Long-established elements of structural racism, from substandard housing to mass incarceration to limited job opportunities, are responsible for the disproportionate toll COVID-19 is taking on African Americans in Chicago and elsewhere, a new paper from the Chicago Urban League argues.
The paper, released Tuesday, notes that black residents account for 30% of Chicago’s population but 54% of the city’s coronavirus deaths. Similar lopsided figures can be seen in Milwaukee, St. Louis, Washington, D.C., New Orleans and other cities.
“How can we live in the wealthiest country in the world and have such stark inequities?” said report co-author Kathie Kane-Willis. “It’s just not right.”
The report says African Americans are more likely than other races to be infected by the virus because of larger structural forces, starting with job opportunities. Black people represent an outsize portion of employees who work in jobs that heighten their risk of exposure, from bus drivers to nursing aides to mail sorters, and are less likely to be able to work from home.
Black people are also more likely to live in overcrowded conditions, in households with older family members who are more vulnerable to the virus, or in homeless shelters, nursing homes or jails, the report says.
“Jails and prisons have a steady influx of people into and out of the facilities," the paper says. “It is a daily, constant churn of new detainees, staff and volunteers, and contracted workers all entering into the facilities from the community. The buildings themselves are often overcrowded, or structured in such a way that people spend time double or triple-bunked, or sleeping in dormitory-style housing.”
Once infected, the paper says, African Americans are more likely to die from COVID-19 than people of other races because of other factors grounded in discrimination, from a lack of access to health care to segregated neighborhoods where airborne pollutants and lead levels are especially high.
“Many communities of color are located in areas with disproportionately poor air and water quality,” the report says. “The higher the levels of environmental pollutants in an area, the more vulnerable residents are to stroke, heart disease, lung cancer, and chronic and acute respiratory illnesses.”
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has responded to the disparity by creating response teams for hard-hit areas of the city and opening new testing sites in predominantly black and Latino neighborhoods. But the paper concludes that a multitude of short- and long-term measures is needed to stem the tide.
Those range from funding community-based groups to provide wellness checks and allowing Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program beneficiaries to buy groceries online, to ending mass incarceration and providing health care for all.
“It seems to me that the most fragile among us tend to be the most expendable, unfortunately,” Kane-Willis said. “We have to care about everyone.”