Biosecurity

Covid-19 is disproportionately taking black lives

US Surgeon General Jerome Adams gave America a dire warning on Monday: The country was about to enter its worst week yet of the coronavirus pandemic, “our Pearl Harbor moment, our 9/11 moment.” While Adams cautioned that the calamities wouldn’t be localized but would be “happening all over the country,” it’s becoming increasingly clear that based on new data, Covid-19 will have a starker impact on one group in particular: black people.

Over the past few days, several states and cities across the country have begun releasing Covid-19 outcomes by race. The preliminary numbers reveal that black people are facing higher risks when it comes to the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

As of Tuesday, black people made up 33 percent of cases in Michigan and 40 percent of deaths, despite being just 14 percent of the state’s population. In Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, where blacks represent 26 percent of the population, they made up almost half of the county’s 945 cases and 81 percent of its 27 deaths, according to a ProPublica report. In Illinois, black people made up 42 percent of fatalities but make up only 14.6 percent of the state’s population. In Chicago, the data is even graver: Black people represented 68 percent of the city’s fatalities and more than 50 percent of cases but only make up 30 percent of the city’s total population.