Tag: race/ethnicity

Will Connecticut’s New Vaccine Plan Achieve Its Goals?

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.governing.com/now/Will-Connecticuts-New-Vaccine-Plan-Achieve-Its-Goals.html

Excerpt:

 In announcing a surprising new vaccine distribution plan Monday, Gov. Ned Lamont said Connecticut’s approach was designed with two factors in mind: speed and equity.

“Broadly speaking, these are our goals for vaccination,” Lamont said. “Get as many people vaccinated as we possibly can … and complement that with equity, knowing full that our Black and brown population here in this state and around the country are twice as likely to suffer complications from an infection and half as likely to get vaccinated.”

But experts are divided on whether the new strategy will truly accomplish those goals — and particularly whether it will truly maximize equity. While state and hospital officials say this plan, which establishes priority groups almost strictly by age, will create a smoother, faster rollout, skeptics worry the new eligibility guidelines are not as inclusive as those the Lamont administration jettisoned.

Author(s): EMILY BRINDLEY, HARTFORD COURANT

Publication Date: 25 February 2021

Publication Site: Governing

N.Y. Pension Prods Companies to ‘Confront Institutional Racism,’ Or Else

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-02-25/n-y-pension-prods-companies-to-boost-diversity-or-face-a-vote

Excerpt:

The New York State Common Retirement Fund, the third-largest U.S. public plan, said it’s pressing companies to boost their ethnic and gender diversity, and will vote against directors who fail to act.

“Companies must root out racial inequality, just as they would root any other systemic problem that puts their long-term success at risk,” New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli said in a statement Thursday. “Corporate America must join in the national reckoning over racial injustice and confront institutionalized racism.”

The New York pension, which has $248 billion of assets, plans to file shareholder proposals supporting increased diversity on corporate boards. It also will seek better disclosures about the gender and ethnic breakdown of companies’ employees. The fund said it will vote against board members who ignore these requests.

Author(s): Saijel Kishan

Publication Date: 25 February 2021

Publication Site: Bloomberg

The Black-white life expectancy gap grew in 2020 — but it can be reversed

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.vox.com/22285868/black-white-life-expectancy-gap-covid-19-health

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Excerpt:

That’s not to say every single white American has it great — that’s obviously not true. But, on average, Black people tend to face much bigger challenges for living the healthiest life possible. That shows up in the life expectancy gap: White people were expected to live nearly 79 years on average before Covid-19 and almost 78 years after, while Black people were expected to live nearly 75 years before Covid-19 and almost 73 after, according to the PNAS study. The Black life expectancy even before Covid-19 was equivalent to what the white life expectancy was in the 1970s — as though decades of progress in well-being and health care were suddenly erased.

Author(s): German Lopez

Publication Date: 23 February 2021

Publication Site: Vox

Diverse Population Uses Nursing Homes Less

Mary Pat Campbell
Diverse Population Uses Nursing Homes Less

Excerpt:

Eight states have seen the biggest drops in nursing home use: Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Many of these states have experienced fast growth in their minority populations or have more generous state allocations of Medicaid funds for long-term care services delivered in the home.

Growing diversity is actually the second-biggest reason for lower nursing home residence, accounting for one-fifth of the decline, according to the study, which was funded by the U.S. Social Security Administration and is based on U.S. Census data.

Publication Date: 25 February 2021

Publication Site: Squared Away Blog

Officials Pledged to Address Rising Black Suicides in Chicago. Six Months On, There’s Still No Plan.

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.thetrace.org/2021/02/chicago-black-suicide-data-cook-county-mental-health/#new_tab

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Excerpt:

In July, a city official told The Trace andthe Sun-Times that the city would be releasing additional funds to address mental health, including several million for the expansion of existing mental health services and $1 million for suicide prevention. The official also said the city would seek proposals for a suicide-prevention plan in late 2020 or early 2021. 

In October, the city announced that more than 30 community-based mental health organizations would receive $8 million in annual grants to expand existing services. However, the grants do not fund suicide prevention specifically. Asked about the status of the city’s suicide-prevention efforts, a spokesperson with the Chicago Department of Public Health declined an interview request and said the agency was “finalizing our planning in regards to what we will be funding.” 

Author(s): Lakeidra Chavis

Publication Date: 19 February 2021

Publication Site: The Trace

Excess Mortality in California During the Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic, March to August 2020

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2774273?guestAccessKey=c8fe2604-92e1-4640-b62b-2ac686cef7f0&utm_source=silverchair&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=article_alert-jamainternalmedicine&utm_term=mostread&utm_content=olf-widget_12222020

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Excerpt:

From March 1 through August 22, 2020, 146 557 deaths were recorded in California, with an estimated 19 806 (95% prediction interval, 16 364-23 210) deaths in excess of those predicted by historical trends (Table). Per capita excess mortality was highest among people aged 65 years and older, men, Black and Latino residents, and those without a college degree. Comparing deaths in March through April vs May through August, Latino residents and those without a high school degree or general education development (GED) certificate had the greatest increase in excess deaths, with Latino deaths tripling (from 16 to 51 excess deaths per million) and deaths in those without a high school degree/GED increasing by a factor of 3.4 (from 21 to 72 excess deaths per million). Across age groups, younger adults had the greatest increases in excess death, with rates more than doubling between shutdown and reopening (age, 25-54 years: from 4 to 11 excess deaths per million, 55-64 years: from 12 to 30 excess deaths per million).

