The Conversation: Rethinking the boundaries between economic life and coronavirus death. “As governments around the world begin to reopen their borders, it’s clear that efforts to revive the economy are redrawing the lines between who will prosper, who will suffer and who will die. Emerging strategies for restoring economic growth are forcing vulnerable populations to choose between increased exposure to death or economic survival. This is an unacceptable choice that appears natural only because it prioritizes the economy over people already considered marginal or expendable.”
health care inequality
New York Times: The Fullest Look Yet at the Racial Inequity of Coronavirus
New York Times: The Fullest Look Yet at the Racial Inequity of Coronavirus. “Early numbers had shown that Black and Latino people were being harmed by the virus at higher rates. But the new federal data — made available after The New York Times sued the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — reveals a clearer and more complete picture: Black and Latino people have been disproportionately affected by the coronavirus in a widespread manner that spans the country, throughout hundreds of counties in urban, suburban and rural areas, and across all age groups.”
Buenos Aires Times: Coronavirus decimating indigenous Latin American communities
Buenos Aires Times: Coronavirus decimating indigenous Latin American communities. “The Pan American Health Organisation says that at least 20,000 people living in the Amazon River basin, which passes through Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Guyana and Suriname, are infected. On the border between Brazil and Venezuela, the Yanomamis territory is occupied by around 20,000 illegal miners, according to Survival International. Sometimes, the illegal miners and loggers carry the virus with them, exposing indigenous populations to danger.”
Arizona State University: Native nations are fighting COVID-19 on many levels
Arizona State University: Native nations are fighting COVID-19 on many levels. “COVID-19 has exacerbated infrastructure vulnerabilities in Indian Country and has brought attention to myriad issues that advocacy hasn’t been able to, experts say. Even though the Navajo Nation’s highest per capita coronavirus infection rate has been getting the lion’s share of attention in the media, the lack of infrastructure — especially broadband — impacts civic engagement, education, energy and health care delivery on U.S. reservations affected by the pandemic.”
CNBC: Black doctors push for anti-bias training in medicine to combat health inequality
CNBC: Black doctors push for anti-bias training in medicine to combat health inequality. “George Floyd’s last words, ‘I can’t breathe,’ have become a rallying cry during the weeks of protests against police violence. Doctors writing in the New England Journal of Medicine use those words as a refrain to lay out how systemic racism has negatively impacted the health of African Americans and how this is the moment to change it.”
Emory University: Emory launches national dashboard to help visualize and target COVID-19 disparities
Emory University: Emory launches national dashboard to help visualize and target COVID-19 disparities. “On the homepage, users can see a snapshot of COVID-19 deaths across the country. Selecting a state brings up a map displaying COVID-19 mortality by county. Drilling down, users can select a county to see how it compares to the rest of the state and to the country in average daily cases and deaths, and in social characteristics, such as percentage of residents who are African-American, percentage who live in poverty, percentage who are obese, percentage who have diabetes, and more. The dashboard allows users to compare counties within the same state, aggregating key metrics that tell a story of a community’s social and economic health.”
ProPublica: State Investigating Hospital With Coronavirus Policy That Profiled Pregnant Native American Mothers and Separated Them From Newborns
ProPublica: State Investigating Hospital With Coronavirus Policy That Profiled Pregnant Native American Mothers and Separated Them From Newborns. “Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham cited ‘significant, awful allegations’ in a ProPublica and New Mexico In Depth story on a hospital where clinicians said pregnant Native women were singled out for COVID-19 testing and separated from newborns after delivery.”
Courthouse News: Government Claims Native American Lawsuit Over Covid-19 Funds Too Late
Courthouse News: Government Claims Native American Lawsuit Over Covid-19 Funds Too Late. “The Trump administration blamed a Native American tribe for waiting until the eleventh hour to challenge the distribution metrics for Covid-19 relief funds in federal court on Thursday, as the government gears up to send billions of dollars out the door over the next week.”
