Covid-19 hits African-Americans hardest in ‘potential catastrophe of inequality’, US study finds
- Infection rate 80 per cent higher than among Caucasians, with other ethnic minorities also more likely to contract disease, researchers in Texas say
- Finding highlights social divide and inequalities between the communities and could be happening in other US cities
African-Americans had an 80 per cent higher infection rate for the disease known as Covid-19, according to the study led by Dr Farhaan Vahidy with the Houston Methodist Hospital and released in a non-peer reviewed paper posted on medRxiv.org on Tuesday.
The infection rate for Hispanics was 70 per cent more than Caucasians, while the rate for Asians stood at more than 40 per cent higher.
“The strong association between racial and ethnic minorities and Sars-CoV-2 infection demonstrated in our data … highlights a potential catastrophe of inequality within the existential crisis of a global pandemic,” the researchers said, using the clinical name for the coronavirus.
What happened in Houston might be happening in other US cities, they said.
“The Houston metropolitan area is one of the most diverse and representative in the US, and our health care system is one of the largest systems providing care to Covid-19 patients in the Greater Houston area,” the paper said.