The Inequality of COVID-19

At this point in the COVID-19 pandemic, the two places that appear to be the hardest hit in terms of infection and mortality rates are nursing homes and the urban areas with the largest concentrations of minority residents, especially lower income residents.

At this point in the COVID-19 pandemic, the two places that appear to be the hardest hit in terms of infection and mortality rates are nursing homes and the urban areas with the largest concentrations of minority residents, especially lower income residents. This disproportionate inequality of COVID-19 and its impact on minorities is tragic but not surprising. Minorities have long suffered from relatively poorer health conditions, shorter longevity, and less access to timely and good quality health care than whites. These enduring disparities in health status and care are mainly due to what are commonly referred to social determinants of health–factors largely out of the control of individuals–and include discrimination, much lower incomes and household wealth, residing in lower quality housing often in neighborhoods afflicted by disproportionately greater exposure to environmental threats like air pollution and toxic waste sites, higher crime rates, lower quality schools and child care.

This site is for information about how the inequality of COVID-19 is playing out during the pandemic, the role of social and economic determinants in the generation of racial and ethnic disparities in infection and mortality rates, and possible policy responses to them.

Reports

• Assessment of COVID-19 Hospitalizations by Race/Ethnicity in 12 States (JAMA)

Important Links

• Why isn’t routine Covid-19 testing happening in prisons and immigrant detention centers? (STAT)
• Down syndrome tied to 10 times the risk of COVID-19 death (CIDRAP)
• ‘All You Want Is to Be Believed’: The Impacts of Unconscious Bias in Health Care (KHN)
• CDC Reports Nearly 300,000 ‘Excess Deaths’ in the U.S. Amid Pandemic (KQED)
• Asian Americans in San Francisco are dying at alarming rates from COVID-19: Racism is to blame (USA Today)
• Structural Ageism and the Health of Older Adults (JAMA)
• Healthcare Billionaires Got Nearly $150B Richer Due to COVID Pandemic (Newsweek)
• Covid-19 long-haulers and the experience of ‘hidden’ disabilities (STAT)
• Access to medical oxygen: a glaring global inequity (STAT)
• ‘Covid is all about privilege’: Trump’s treatment underscores vast inequalities in access to care (STAT)
• Why people with diabetes are being hit so hard by Covid-19 (STAT)
• New research shows older adults are still often excluded from clinical trials (STAT)
• The missing grandparents: families mourn elder generation lost to COVID-19 (Reuters)
• Black Americans, suffering disproportionately from COVID-19, face a mounting mental health crisis (Boston Globe)
• Why coronavirus is hitting Black seniors especially hard (Tampa Bay Times)
• Sent Home to Die (ProPublica)
• As Covid-19 cases in prisons climb, data on race remain largely obscured (STAT)
• CDC Study Finds Hispanics Hit Disproportionately Hard By Workplace Outbreaks (WLRN)
• The Mass. Legislature’s Climate Bills Are Important. But They Wouldn’t Do Enough For My Most Vulnerable Patients (wbur)
• “All These Rich People Can’t Stop Themselves”: The Luxe Quarantine Lives of Silicon Valley’s Elite (Vanity Fair)
• The recession is over for the rich, but the working class is far from recovered (The Washington Post)
• The Pandemic Has Revealed America’s Zip Code Map of Inequality (naked capitalism)
• Majority white counties have significantly fewer COVID-19 cases: Study (ABC News)
• Racial disparity in COVID-19 deaths: Seeking economic roots in census data (VOX EU)
• Without Federal Protections, Farm Workers Risk Coronavirus Infection to Harvest Crops (KHN)
• Coronavirus relief favors white households, leaving many people of color at risk of being evicted (Politico)
• Hispanic and Black children facing higher rates of COVID-19 hospitalization: CDC (The Hill)
• The Problem of the Not-Quite-One Percent (The New Republic)
• Black and dual-eligible Medicare patients among hardest hit by COVID-19 (Modern Healthcare)
• For HBCUs, the coronavirus pandemic hits especially close to home (Politico)
• US agency vows steps to address COVID-19 inequalities (AP News)
• Artificial Intelligence, Health Disparities, and Covid-19 (undark)
• Technology Divide Between Senior ‘Haves’ and ‘Have-Nots’ Roils Pandemic Response (KHN)
• ‘Crashing down’: How the child care crisis is magnifying racial disparities (Politico)
• Pandemic Threatens Black Middle-Class Gains (PEW)
• In another Covid-19 disparity, Black and Hispanic Americans are dying at younger ages than white Americans (STAT)
• ‘We need help,’ say Latina workers, hit hard by pandemic job losses (PBS)
• Stark racial disparities emerge as families struggle to get enough food (Politico)
• The Fullest Look Yet at the Racial Inequality of Coronavirus (The New York Times)
• Why Surviving the Virus Might Come Down to Which Hospital Admits You (The New York Times)
• Black Americans hospitalized for COVID-19 at four times the rate of whites, Medicare data shows (Reuters)
