{"id":146363,"date":"2021-05-02T16:33:43","date_gmt":"2021-05-02T16:33:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/radiofree.asia\/?guid=3c0cf4e4c24ee0a9f4034bb8960c6172"},"modified":"2021-05-02T16:33:43","modified_gmt":"2021-05-02T16:33:43","slug":"capitalism-and-racism-are-enemies-of-an-effective-vaccine-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/05\/02\/capitalism-and-racism-are-enemies-of-an-effective-vaccine-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"Capitalism and Racism Are Enemies of an Effective Vaccine Plan"},"content":{"rendered":"\"A<\/a>

Pandemics don\u2019t spread evenly. The spread depends on environmental conditions such as temperature and airflow, population density and size, and, as it turns out, privilege. Brutal capitalism has driven the disproportionate impact of COVID on marginalized communities, and it is now driving inequities in vaccine distribution.<\/p>\n

Not surprisingly, the contours of COVID\u2019s impacts have reflected pre-existing societal disparities \u2014 which are often shaped along gender, race and class lines. These disparities determine not only how a virus spreads, but also the impacts that the virus has on the individual communities that are exposed. It has been widely reported<\/a> that Black communities have been impacted disproportionately by COVID, experiencing higher rates of hospitalization, infections and mortality; these trends have continued on into the third wave of COVID, and have inspired hundreds of cities and counties, as well as the Centers for Disease Control, to declare racism to be a public health threat<\/a>. Black, Indigenous and Latinx communities have less access to health care and testing, access to information, economic stability and work conditions, all of which contributes to the virus\u2019s disparate impact.<\/p>\n

In addition to race, another significant social determinant of health is class. Essential workers and those who do not have the privilege of working from home are disproportionately impacted by COVID, as they are much more likely to be exposed to the virus. Black workers and most of the low-waged frontline workers have less access to sick leave and are less likely to have health insurance coverage, contributing to the disproportionate impacts of COVID.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople in lower income neighborhoods are more likely to have COVID-19 and are at greater risk of COVID-19 deaths as compared to people in higher income neighborhoods,\u201d Gregorio Millett, former scientist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and author of the paper \u201cAssessing differential impacts of COVID-19 on black communities,\u201d told Truthout.<\/em><\/p>\n

Lisa Dubay, co-author of the Urban Institute research report<\/a> titled, \u201cHow Risk of Exposure to the Coronavirus at Work Varies by Race and Ethnicity and How to Protect the Health and Well-Being of Workers and Their Families,\u201d noted, \u201cWe thought it was really important to look at the intersection of race and exposure, because what we know is that the U.S. has a long history of structural racism and interpersonal racism\u2026. That has resulted in long-standing occupational segregation that privileges whites and people with higher education.\u201d Dubay noted that the lack of sick leave, living wages and health insurance drove COVID\u2019s spread among low-wage workers, disproportionately workers of color.<\/p>\n

Another population that has been disproportionately impacted by COVID is incarcerated people. According to research reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association<\/em>, incarcerated people are infected by the coronavirus at a rate more than five times<\/a> higher than the country\u2019s overall rate. And as of April 16, more than 661,000<\/a> incarcerated people and staff have been infected. Amber Casey of the Washington State Department of Public Health told Truthout<\/em>, \u201cWhen those folks go back into their communities, which are often heavily policed communities, Black and Brown communities \u2014 the same communities that are heavily affected by COVID due to other factors \u2014 those communities are more likely to be exposed and it does really keep a reservoir of COVID circulating.\u201d<\/p>\n