Pandemics expose racism and discrimination
Annual Mortality per 100,000 (age adjusted)
Source: Am J Pub Health
Viruses are not racist. They can infect everyone - regardless of race, creed, or socioeconomic status.
BUT…
Deaths from viruses are not race-blind!
Minorities generally fare the worst in any epidemic of respiratory disease because they
· Have more poverty, and have less access to quality medical care
· Live in areas of denser concentration - where it's easier to transmit respiratory disease
· Live in areas with more pollution, including air pollution. (Coal use was associated with higher mortality during the 1918 Influenza Pandemic)
· Can't afford to stay home because they are more likely to lack financial reserves
· Have higher rates of underlying illnesses including diabetes, heart disease, and asthma that are associated with higher mortality
· Have higher rates of tobacco use, also a risk for worse outcomes
Above is data from the US showing differential nonwhite vs. white death rates. You can see that nonwhite death rates are consistently higher. Researchers from Wellesley College just published a piece in EconoFact showing that the difference between black and white mortality doubled during the 1918 Influenza Pandemic, although other researchers have found that the white and black death rates converged somewhat.
Regardless, the health impacts and the economic impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic are likely to fall disproportionately on Americans of color.
From Econofact. Note that this shows the difference between black and white mortality rate, and does not exactly match the AJPH data above.
Here's worrisome data from Michigan, where African Americans are disproportionately represented among those who have died so far of COVID-19.
Unfortunately, many states and cities are not reporting their COVID cases and deaths by race. Data from New Orleans and Chicago looks similar to the data from Detroit above.
Viruses don't only kill minorities at higher rates - they also bring out racism. From a history of the 1918 Influenza Pandemic in Chicago:
When the flu epidemic of 1918 came to Chicago, black people were blamed, and that blame came directly from John Dill Robertson, the city’s commissioner of public health. … Robertson’s public health edicts functioned as another layer of Jim Crow laws, limiting the movement of black Americans, and effectively quarantining them to ghettos on the city’s South Side. Public health officials became a de facto police force. Beginning in 1917, Robertson’s health department passed 75 regulations, regulating [everything from] where people could drink water to where children could play.
Hate-crimes against Asians have increased during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Here's a first-person account from Slate today about an Asian feeling unsafe due to COVID-related racism.
Pandemics aren't the cause of racism and discrimination - but they bring out the latent racism and discrimination in our society. We should address discrimination and stigma associated with the Pandemic - and do all we can to be sure that minorities and the lowest paid workers do not face disproportionate risk.