the nation and die on average 12 years sooner than many other racial groups in the state. And, what most do not realize, outside of Honolulu, we have one of the most rural states in the nation. The importance of this issue in my state is a reflection of its importance to the nation.”