To add to the pantheon of Driving While Black, Shopping While Black, and the general Existing While Black, is COVID While Black.
ITEM: Black people have faced racial discrimination on Zoom meetings through Zoombombing. K’Andre Miller was making an appearance to talk to New York Rangers fans when he was subject to a vile racist outburst. The hacker posted the N-word hundreds of times during the online chat. A virtual meeting with black University of Texas students was cut short by racist ‘Zoom bombing’.
A friend of mine has posted about his personal experience of being targeted with the N-word and the F-word. while in a Zoom meeting. The hacker even called him by name because his name was under his picture. He was the only black person in that session. It appears that Zoom has fixed the problem with added steps of security passwords. Still, it was quite disturbing.
Who IS that masked man?
ITEM: You know how we’re all supposed to wear those face coverings to help stem the tide of the virus. But, in particular, black men fear homemade coronavirus masks could exacerbate racial profiling. “The CDC’s guidance on wearing masks outside comes with an added burden for minorities. ‘If you’re a person of color, you can’t just wear a mask.’”
I’ll admit to feeling a tad nervous wearing them myself, as though someone thought I might steal the toilet paper. I may be wrong, but I swear I’ve felt the negative reaction myself. And my masks are really nifty items, made from my daughter’s scarves.
Related, there are stores that have banned the use of masks, which makes no public safety sense.
ITEM: African-Americans may be especially vulnerable to COVID-19. Why IS that?
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African-Americans are more likely to be exposed to COVID-19. Not everybody can work from home. Black and Hispanic workers are much less likely to be able to telework.
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African-Americans have a higher incidence of underlying health conditions. And yet…
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African-Americans have less access to medical care. “Inequities in access to health care, including inadequate health insurance, discrimination fears, and distance from clinics and hospitals, make it harder for many African-Americans to access the sort of preventive care that keeps chronic diseases in check.”
Roger,
Thank you for this.
Love,
Carla
I talk about “environmental justice” in my Policy and Law Class (which is a hard sell with some of the students, sadly) but I would not be surprised to learn at least part of the “COVID hits worse in African-American populations and recent Hispanic immigrants” because people in those groups often wind up living in more polluted areas (especially worse air quality), related to socioeconomic issues.
There will be a lot for future researchers in many fields to look at. Maybe not now. I am about to record my disease-ecology lectures for my ecology class and I have ALREADY told them there will be nothing specifically about COVID because it’s just too hard for me to talk about it now. H1N1 when it happened was more “distant” somehow, and Ebola was very few cases in the US (and those all people “rescued” from more-affected areas, and also with Ebola we were learning it was less deadly than once feared)\
I would not want to be teaching (from home) epidemiology right now 🙁