Covid-19 attacks groups who are most vulnerable and in America, no one is more vulnerable than poor black people (and poor Native people.) A host of issues ensured black people would contract and die from coronavirus at the highest rates, including housing, employment and heath.

Black Americans are far more likely to work in service sector jobs than white Americans, meaning they were far more likely to work jobs where they come in contact with a lot of strangers and where they could not social distance and work from home. https://www.prb.org/racialinequalitiesinmanagerialandprofessionaljobs/

Black Americans are the least likely to own a car, the travel the furthest distance to get to work, and are the most likely to take public transit, again, meaning they were mostly likely to be exposed to large numbers of strangers in cramped quarters.

https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Srvy_JobsProximity.pdf

Black Americans have the lowest homeownership rates, meaning that even in the places they are sheltering in place, they are coming in contact with far more people than those who live in single-family homes.

Now, even as black Americans risked higher exposure, they already disproportionately suffer the comorbidities that make Covid-19 so deadly. Black Americans are 40 % more likely to have hypertension than white, twice as likely to have diabetes, up to 3x asthma hospitilization.

Now, consider that we all thought the virus did not really kill younger people *until* it arrived in the U.S. Well, this makes sense. Black Americans health outcomes are so abysmal that younger black people are suffering from the diseases WE TYPICALLY SEE ONLY IN OLDER PEOPLE.

Now, before all the its class-not-race people jump in here, let me assure you it's both/and. Black Americans have the highest poverty rate in the nation, but most black people are not poor and now I am going to show you how these health effects transcend class.

US Census data shows the affluent black people live in neighborhoods with higher concentrations of poverty than poor white Americans. https://s4.ad.brown.edu/Projects/Diversity/Data/Report/report0727.pdf

These neighborhoods are the most likely to be near toxic sites that cause some of the the underlying conditions that make Covid-19 so deadly. https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/11/study-black-people-are-75-percent-more-likely-to-live-near-toxic-oil-and-gas-facilities/

Black Americans are also the most likely to live in areas where they do not have easy access to the trauma centers needed to treat a deadly disease such as Covid-19. https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/trauma-articles/race-and-trauma-desert-research

Now, let's talk about insurance and whether black people can get access to Covid-19 tests,or see a doctor with early symptoms. Black Americans are almost twice as likely to be uninsured as white Americans and pay a greater share of their income on premiums https://tcf.org/content/report/racism-inequality-health-care-african-americans/?session=1

It's far worse in the S, where a majority of black pp live & where most states refused to expand Medicaid. Two of the last states to implement stay-at-home orders -- GA and FL -- have largest share of black Americans. Deadly outbreaks are happening there. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/30/us/coronavirus-funeral-albany-georgia.html

And, we also know that black Americans, regardless of income and education, receive inferior healthcare. They received fewer therapeutic interventions, fewer procedures and poorer-quality care than white Americans. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2425753

Black Americans are sicker than white Americans, and yet on whole, and yet we spend less on their care, so much so that to remedy the disparity we would have to spend up to 47 percent more on their care. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/366/6464/447