In most weeks of the pandemic, Black residents had higher per capita excess mortality than other racial/ethnic group (Figure). Late in the shelter-in-place period, White, Asian, and Black residents had a decline in excess per capita mortality. In contrast, Latino residents and those without a high school degree/GED saw a substantial and sustained increase in per capita mortality.

Author(s): Yea-Hung Chen, PhD, MS1; M. Maria Glymour, ScD, MS2; Ralph Catalano, PhD, MRP3; et al

Publication Date: 21 December 2020

Publication Site: JAMA Internal Medicine

U.S. life expectancy fell by a year in the first half of 2020, CDC report finds

Mary Pat Campbell
U.S. life expectancy fell by a year in the first half of 2020, CDC report finds

Graphic:

Excerpt:

Looking further at racial disparities in the data, the gap in life expectancy between non-Hispanic white and Black people widened from 4.1 years in 2019 to six years in the first half of 2020 — the largest gap since 1998.

“The disparities between those populations have been declining consistently, since we began estimating life expectancy, which goes back to 1900,” she said. 

The gap between Hispanic and white non-Hispanic individuals narrowed, however, from three years in 2019 to 1.9 in 2020.

Author(s): Rebecca Sohn

Publication Date: 18 February 2021

Publication Site: Stat News

U.S. Life Expectancy Fell in First Half of 2020 as Covid-19 Deaths Surged

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-life-expectancy-fell-in-first-half-of-2020-as-covid-19-deaths-surged-11613624460

Graphic:

Excerpt:

U.S. life expectancy declined by a year during the first half of 2020, according to federal figures released Thursday that show the deadly impact of the coronavirus pandemic’s early months.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics said life expectancy at birth was 77.8 years as of the end of June based on provisional estimates. The one-year decline from the previous year was the largest drop since World War II, when life expectancy fell 2.9 years between 1942 and 1943. It put life expectancy at its lowest level in the U.S. since 2006.

“It’s very concerning when we see mortality increase to such a degree,” said Elizabeth Arias, a health scientist at the center and a co-author of the report. “It gives you a clear picture of the magnitude of the effect of the Covid pandemic.”

Author(s): Janet Adamy

Publication Date: 18 February 2021

Publication Site: Wall Street Journal

N.Y.C. Covid Vaccine Disparities Revealed in ZIP Code Data: Officials

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/16/nyregion/nyc-covid-vaccine-zip-codes.html

Excerpt:

Officials in New York City released new data by ZIP codes on Tuesday that they said underscored troubling disparities in the city’s vaccination effort, with the share of residents who are fully vaccinated in some wealthier Upper West and East Side ZIP codes, which have high proportions of white residents, reaching up to eight times the rate in parts of predominantly Black neighborhoods like East New York.

The figures for individual ZIP codes provided one of the most granular pictures of the city’s vaccination effort to date. And it added more evidence suggesting that across the country, the vaccine appears to be flowing disproportionately toward areas with wealthy and white residents, even though low-income communities of color remain the hardest hit by the coronavirus.

Still, questions remained. The new city data does not break down vaccine recipients by race in each ZIP code, nor does it account for how many people in each ZIP code are eligible to be vaccinated.

Author(s): Mihir Zaveri

Publication Date: 16 February 2021

Publication Site: NY Times

Why a COVID Skeptic Finally Took the Vaccine

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://slate.com/human-interest/2021/02/vaccine-skeptic-covid-latinos-california.html

Excerpt:

When a vaccine became available, did your dad immediately want it?

Oh, no, of course not. He was still conspiracy minded, and even to this day. But when the vaccine starts, they’re saying it’s going to be for people over 65, and my sisters said that we’ve got to get our dad to get the vaccine. We told my dad, and that’s when he started saying, I don’t need it, they’re saying that’s going to kill you, they’re saying there’s a chip. I don’t need it. I have strong blood and a positive outlook on life and insurance.

Plus, the vaccine is a vaccine of privilege. Let’s clear about that, especially the way it’s rolling out in California. You have to do it online. For weeks, there was only English, no Spanish translation. If you’re 65 and older, and especially if you’re an immigrant, more likely than not you’re not going to be the most social media–fluent of people. So not only do you need somebody you can rely on to translate any internet stuff for you, but you also need someone who’s going to have a job that allows them to be on social media nonstop. It was the luck of the draw that my sister randomly saw a friend who told her about this Instagram post with vaccine info. So she was able to do it immediately.

Author(s): Mary Harris

Publication Date: 16 February 2021

Publication Site: Slate

How a Black bioethicist makes the case for vaccination to people of color

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2021/2/16/22266517/covid-19-moral-obligation-get-vaccinated

Excerpt:

And in the Black community, if we’re just thinking about ourselves, I do think there’s some obligation there to not infect fellow members of your Black population. Black people on average tend to have housing situations with more people, so there’s more chance for more infection. Black people are more likely to be essential workers, working in grocery stores and places where they’re interacting. If they’re not vaccinating themselves, they have an effect on the Black community that they come into contact with daily.

Even if you can’t think about your moral obligation to the general public because of what medicine has done to Black people in the past and currently, I would encourage you to think about what not being vaccinated means for your family, your friends, your community.

Author(s): Sigal Samuel

Publication Date: 16 February 2021

Publication Site: Vox