Disparities in COVID-19 hospitalizations should concern everyone
No one should assume they’re entirely immune from the risk that the novel coronavirus represents to themselves and others. Medical experts say that applies even to an otherwise healthy young adult — and even, perhaps, to someone who has recovered from a bout of COVID-19.
But some individuals, and some communities, are more vulnerable than others. And as we slog through this long, grim summer, we should be aware of that too.
As the week began, the state was reporting more than 270,000 cases of the new coronavirus — and 3,274 fatalities. And
Harris County authorities said Monday that the pandemic is taking a particularly heavy toll on Houston-area residents who are African American or Latino.
Roughly 44 percent of county residents are Latino. But since mid-May, more than half of those hospitalized each week with the virus that causes COVID-19 have been Latino — and some weeks, Latinos have accounted for fully two-thirds of such hospitalizations.
Dr. Umair Shah, the local health authority for Harris County, said there’s no single reason for these disproportionate outcomes.
“We know that some of those factors may be related to uninsurance rates, may be related to many in our Hispanic community working front-line jobs, the economics of what’s occurring with this pandemic, as well as multi-family households and, certainly, we are concerned about fear and stigma in our community,” Shah said at a news conference.
Addressing the latter is a key focus of a new emergency outreach initiative launched by the Houston Health Department, “Better Together” — or, in Spanish, Todos Juntos Mejor.
“Basically our goals are to reach the Hispanic community with the message of how to protect themselves and also the importance of testing, especially if they know they’ve been exposed to someone who’s having
symptoms,” said Porfirio Villarreal, a public information officer for the Houston Health Department.
And, to that end, he explained, the campaign seeks to allay the concerns that some Hispanic Houstonians have expressed about the testing process itself.
“We will not be asking for immigration status. We are not going to be asking for health insurance,” Villarreal said. “The phone number is the most important thing we are going to get from them.”
The Centers for Disease Control has reported a similar trend across the country. As of last month, according to data, Latinos
are being hospitalized at nearly four times the rate of non-Hispanic white people. On Monday, actress Eva Longoria Bastón, a Corpus Christi native, joined Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti to announce the launch of a new coalition, Momento Latino, to focus on issues of concern to the nation’s Hispanic population — COVID-19 being a case in point.
“We keep America running. Now is our moment to bring our diverse community together to create and advocate for the resources we deserve,” the group says on its website.
“America can’t recover from COVID-19 unless the Latino community recovers from COVID-19,” it continues.
That’s certainly true in
states such as California, Arizona and Texas, all of which have large Latino populations — and all of which have seen spiking case numbers and hospitalizations in recent weeks.
In Texas, at least, the re-opening has fortunately been paused for the time being. And Gov. Greg Abbott is facing calls for stronger action. Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner on Monday called for a two-week shutdown of the city, which is facing significant community spread, to try to flatten the curve of new infections as the region was doing last spring.
The disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on minority communities is among the reasons a temporary shutdown would make sense. Several factors are contributing to the disparity, Shah noted. Latinos are disproportionately likely to lack health insurance, for example, compared to white Americans, and to suffer from other chronic diseases such as asthma or diabetes.
They’re also less likely to have paid sick leave, or the option of working from home, which puts them at particular risk in states that have reopened for business.
“The pandemic has highlighted something many of us have been advocating about for decades,” said state Sen. Carol Alvarado, a Houston Democrat who has been a leader in the push for Medicaid expansion in Texas.
“We knew that these health disparities were there,” she continued. “This is nothing new.”
Whether Abbott will act remains to be seen. In the meantime, all Houstonians should be mindful of the toll the pandemic is taking on some of our most vulnerable residents.
As Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo tweeted Monday, “We’re all interconnected — when one part of our community does much worse, it ultimately affects us all.”