It’s been known for some time that COVID-19 has hit minority communities particularly hard. A new study from the journal PLOS Medicine confirmed that finding, but also raised questions about why.
The answer the study found was different than what we’ve heard before.
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During the early months of the pandemic, it was determined Blacks were more likely to have pre-existing conditions, less likely to have health insurance and more likely to work jobs that don’t accommodate remote work. But the PLOS Medicine study found those reasons don’t entirely explain the disparity.
“In this nationwide study, we found that Black and Hispanic individuals are experiencing an excess burden of SARS-CoV-2 infection not entirely explained by underlying medical conditions or where they live or receive care," the author said.
The team found that Black people were more likely to be tested than Hispanic and white people. Black people were tested at a rate of 60 per 1,000 people, compared to 52.7 per 1,000 among Hispanic people and 38.6 per 1,000 among white people.
Among those who received COVID-19 tests, 10.2% of Black people and 11.4% of Hispanic people tested positive, compared to just 4.4% of white people. Though Black and Hispanic people were more likely to test positive for coronavirus, the team found no differences in 30-day mortality among the different ethnic groups.
The researchers found that the disparity between Black and white people testing positive for coronavirus was higher in the Midwest than the West, while the disparity between Hispanic and white people was consistent across regions.
The team looked at more than 5.8 million people receiving care in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and most were men.
The authors concluded there is an urgent need to proactively tailor strategies to contain and prevent outbreaks in racial and ethnic minority communities and that’s likely not just through more testing.