We read with great interest the original article by Brant et al.1 The discovery of African American (AA)-specific loci and loci that are shared between ethnic groups highlight the importance of studying inflammatory bowel disease in other populations apart from Europeans for a unique insight into the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease. The challenges with studying populations of non-European ancestry remains one of terminology. The main drawback is that the difference between race and ethnicity is not clearly defined in most studies.