By Elizabeth Cooney, STAT, April 6, 2020
Stark statistics are coming to light only now and only in piecemeal fashion showing that African Americans are disproportionately affected by Covid-19. The racial divide in who gets infected, who gets tested, and who dies from Covid-19 is emerging from the few cities and states whose data are public.
African Americans in Illinois, for example, accounted for 29% of confirmed cases and 41% of deaths as of Monday morning, yet they make up only 15% of the state’s population, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health, one of just a handful of government agencies sharing information on who is hardest hit by the virus. Michigan mirrors Illinois, with 34% of Covid-19 cases and 40% of deaths striking African Americans, even though only 14% of Michigan’s population is African American. The story is similar in Wisconsin, where ProPublica first reported that African Americans number nearly half of the 941 cases in Milwaukee County and 81% of its 27 deaths while the population is 26% African American.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention distributes data on age, gender, and location of Covid-19 patients but not their race or ethnicity. The CDC did not respond to a request for comment made on Monday, but on Tuesday CDC spokesman Scott Pauley pointed to information sent to the agency from public health departments around the country. “Unfortunately, case report forms are often missing important data, including race and ethnicity. To address this and other data gaps, supplementary surveillance systems are being stood up to better capture ethnicity and race data, as well as other key demographic or clinical information.”
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