‘This is what happens to us.’: How U.S. cities lost precious time to protect black residents from the coronavirus (Washington Post)
Washington Post: ‘This is what happens to us.’: How U.S. cities lost precious time to protect black residents from the coronavirus. “Interviews with nearly 60 public health experts, lawmakers and community leaders show that many of the first coronavirus testing sites went up in areas that happened to be whiter and more affluent, despite the requests of black leaders. Local governments — sometimes ignoring the pleas of community activists — targeted few of their education campaigns about prevention and social distancing specifically to African Americans, even as conspiracy theories spread that black people were immune to the disease.”
Arizona State University: African American community experiencing higher rates of COVID-19 exposure, infection and death
Arizona State University: African American community experiencing higher rates of COVID-19 exposure, infection and death. “Researchers are discovering that health differences between racial and ethnic groups are often due to economic and social conditions, lower access to health care and other existing heath disparities. Mako Fitts Ward, a clinical assistant professor with ASU’s School of Social Transformation and faculty lead of African and African American Studies, said all of these conditions have left the African American community especially vulnerable during the pandemic. An educator, writer, facilitator and social justice advocate with over 15 years of experience teaching core principles of justice and social change to college students and advocating for racial and gender equity in communities around the country, ASU Now spoke to Ward about her observations on how COVID-19 has impacted the African American community.”
The Appeal: Black Women Have Long Faced Racism In Healthcare. Covid-19 Is Only Amplifying It.
The Appeal: Black Women Have Long Faced Racism In Healthcare. Covid-19 Is Only Amplifying It.. “Across the United States, Black women like [Rana Zoe] Mungin have long faced significant social, economic, and racial barriers to receiving healthcare. Wage disparities, lack of access to hospitals and doctors’ offices, and the chronic stress of racism and implicit biases from providers all contribute to worse healthcare outcomes for Black women versus their white peers. Now, doctors and policymakers are concerned that those factors are compounding in the COVID-19 pandemic, creating greater gaps in care, and potentially increasing the virus’s spread.”
‘It’s disturbing’: Coronavirus kills black residents at dramatic rates across Louisiana (NOLA)
NOLA: ‘It’s disturbing’: Coronavirus kills black residents at dramatic rates across Louisiana . “Nearly 57% of the 1,405 people who have lost their lives to the coronavirus in Louisiana are black, while African-Americans make up only 33% of the state’s population. As of Tuesday, more than 52 out of every 100,000 black residents of the state had been killed by COVID-19, about 2.65 times as high as the rate at which those of other races had succumbed.”
Native News Online: Navajo Nation Covid-19 Cases Increase By 124; 1,321 Total Cases – Death Toll At 45
Native News Online: Navajo Nation Covid-19 Cases Increase By 124; 1,321 Total Cases – Death Toll At 45. “The Navajo Nation released an update last Monday evening that show an increase of 124 new COVID-19 cases since Saturday, which brings the total to 1,321 confirmed cases. The overall number of positive cases includes cases on the Navajo Nation and nearby border towns.”
Salt Lake Tribune: Navajo Nation has a higher coronavirus testing rate than Utah and most states
Salt Lake Tribune: Navajo Nation has a higher coronavirus testing rate than Utah and most states. “The Navajo Epidemiology Center announced 1,127 confirmed cases of the disease and 44 deaths as of Saturday, and Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez has warned the peak may still be weeks away — a startling trend for a Native American nation that has an on-reservation population of about 174,000. As The Salt Lake Tribune previously reported, if the Navajo Nation were a U.S. state, it would rank behind only New York and New Jersey for per-capita confirmed cases.”
Associated Press: Racial toll of virus grows even starker as more data emerges
Associated Press: Racial toll of virus grows even starker as more data emerges. “As a clearer picture emerges of COVID-19’s decidedly deadly toll on black Americans, leaders are demanding a reckoning of the systemic policies they say have made many African Americans far more vulnerable to the virus, including inequity in access to health care and economic opportunity. A growing chorus of medical professionals, activists and political figures are pressuring the federal government to not just release comprehensive racial demographic data of the country’s coronavirus victims, but also to outline clear strategies to blunt the devastation on African Americans and other communities of color.”
