University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign: Some U.S. states hit harder by COVID-19 food insecurity. “The report finds the hardest hit states are the same as before the pandemic – Mississippi, Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana, and New Mexico – but with higher rates. Jefferson County, Mississippi, has the highest food insecurity rate, 30.4%, in the country. However, the pandemic disproportionately affected other states. For example, Nevada jumped from 20th to eighth highest food insecurity rate by state.”
poverty
BuzzFeed News: His Landlord Evicted Him During The Pandemic And Then Demanded $1,100 For Him To Get His Belongings
BuzzFeed News: His Landlord Evicted Him During The Pandemic And Then Demanded $1,100 For Him To Get His Belongings. “Ty is one of tens of thousands of Americans who have already been, or soon will be, evicted from their homes since the coronavirus pandemic led to widespread job and income loss in March. The combined forces of the economic fallout from the pandemic, tenuous contract employment, poor protections for tenants, and lack of access to affordable healthcare have created a miasma of conditions that has pushed those already living in a precarious state over the edge.”
New York Times: 8 Million Have Slipped Into Poverty Since May as Federal Aid Has Dried Up
New York Times: 8 Million Have Slipped Into Poverty Since May as Federal Aid Has Dried Up. “The number of poor people has grown by eight million since May, according to researchers at Columbia University, after falling by four million at the pandemic’s start as a result of an $2 trillion emergency package known as the Cares Act.”
Futurity: Utility Shut-offs, Evictions More Likely For Households Of Color
Futurity: Utility Shut-offs, Evictions More Likely For Households Of Color. “Researchers from the Indiana University O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs surveyed more than 1,800 Americans at or below 200% of the federal poverty line. The survey, which professors Sanya Carley and David Konisky conducted, is the second wave of the ‘Survey of Household Energy Insecurity in Time of COVID.’ In June they released the first batch of data, which both highlighted and foreshadowed significant problems with vulnerable populations’ ability to pay utility bills, put food on their tables, and remain in their homes.”
BBC: Coronavirus risks ‘greatest surge in child marriages in 25 years
BBC: Coronavirus risks ‘greatest surge in child marriages in 25 years. “The coronavirus pandemic could lead to a spike in child marriages globally, reversing 25 years of progress on ending the practice, a charity has warned. Save the Children said Covid-19 had put 2.5 million more girls at risk of early marriage by 2025. The pandemic is increasing poverty, forcing girls out of school and into work or marriage, the charity said.”
AP: A family struggle as pandemic worsens food insecurity
AP: A family struggle as pandemic worsens food insecurity. “At the peak of the coronavirus pandemic this spring, Sharawn Vinson often woke up crying. A recurring thought was making the unemployed single mother desperate: That her kids could go hungry. There was also fear of contracting the virus, which has disproportionately hit low-income Black families like hers. Meanwhile some of the largest protests against racial injustice in decades were transpiring right outside their window, after the family had experienced its own terrifying encounter with police earlier in the year. There were unpaid bills, and feelings of shame from having to go to a soup kitchen in search of a meal.”
BuzzFeed News: At 10, Kyle Can No Longer Imagine What He Wants To Be When He Grows Up
BuzzFeed News: At 10, Kyle Can No Longer Imagine What He Wants To Be When He Grows Up. “For Kyle Lyons, parts of childhood are fading into memory as he learns to cope with an uncertain future. His parents fear what the pandemic is doing to him — and his Bronx neighborhood, one of the poorest in the country.”
India coronavirus: ‘More than half of Mumbai slum-dwellers had Covid-19’ (BBC)
BBC: India coronavirus: ‘More than half of Mumbai slum-dwellers had Covid-19’. “More than half the residents of slums in three areas in India’s commercial capital, Mumbai, tested positive for antibodies to the coronavirus, a new survey has found. Only 16% of people living outside slums in the same areas were found to be exposed to the infection. The results are from random testing of some 7,000 people in three densely-packed areas in early July.”
Brookings Institution: A new tool for tracking vulnerability and premature mortality in America
Brookings Institution: A new tool for tracking vulnerability and premature mortality in America. “…we have built an interactive vulnerability indicator that shows the links between state-level trends in well-being (optimism and worry) and county-level trends in deaths of despair. Our indicator allows users to see how these accord with county- and state-level trends in poverty, unemployment, and average household income. As such, the indicator allows users to see how these trends vary by populations, by state and county, and their relationship with trends in well-being (and ill-being).”
The Scotsman: Nicola Sturgeon ‘hugely anxious’ about Covid-19 impact on poorest young people as attainment gap analysis suspended
The Scotsman: Nicola Sturgeon ‘hugely anxious’ about Covid-19 impact on poorest young people as attainment gap analysis suspended. “The first minister said she was aware that children and young adults in vulnerable or impoverished settings were being forced to bear a ‘disproportionate impact’ during the pandemic, but stressed to leave “no stone unturned” in ensuring they did not suffer more than those young Scots from more prosperous backgrounds.”
New York Times: Pakistan’s Deficit and Poverty Rate to Soar Due to Coronavirus
New York Times: Pakistan’s Deficit and Poverty Rate to Soar Due to Coronavirus. “Pakistan’s fiscal deficit will be significantly worse than projected this fiscal year, with the fallout from the novel coronavirus pandemic pushing millions into unemployment and poverty, according to government estimates reviewed by Reuters.”
BBC: Virus could push half a billion people into poverty
BBC: Virus could push half a billion people into poverty. “The economic fallout from coronavirus could increase global poverty by up to half a billion, Oxfam has warned. Using research by the Australian National University (ANU) and Kings College, London, the charity says it will be the first time poverty has risen globally in 30 years.”
Adam Matthew: Adam Matthew Digital announces publication of ‘Poverty, Philanthropy and Social Conditions in Victorian Britain’
Adam Matthew: Adam Matthew Digital announces publication of ‘Poverty, Philanthropy and Social Conditions in Victorian Britain’. “Adam Matthew Digital has today announced the publication of ‘Poverty, Philanthropy and Social Conditions in Victorian Britain ’, a vital resource for the study and teaching of life in Victorian Britain. With material drawn from the British Library, the National Archives, UK and the Family Welfare Association Library housed at Senate House Library, UK, this unique collection offers insight and perspective on welfare reform and the social tensions surrounding poverty at the time.”
Officials: Burial Ground Has Many More Remains Than Thought (Daily Inter Lake)
Daily Inter Lake: Officials: Burial Ground Has Many More Remains Than Thought. “Officials say a large western Pennsylvania public burial ground already thought to contain hundreds of remains actually has many more than previously thought — and there’s a new resource available to those who believe a relative may be buried there.”
Skynet, But For Welfare: Automating Social Services Is Killing People (Techdirt)
Techdirt: Skynet, But For Welfare: Automating Social Services Is Killing People. “Citizens looking for government assistance have grown accustomed to jumping through red tape hoops. Now, the hoops are inaccessible, but still must be jumped through. The most marginalized members of society are given URLs instead of contact names and numbers when many of them have no reliable access to the internet or a computer. A new series by The Guardian shows the human cost of going paperless. It’s happening all over the world, and it’s literally killing people.”