26 • December 16, 2021 - December 22, 2021
THE NEW YORK AMSTERDAM NEWS
Health Data proves that racial disparities compound COVID risk By CHRISTINE SPOLAR KHN
units began distributing protective equipment and COVID tests in Black neighborhoods. The ferocity of the COVIDIn Pittsburgh, Abrams asked 19 pandemic did what Black tech-minded allies to docuPittsburgh—communities that ment the reality of COVID inmake up a quarter of the city’s fection in Pittsburgh. “We population—thought impossiintuitively knew what was hapble. It shook the norms. pening,” she said. “But without Black researchers, medical that data, we couldn’t target professionals and allies knew our attention and know who that people of color, even needed the help most.” before COVID, experienced Within days, volunteers were bias in public health policy. As on daylong rounds of video the deadly virus emerged, data calls and appealing to county analysts from Carnegie Mellon and state bureaucrats for more and the University of Pitts- Advocates within the Black Equity Coalition—a grassroots collaboration of volunteers, community race-based statistics to bolster burgh, foundation directors, leaders, and data analysts—gather to discuss their ongoing mission to uncover the life-threatening their research. disparities between white and Black Pittsburgh. (Left to right) Robert Gradeck, Kellie Ware, Karen epidemiologists and others Fred Brown, president of the pooled their talents to config- Abrams, Tiffany Gary-Webb, Mark Lewis and Fred Brown. (Martha Rial for KHN) nonprofit Forbes Funds, and ure databases from unwieldy state data proportional investment and genera- commission, had yet again detailed Mark Lewis, who heads the Poise Founto chart COVID cases. tional disproportional treatment. And glaring disparities. dation, were stalwarts of a “huddle,” a Their work documented yet anoth- it impacts all that you see.” The blandly titled report, “Pitts- core of longtime advocates who evener life-threatening disparity between The COVID pandemic proved how burgh’s Inequality Across Gender and tually founded the coalition. white and Black Pittsburgh: people of structural inequities have been missed Race,” jolted emotions in the city of Brown emphasized pulling labor stacolor were at higher risk of catching the or ignored, Burgess said. 303,000 people—and underscored how tistics to show that the essential workdeadly virus and at higher risk of severe “I’ve lost friends, family and a lot of health disparities track with income. ers keeping the city running—among disease and death from that infection. church members. My son had COVID. Among the findings: Black people in them nursing homes aides and home More than 100 weeks after advocates For me it’s personal,” he said. “I knew Pittsburgh earned far less than their care staff—were overwhelmingly Black began pinging and ringing one another immediately it would have a dispropor- white neighbors and suffered far worse or Latino. to warn of the virus’s spread, these vol- tionate effect.” from disease. For every dollar white Mapping COVID testing centers and unteers are the backbone of the Black In 2020, COVID reduced overall U.S. men earned, the report found, Black analyzing data proved sobering, he Equity Coalition, a grassroots collab- life expectancy by 1.5 years, according women earned 54 cents, making them said. It turned out that the people most oration that scrapes government data to the National Center for Health Sta- five times as likely to live in poverty as likely to be tested lived in Pittsburgh’s and shares community health intel. tistics. Black and Hispanic people fared white men. predominantly white neighborhoods. About a dozen members of its data the worst, losing more than three years With notably higher cardiovascular Largely employed in tech, academia team of 60 meet twice weekly to study in life expectancy. White people saw a disease and cancer rates, Black resi- and finance, they could easily adapt to hospitalization rates and employment 1.2-year drop. dents’ life expectancy was about eight lockdowns. They had round-the-clock statistics. Social media advisers turned Using county data, the Black Equity years less than white Pittsburghers’ life internet at home and could afford food health equity into a buzzy online effort, researchers found a sobering racial gap expectancy. deliveries to limit the chance of infecwith videos and weekly Facebook town in the Pittsburgh area: Black residents The report sparked a furor, which tion. Later, they could access vaccines halls, to encourage vaccinations. Local of Allegheny County saw dispropor- Ware met with perspective shaped quicker. ministries are consulted, and volun- tionate hospitalization rates—and were over years away from the former steel “The communities that had the most teers take surveys at pop-up clinics, more likely to land in the ICU or on a town. “The report was factual,” Ware tests were the affluent ones,” Brown sponsored by other groups, at barber- ventilator—in the pandemic. Weekly said, “but I know this: there’s not a ton said. And those with the fewest “were shops and hair salons. Elected lawmak- hospitalization rates were higher of places where it’s great to be a Black the most resilient, the people who had ers seek its counsel. during surges of infection in April, woman. Those earnings? It’s 54 cents to to go out there and work.” “We came together because we were July and December 2020 and again in a dollar for women in Pittsburgh. It’s 68 Lewis, a certified public accountant concerned about saving lives,” said Tif- March and October 2021. Deaths, too, cents nationally. It’s all a shade of bad.” who spent years as a corporate auditor, fany Gary-Webb, associate dean for di- were disproportionate but fluctuated The first signs of the pandemic su- focused on standards. County and state versity and inclusion at the University after December 2020. percharged Ware and others. As COVID health professionals worked mightily to of Pittsburgh, who oversees the data For much of the pandemic, death devastated New York in March 2020, control the spread of COVID but didn’t effort. “It evolved, with us realizing we rates were higher for African Americans Karen Abrams, a program officer at the always gather data to ensure fairness in can do more than address COVID.” than for other racial groups, the coali- Heinz Endowments, a foundation in distribution, he said. “We realized that, COVID ravaged communities across tion said. Pittsburgh that spends $70 million a as testing was done, it was not being rethe United States—more than 787,000 year on community programs, began corded by race,” Lewis said. “Why? A lot Americans have died, including Colin ‘It’s all a shade of bad’ connecting the dots in texts and calls of the issue was—at the state and the Powell, the first Black secretary of state with nonprofits, business owners and local level—there was no requirement and a decorated Army general—and Kellie Ware has long considered university researchers. to collect it.” laid bare how marginalized popula- health inequity a deadly problem. COVID spread quickly in dense multiGary-Webb said researchers had a tions lose out in the scrum for public She graduated from Pittsburgh public generational households and in Black sense of where the inequities would be health dollars and specific populations schools, left for law school in Boston, neighborhoods in Chicago, Washing- found because they knew the neighwere left vulnerable. and months before COVID began its ton, New Orleans and Detroit. Abrams borhoods. They first layered in perMonths before the pandemic began, global assault she was working in her was among the advocates in Pennsyl- centages of Black families in poverty as the Rev. Ricky Burgess led the Pitts- hometown mayor’s office as an equity vania who watched county and state well as data on the locations of federburgh City Council to declare racism a and diversity policy analyst. health systems race to prepare and ally qualified health centers to advise public health crisis. Ware was at her desk in late 2019 who feared that Black residents would health authorities on where and when “Institutional racism is for real,” the when her phone started ringing. A be underserved. to increase testing. councilman said in a recent interview. damning report, compiled by univerIn Philadelphia, early on in the panUniversity and nonprofit researchers “You are talking about generational dis- sity sociologists and the city’s gender demic, volunteer doctors in mobile See HEALTH on page 36
