Doctors Call On HHS To Help Address Racial Disparities In Treatment Of Coronavirus Patients

Modern Healthcare: Providers Ask HHS To Help Address COVID-19 Racial Disparities
Providers are urging the Trump administration to collect more information about what’s causing high rates of COVID-19 infection and death among African Americans and other people of color, according to a joint letter sent Thursday to HHS by three major associations. The American Hospital Association, American Medical Association and American Nurses Association identified several areas that require more federal attention, including the need for additional information about “comorbidities, the number of patients by race who require ventilators, oxygen support or intubation, and the number who died in their homes.” (Brady, 4/16)

ABC News: Blacks Make Up As Many As 30% Of COVID-19 Cases, Per Early CDC Figures 
Of the novel coronavirus cases in the U.S. in which person’s race was identified, 30 percent of those people were black or African American, according to new nationwide statistics posted online by the CDC. That’s despite being only about 13 percent of the U.S. population. (Osborne, Shapiro and Pereira, 4/16)

San Francisco Chronicle: Coronavirus Appears Twice As Deadly For Blacks As Whites In California 
The racial disparities that have plagued the cruel and uneven toll of the coronavirus across parts of the nation appear to be emerging in California. The state’s black residents are dying from COVID-19 at nearly twice the rate of white residents, according to initial figures released this week by the California Department of Public Health. As of Tuesday, almost 100 of California’s more than 800 COVID-19 deaths were African Americans, amounting to about 12% of the total. That far outpaces the group’s representation, which is about 6% of the state population. (Alexander, 4/16)

Stateline: Fearing Coronavirus, Many Rural Black Women Avoid Hospitals To Give Birth At Home 
Pregnant women in Tennessee, Arkansas and Mississippi have been calling nonstop to CHOICES Midwifery Practice in Memphis, but the center is booked. The callers are terrified that they or their babies will contract the novel coronavirus if they deliver in hospitals. Some women live in rural areas far from hospitals and obstetrics units. The center’s clients are primarily black and other women of color. (Simpson, 4/17)