MEDICALLY SPEAKING
Another Silent Killer COVID-19 is ravaging the Black community. But why and how do we reverse it? By D. Shenell Reed
I
n Pensacola, nearly 200 African Americans gathered at an apartment complex to celebrate Easter. They stood together unmasked, closer than six feet apart. They hugged, talked face-to-face and carried on with the jubilance of any holiday party. Normally, the takeaway would have been “a community celebrated the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” But today, we live nowhere near normal. We live in a world where we cross the street to avoid passing our neighbor on the sidewalk. We video chat with our loved ones, wear latex gloves in the grocery store, hide our lower faces behind homemade shields, and rarely leave the house. This is life during a pandemic, and it is quickly becoming our new normal. The police broke up the Easter celebrants, largely because they were violating the safe distance guidelines most of the world is adhering to: stay six feet apart, because if just one drop of your saliva contains the coronavirus COVID-19, 8 ONYX MAGAZINE
you could infect another person and start a domino effect of illness. Now, we have more evidence that for Black people in America, that one drop could be deadly. Identifying the Problem According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Black Americans make up 13.4 percent of the American population; but account for more than half of all COVID-19 cases and nearly 60 percent of the deaths, a study found. The report went on to disclose that health disparities, including access to health care, are likely to blame. “I am a little bit surprised that there are folks who seem to have been caught off guard by these increased numbers in the Black community,” said B. Lee Green, Ph.D., during a virtual B. Lee Green, Ph.D.
town hall meeting conducted by ONYX Magazine and Orlando City Commissioner Regina I. Hill (District 5). “These are the same issues we have seen with disparities over the last Commissioner Regina I. Hill 30, 40, 50 years. (District 5) These issues cause health disparities and increased deaths in Blacks. So, basically, COVID-19 has shone more of a light on the issue of racial health disparities and this is certainly a wakeup call for our country.” Green, the vice president of Diversity, Public Relations and Strategic Communications at Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, said researchers found there were several factors that put this population at higher risk of having complications with COVID-19.
