NEWS

Racism’s Plague on Public Health

By Dr. Lyndon Haviland

June 22, 2020

TheHill.com

COVID-19’s devastating impact on the Black community has been widely known since the very early stages of the pandemic. Yet in a spectacular display of federal foot-dragging, the Department of Health and Human Services waited until June 4th to require the collection of anonymized data regarding the race and ethnicity of those who test positive for coronavirus (which won’t start until Aug. 1). … Why did it take so long for federal agencies to act? Why weren’t minority groups disproportionately affected given priority access to testing and treatment?