• ‘So much worse than I ever thought it would be’: Virus cases skyrocketing among Latinos (Politico)
• To understand who’s dying of Covid-19, look to social factors like race more than preexisting diseases (STAT)
• Why chronic stress and COVID-19 are a ‘perfect storm’ for the health of black Americans (PBS)
• Missing data veils coronavirus damage to minority communities (Politico)
• ‘The direct result of racism’: Covid-19 lays bare how discrimination drives health disparities among Black people (STAT)
• Black Workers, Already Lagging, Face Big Economic Risks (The New York Times)
• Mass protests could undo hard-won progress in pandemic (Politico)
• Will Covid-19 Be a Turning Point in the Fight Against Racial Disparities in Health Care? (The Nation)
• COVID-19 Is Crushing Black Communities. Some States Are Paying Attention. (PEW)
• Some people of color worry reopening rethreads nation’s dark economic narrative: Analysis (ABC News)
• They didn’t all have to die — a moment of reflection as US Covid deaths reach 100,000 (CNN)
• The federal government fiddles as covid-19 ravages Native Americans (The Washington Post)
• Number of working black business owners falls 40 percent, far more than other groups amid coronavirus (The Washington Post)
• ‘Heroes or hostages?’: Communities of color bear the burden of essential work in coronavirus crisis (ABC News)
• Covid-19 Crisis Triage — Optimizing Health Outcomes and Disability Rights (New England Journal of Medicine)
• Black healthcare workers hit harder during pandemic, paper finds (Modern Healthcare)
• Why America Can’t Stop COVID-19 (wbur)
• Today’s children are the pandemic generation. For millions, the future is now grim. (The Washington Post)
• Racial Status And The Pandemic: A Combustible Mixture (KHN)
• Disparity Ideology, Coronavirus, and the Danger of the Return of Racial Medicine (Common Dreams)
• The Coronavirus Was an Emergency Until Trump Found Out Who Was Dying (The Atlantic)
• Early Data Shows Black People Are Being Disproportionally Arrested for Social Distancing Violations (ProPublica)
• For Latinos and Covid-19, Doctors Are Seeing an ‘Alarming’ Disparity (The New York Times)
• Let’s Protect and Reward Workers Who Are Keeping America Going (The New Yorker)
• Disproportionately black counties account for over half of coronavirus cases in the U.S. and nearly 60% of deaths, study finds (The Washington Post)
• A new study shows just how badly black Americans have been hit by Covid-19 (Politico)
• Los New Yorkers: Essential and Underprotected in the Pandemic’s Epicenter (ProPublica)
• Job or Health? Restarting the Economy Threatens to Worsen Economic Inequality (The New York Times)
• ‘A Terrible Price’: The Deadly Racial Disparities of Covid-19 in America (The New York Times)
• Riding the bus in a pandemic (The Washington Post)
• As coronavirus infections peak, profit-driven hospital systems must be held accountable (Boston Globe)
• Women, minorities shoulder front-line work during pandemic (AP News)
• Black activists and officials see a major threat in South’s plans to reopen (The Washington Post)
• ‘A Terrible Price’: The Deadly Racial Disparities of Covid-19 in America (The New York Times)
• Navajo Nation, hit hard by COVID-19, comes together to protect its most vulnerable (PBS)
• How covid-19 is a perfect storm for black Americans (The Washington Post)
• The Other COVID Risks: How Race, Income, ZIP Code Influence Who Lives Or Dies (KHN)
• The Black Plague (Black Agenda Report)
• To defeat COVID-19, don’t only treat the patient, treat the neighborhood (ABC News)
• A legacy of health disparities laid bare by COVID-19 (Modern Healthcare)
• Stop Blaming Black People for Dying of the Coronavirus (Portside)
• Opinion: Black mothers expected to fare worse in pandemic (AJC)
• What the Surgeon General gets wrong about African Americans and Covid-19 (CNN)
• Why Coronavirus Is Killing African-Americans More Than Others (The New York Times)
• 4 reasons coronavirus is hitting black communities so hard (The Washington Post)
• Why are Blacks dying at higher rates from COVID-19? (Brookings)
• For some black Americans, anxiety about wearing face coverings in public may keep them from doing so (The Washington Post)
• Why black Americans are at higher risk for coronavirus (CNN)
• The Pandemic’s Missing Data (The New York Times)
• Coronavirus disparity in Louisiana: About 70% of the victims are black, but why? (The New Orleans Advocate)
• Health professionals warn of ‘explosion’ of coronavirus cases in minority communities (Politico)
• COVID-19 exacerbating inequalities in the US (The Lancet)
• Long-standing racial and income disparities seen creeping into COVID-19 care (Modern Healthcare)
• ‘Those numbers take your breath away’: Covid-19 is hitting Chicago’s black neighborhoods much harder than others, officials say (The Washington Post)
• Covid-19 is ravaging black communities. A Milwaukee neighborhood is figuring out how to fight back. (The Washington Post)
• Early Data Show African Americans Dying of Coronavirus at an Alarming Rate (Portside)

Image Courtesy of Enrique Ortiz / Getty