TOPLINE
An analysis from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of over a million coronavirus cases in the U.S. puts new numbers behind previous observations that the disease “disproportionately” affects racial and ethnic minority groups in the United States, as well as older people and those with underlying health conditions.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – MAY 26: A medical worker wears a protective face mask outside NYU Langone … [+] Health hospital as people applaud to show their gratitude to medical staff and essential workers during the coronavirus pandemic on May 26, 2020 in New York City. Government guidelines encourage wearing a mask in public with strong social distancing in effect as all 50 states in the USA have begun a gradual process to slowly reopen after weeks of stay-at-home measures to slow the spread of COVID-19. (Photo by Noam Galai/Getty Images)
Getty Images
KEY FACTS
Of the 1,320,488 reported cases analyzed between January 22 and May 30 that included information on race and ethnicity, 33% of the patients were Hispanic, 22% were Black and 1.3% were American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN).
“These findings suggest that persons in these groups, who account for 18%, 13% and 0.7% of the U.S. population, respectively, are disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic,” the CDC report reads.
About 14% of the cases analyzed required hospitalization, with 2% admitted to intensive cares units and 5.4% resulting in death.
Hospitalization occurred more often for people with underlying conditions (45.4% versus 7.6% of those without), as well as death rates (19.5% versus 1.6%).
The most frequent underlying health condition was cardiovascular disease (32%), followed by diabetes (30%) and chronic lung disease (18%).
Incidence was highest among people 80 and older (902 cases per 100,000), while it was lowest among children 9 and younger (51), but surprisingly people between the ages of 40 to 59 saw higher incidence (between 541 and 550) than people between 60 and 79 (478 and 464).
According to Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. leads all other countries with confirmed coronavirus cases (2,107,632) and reported deaths (116,029).
Tangent
As more of the country moves forward with reopening, multiple states are seeing rising case numbers and hospitalizations. Texas, for example, on Monday set a hospitalization record for the fourth day in a row. Regardless, Trump is planning to hold a rally on June 20 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a state that’s also seeing cases tick upward.
Key background
As protests against systemic racism in policing take place nationwide following the death of 46-year-old George Floyd while in Minneapolis police custody, the pandemic continues to show similar discrepancies in healthcare and economics. In New York City, the epicenter of the outbreak in the U.S., Black and Hispanic people outnumber other demographic groups among essential workers, like transit workers. Limited access to Medicaid in some states also disproportionately affects the Black community.
