Editor’s Note: Errol Louis is the host of “Inside City Hall,” a nightly political show on NY1, a New York all-news channel. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion articles on CNN.
The killing of George Floyd and the national explosion of protests that followed exposed the longstanding crisis of racism in America. But even as we continue pressing for criminal justice reforms, America must not forget the deadly health crisis still afflicting the nation – another crisis that reflects deep patterns of racial difference.
Communities of color in urban and rural cities from coast to coast are disproportionately bearing the brunt of the Covid-19 pandemic. They need and deserve a national response targeted to the special situations that make them especially vulnerable to the virus.
It’s not just a public health issue, but a moral one. It’s a story we are forgetting as the nation battles over reopening: how, when and whether states and other localities loosen Covid-19 restrictions and/or reopen industries, parks, schools, beaches and houses of worship.
The floor of the New York Stock Exchange has reopened. All or part of every state has reopened and has loosened public health restrictions, allowing many businesses to resume operations.
But even as we begin an understandable rush to figure out whether it’s safe to be out and about again, America must not forget the millions of vulnerable people who are still in grave danger of suffering serious injury and death from Covid-19.
The disparities have made headlines throughout the short history of the Covid crisis.
In New York City, the epicenter of the epidemic, black and Hispanic residents have died from Covid at twice the rate of whites. The Chicago Tribune, relaying on municipal health data, reported in early April that “Black Chicagoans are dying at nearly six times the rate of white residents.”
Blacks make up 13% of the population of Michigan, but 40% of the state’s Covid-19 deaths. Fatalities are concentrated in Detroit, which is more than 78% black. According to the Louisiana Department of Health, by early May, 57% of the 2,154 people in the state who died from Covid-19 were African American, although the state is only 32% black
In late April, just a couple months into the pandemic, the Los Angeles Times reported that “younger blacks and Latinos are dying of Covid-19 at higher rates in California,” and in May a chilling headline on website DCist noted that “Black Washingtonians Make Up Less Than Half Of D.C.’s Population, But 80% Of Coronavirus Deaths.”
Even more troubling, the LA Times says that Los Angeles health authorities now find “the virus is increasingly ravaging predominantly black and Latino neighborhoods with higher poverty levels, while wealthier, majority-white enclaves that initially reported some of the highest infection rates see much slower growth.”
And CNN reported that the Navajo Nation, which stretches across parts of Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, has passed New York and now has the highest per capita Covid-19 infection rate in America.
Such news stories, along with the grim reality of rising death rates, have persuaded many political leaders – including the governors of Michigan and Louisiana and the Mayor of Washington DC – to establish official commissions to investigate racial and ethnic disparities in the crisis.
The panel will almost certainly (re)discover what experts have known all along: the underlying health problems in low-income and minority communities – known as comorbidities – leaves them especially vulnerable to Covid-19. As the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned early on, you are more likely to have a serious negative reaction to the coronavirus if you already have diabetes, obesity, hypertension and liver disease, or are on dialysis.
All these ailments have been serious problems for decades in inner-city communities, low-income rural areas and Indian county.
The Washington, DC Deparment of Health reports that “racial disparities with regards to obesity in the District are extreme, for example, less than one in every ten White District residents are obese, whereas one in every three African Americans in the District are obese.”
In New York City, an eye-popping 987,000 residents have diabetes, and 40% of school-age children are obese, making them more likely to get Type 2 diabetes in the future. Black, Latino and Asian New Yorkers are twice as likely as whites to have diabetes, according to an analysis by the Hunter College New York City Food Policy Center
And Native Americans have the highest diabetes rates in the nation, the Center reported. which is one of the reasons the Navajo Nation’s high infection rate is distressing.
To its credit, President Donald Trump’s administration has taken steps to deal with these health disparities. The Office of Minority Health within the Department of Health and Human Services recently allocated up to $22 million for a program specifically targeted at delivering information to minority communities worst-hit by Covid-19.
That’s a good start, but much more needs to be done.
States and cities where disparities exist should attack underlying health problems like diabetes with the same urgency and resources as they scrambled to get ventilators, masks and other life-saving equipment to frontline workers. A broad national campaign is needed to explain that dealing with problems like obesity can save one’s life – not only in the long term, but as an immediate response to the pandemic.
Get our free weekly newsletter
This isn’t somebody else’s problem. It’s a mistake to imagine that the virus will selectively spare white and wealthy Americans. We are all but one encounter away from the army of cooks, waitstaff, transit workers, drivers, airport baggage handlers, haircutters, delivery men and women and assembly line workers who are currently bearing the brunt of infection, sickness and death.
The urge to move on to the next big thing should not blind us to the ongoing health crisis in urban and rural communities of color from coast to coast. We will not truly defeat the disease until and unless we develop a plan to make these vulnerable communities safer and more resilient.