Covid-19 is ravaging black communities.

[RandySF]

MILWAUKEE — In this segregated section of America, the novel coronavirus's first casualty was Lawrence Riley, a 66-year-old Navy veteran and retired firefighter.

Riley had lived through two strokes, a heart attack and a broken back, according to his daughter. But he could not survive covid-19.

"I don't even know how my dad could have caught this because we are homebodies," said Whitley Riley, 20, whose family lives in the city's overwhelmingly black north side. "It's so weird that people here keep getting infected. It makes you wonder."

In African American communities ravaged by covid-19, residents like Riley are wondering what they might do to soften the virus's deadly blow. The pandemic wasn't simply exposing the disparities within their city. It was making them worse.

As of Monday, 33 of the 45 residents who died of covid-19 in Milwaukee County were black, according to the medical examiner. That's 73 percent, though black residents made up fewer than half of the county's coronavirus infections and about 28 percent of the total county population.

The disparity is even more glaring when looking statewide: Black residents here represent nearly half of the coronavirus-related deaths in Wisconsin, a state that is 6 percent black.

No part of the black community here has been left untouched by the virus: It passed through blocks with stately middle-class homes where wild turkeys grazed on front lawns and in poorer sections where swales are strewn with empty vodka bottles and used surgical gloves. The virus touched the lives of students at a neighborhood high school, where a basketball coach died after contracting it. It touched the local police department, which lost a retired lieutenant. It touched families who lived on 44th Street and 32nd Street and 57th Street, where relatives wondered if their loved ones got all the medical attention they needed to keep them alive.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/covid-19-is-ravaging-black-communities-a-milwaukee-neighborhood-is-figuring-out-how-to-fight-back/2020/04/06/1ae56730-7714-11ea-ab25-4042e0259c6d_story.html

[tulipsandroses]

1. Lawrence O'Donnell had a segment on the disparity across the states

Its long been said, if White America gets a cold, Black America gets the flu.
The virus highlights long standing healthcare disparity. High rates of Asthma, Diabetes, HTN, Obesity. Lack of health care. I work in mental health, many of my patients have one of the afore mentioned illnesses. Many do not have insurance, so quite often they have uncontrolled HTN or blood sugars. Many still go to the ER for medication. Poor quality air, living environments that are a contributing factor to asthma. The reporter on Lawrence O'Donnell, also mentioned a lot of misinformation. "Black people do not get Covid19" - I actually heard that from someone I know.

The other contributing factor mentioned on the show, many blacks work in service industries - where they would be more exposed.

[Demovictory9]

2. k&r