Preliminary data show coronavirus hitting blacks in Boston more than other groups

Article talking about the problems in poor areas, minority and/or immigrant, in NYC that is largely applicable here as well. Not behind a paywall.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/09/nyregion/coronavirus-queens-corona-ja...

since the posting mentions mattapan, dorchester, hyde park are haitians considered latine or black or both (i assume just black but not latine) ?

so in this case i think latino just means hispanic and not franco-fone.

normally it doesnt matter but for this statistic the overlap mite be significant.

Based on my own empirical observations, 90% plus of nursing care and assisting living facilities are staffed by black workers. And these black workers are very susceptible to getting something like Covid-19 for obvious reasons. We have also obviously seen huge outbreaks in Covid in pretty much every nursing home in Boston, and I'm not sure that is because of testing there, or because it is more under a microscope, but I was just thinking that nursing homes may be a huge factor in this.

There are so many factors that need to be looked at here. Do whites have greater access to tests? What is breakdown of % by race for tested:positive/negative? Are certain racial groups able to get tests through their primary care physician based on their health care plans? Are certain groups waiting until they get too sick because they don't have good health care plans?

Do all hospitals have the same protocol in how they deal with testing and Covid Patients? That right there could be a factor. You have the BI, Brigham, St. E's and Faulkner on "one side" of Boston, with BMC, and Mass General on the other side. Are these hospitals balanced out? Do they treated patients with Covid symptoms the same? Are Randolph residents at BMC included in these stats? Would be interesting to see the racial/general breakdown by hospital as well. Boston EMS will often transport patients by emergency room availability, and I'm sure they have a new protocol for this as well.

https://thorax.bmj.com/content/67/11/1018.full

Asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), interstitial lung disease and cystic fibrosis show correlations between severity and low vitamin D status, as does incidence of pulmonary infections and lung cancer

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32252338

Through several mechanisms, vitamin D can reduce risk of infections. Those mechanisms include inducing cathelicidins and defensins that can lower viral replication rates and reducing concentrations of pro-inflammatory cytokines that produce the inflammation that injures the lining of the lungs, leading to pneumonia, as well as increasing concentrations of anti-inflammatory cytokines. Several observational studies and clinical trials reported that vitamin D supplementation reduced the risk of influenza, whereas others did not. Evidence supporting the role of vitamin D in reducing risk of COVID-19 includes that the outbreak occurred in winter, a time when 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) concentrations are lowest; that the number of cases in the Southern Hemisphere near the end of summer are low; that vitamin D deficiency has been found to contribute to acute respiratory distress syndrome; and that case-fatality rates increase with age and with chronic disease comorbidity, both of which are associated with lower 25(OH)D concentration.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16549493

Vitamin D insufficiency is more prevalent among African Americans (blacks) than other Americans and, in North America, most young, healthy blacks do not achieve optimal 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] concentrations at any time of year. This is primarily due to the fact that pigmentation reduces vitamin D production in the skin.

This largely makes sense. The pandemic started among wealthy people - e.g., people traveling internationally and, locally, the Biogen conference to which people traveled to and from. After all, people who travel internationally have a certain amount of wealth to do so. Scientists who work at Biogen are also wealthy. Early on cases in Boston were in more affluent parts of the city.

Once social distancing starts, the more affluent have more space to themselves to retreat to. Any number of minority workers who work essential jobs - first responders, nursing homes, MBTA, supermarket workers, etc - who also live in less affluent areas are going to suffer more. The minority neighborhoods hardest hit have denser housing and multigenerational family housing. That's a recipe for the virus to spread.

The outlier seems to be Hyde Park. While HP has some sections that have denser housing, HP as a whole also has more space.

That being said, it's also hard to rely on this data when it's only representative of 38% of the confirmed cases. That's compounded by FDA and CDC failures early on that resulted in unreliable data in almost every context. We'll never know how many cases actually exist.

Realistically, what can the "COVID-19 Health Inequities Task Force" do, besides point out that inequities exist?

For starters, many blacks were misled into complacency by a widely circulated false rumor stating that "blacks can't get it." This was bolstered by low (reported) rates in Africa despite large numbers there traveling/trading with China. Epidemiologists feared a major outbreak in Africa would be devastating due to the lack of basic care/ventilators in remote areas. The early maps showed that wasn't happening. So without question, some blacks didn't take early precautions and even joked about their perceived immunity. As for the BMC numbers, based on location, insurance and demographics, it's understandable they would be higher than the "elite" hospitals.

I'm also reminded of one of Ted Koppel's best moments on his pioneering ABC Nightline show. In 1987, when an L.A. Dodgers executive (quickly fired) raised the old, racist trope "why aren't blacks good swimmers?" Koppel shot back, "maybe because they don't have access to the country clubs and pools." 33 years later and many blacks still don't have access to the best health insurance and the suburban supermarkets carrying Purel, Clorox wipes etc. While I believe the numbers, there could be many reasons for them.