Posted on 04/23/2020 10:41:14 AM PDT by Kaslin
The numbers are preliminary, but it seems that African Americans are dying from COVID-19 at alarming rates. In Louisiana, for instance, blacks represent 70 percent of the dead but only 33 percent of the population. In Michigan, blacks comprise 33 percent of the infected, but 40 percent of the fatalities. This has occasioned an outpouring of analysis suggesting that racism is to blame. Racism and discrimination have unarguably left grave traces in the lives of African Americans, but the rush to identify racism as the cause of this particular disparity may be too pat.
CNN, like many others, cited lower levels of health insurance among blacks as one reason for the higher death rate. "Compared to white people, blacks have lower levels of health insurance coverage and are less likely to have insurance coverage through an employer." According to The Kaiser Family Foundation, this is true, but the differences are quite small. Among whites in 2018, 7.5 percent lacked health insurance. Among blacks, the figure was 11.5 percent. The Hispanic rate was significantly higher at 19 percent.
A number of reports have also pointed to higher rates of asthma among African Americans as possibly predisposing them to complications from COVID-19, which seems plausible. But again, the numbers are surprisingly modest. The Office of Minority Health at the Health and Human Services department found in 2015 that the percentage of African American adults with diagnosed asthma was 9.1 percent. The percentage among whites was 7.9 percent. On the other hand, the death rate was three times as high for blacks as whites for reasons unknown. The newest evidence from COVID-19 fatalities, however, has downgraded asthma as a risk factor. Cardiovascular issues appear to be much more significant.
Many reports on racial disparities in deaths from the new virus have unfortunately traded in stereotypes. African Americans are portrayed as largely poor and urban. That's not the case. In 2018, the black poverty rate was 20.8 percent, which was, unfortunately, more than double the white rate of 10.1 percent, but still leaves nearly 80 percent of African Americans in the middle and upper classes. Like whites, blacks are also more likely these days to live in suburbs (39 percent) than in cities (36 percent). Another 15 percent live in small metropolitan areas and 10 percent in rural regions.
There is little dispute that African Americans have higher rates of obesity, diabetes and heart disease than whites, Hispanics or Asians, and those underlying health conditions leave them more vulnerable to various other diseases. But that doesn't answer the question about COVID, or the flu for that matter. The 2009 H1N1 epidemic, for example, affected all ethnic groups similarly. In 2010, the CDC reported, "There is no epidemiological or clinical evidence that suggests that African Americans are more susceptible to either 2009 H1N1 or seasonal influenza."
Some have suggested that because African-Americans are more likely to hold service jobs and interact with the public, they are more at risk. This is somewhat true. Only 20 percent of African Americans in a recent survey said they could work from home, compared with 30 percent of whites. But that's not a huge gap and doesn't explain the large discrepancies in deaths from COVID-19.
Here's another stereotype to retire: the one about blacks as mail carriers and train conductors. The Labor Force Statistics table from the BLS, (which is more interesting than it sounds), shows that blacks are distributed all over the employment map. African Americans represent about 12 percent of the U.S. population, and comprise 10.7 percent of those in "textiles, apparel, leather manufacturing." They are 12 percent of the "household appliance manufacturing" workforce, and 8.4 percent of employees in furniture stores. They are quite overrepresented among human resource administrators (21.8 percent), electronic equipment repair and maintenance (17 percent) and vocational rehabilitation services (26.6 percent). Yes, they represent 29.9 percent of those employed by taxi and limousine companies, as well as 30.5 percent of home health care workers, but the distribution of work is quite broad.
Something is causing large numbers of African Americans to succumb to this new disease. I am not a medical professional and wouldn't hazard a guess as to what's going on physiologically. There are some new reports that the disease causes strange blood clots. If we're lucky, this new insight will point to better treatments.
The truth is that we're dealing with multiple unknowns, and though we can never discount the long-lasting effects of racism, it's dubious to attribute this pathogen's lethality to cultural factors. Americans of all ethnicities are starting to be more alike than different, and looking for social explanations for our current health crisis may impede rather than enhance understanding.
That should be painfully obvious to anyone not worried about being PC.
That may have affected the skewed distribution in the first few weeks after it was clear that was not true but I would think that would rapidly revert to the mean once it was clearly not true. I heard Fauci say, “There is no evidence for a racial sensitivity...”. Which is true. Right now there is no evidence. But it is pretty well understood very hard to treat hypertension is almost always in blacks. ARBs and ACE Inhibitors helped there and we hear the virus requires an ACE2 Receptor to bind. Sure makes me wonder. Could this be a “point of attack”. Probably not, seems to me a drug that would cover that receptor might have seriously detrimental effect on blood pressure.
A majority of victims were probably obese and had breathing problems related to their weight and/or their resulting diabetes.
3 top underlying conditions are hypertension, obesity and diabetes. All 3 are disproportionate to this demographic as well, no?
Yep!
Actually, I read a great article by a researcher at MIT saying that he thought the problem for blacks was lack of Vitamin D, indicated by the fact that African descent people in Europe and America die from this virus at higher rates overall than people with fairer skins. Vitamin D is crucial in maintaining the immune system.
The researcher, who is Indian, said he was about a 3 on something called the Fitzpatrick Scale, used for grading skin colors. Most American black people are a 4 or a 5; Hispanics and European Americans start around a 2 or possibly 3 for the darkest and then go up to the Scandinavians, Irish, and certain other people (including Spanish Celts) with very white skin.
However, having very fair skin in a low-light Northern climate allows you to get as much sun exposure and Vit D production as possible, while having high melanin skin (adapted to seriously high-sunlight conditions) prohibits it.
He also thought that the conditions that afflict African Americans and African descent folks outside of Africa or the ME are possibly autoimmune diseases,,,that would be diabetes and asthma. Very interesting thoughts, and I hope they look into this more.
The researcher takes 5000 units of Vit D everyday, although I think you can safely take more, and he suggested that a study be done to enhance the Vit D intake of African descent people.
This was in the WSJ, so it wasn’t one of those weird “medical” things that pops up on your FB page...
So COVID19 is racist. No, there is more going on here. What underlying conditions, if any, do they have? Certain cultural lifestyles (southern diet is high carb/high fat) can lead to diabetes, high blood pressure, both of which are leading reasons for being in the high risk group. When you only look at one factor, you WILL find what you are looking for. For shame!
“Population density and public transportation.”
OBESITY AND DIABETES
Mona the moron is puzzled.
I don’t think we’ll have any solid data for a while.
Simple explanation, conspiracy edition: The ChiComs developed the virus to depopulate Africa. All else is collateral damage. (Note that the Aryans in Germany, Austria and Scandinavia are getting off light).
In Washington State, the deaths are 87%white, 10% Asian.
The general population of blacks in Louisiana is obese, has hypertension and type 2 diabetes.
It’s really quite simple.
Africanized populations that refuse to assimilate and act white likely do not know the social distancing guideline, and if they do, refuse to follow them
Not being white is truly being black
Most are severely overweight (obese) probably have diabetes and heart problems..
Not many blacks live in Washington then?
It is a sad life to look at everything through a racial lens
I don’t think social distancing really has much to do with the death rate.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/04/can-you-beat-covid-19-without-a-lockdown-sweden-is-trying
New Orleans population is approx. 70% black. Has been for years.
These cause the Corona virus in blacks?
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