WASHINGTON, DC - In the weeks following the House’s historic, first virtual hearing, “The Disproportionate Impact of COVID-19 on Communities of Color," the Ways & Means Committee received more than 75 public submissions for the record, an unusually high amount that underscores the importance and relevance of the discussion as well as the urgent need for both short- and long-term solutions to address the deep racial inequities in the health care system that COVID-19 has brought to the fore.
Respondents encouraged the Ways and Means Committee and Congress more broadly to establish priorities that address racial inequities in health care as they have been highlighted through the COVID-19 crisis. Recommended priorities include:
• Addressing racism within structures and institutions focused on health;
• Increasing rates of insured, expanding coverage, improving access to and affordability of health services;
• Requiring better data collection;
• Supporting scalability and sustainability of local interventions focused on social determinants of health;
• Targeting funding sources according to need; and
• Training a more diverse clinical, allied and public health workforce.
A selection of excerpts from submissions the Committee received:
• “Racism is not only the root cause of the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on communities of color in the United States, it is the root cause of all ‘race’-associated differences in health outcomes in the United States...We need to address the fact that people of color are more exposed, less protected, more burdened by chronic diseases, and have less access to health care." - Camara Phyllis Jones, MD, MPH, PhD
• “What we choose to measure is a values statement. When we fail to comprehensively capture and report information about the impacts of COVID-19 and other morbidities on communities of color, these communities are erased… With smart policies created with cultural humility and sustained federal investments - modest by comparison to overall COVID-19 related appropriations - Congress and the states can rebuild our data to be prepared for future COVID-19 waves and address other racial and ethnic health inequities around the country." - Joia Crear-Perry, MD (National Birth Equity Collaborative) and Daniel E. Dawes, JD (Morehouse School of Medicine)
• “Expand and ensure access to care and treatment: include Medicaid expansion; allow Medicare enrollment at age 45, allow ‘special open ACA enrollment season now’ and permit young adults to remain on their parents’ health care plan to age 30… Overall, make sure everyone has some form of health care coverage with facilitated access to it… Unserved and underserved communities need reliable connectivity technologies to effectively accommodate and benefit from telemedicine, tele-health, tele-mental health, tele-dental, and tele-nutrition to name a few. Stable reliable internet/broadband services are essential for health, home schooling, higher education, training in the trades and more. These deficiencies adversely limit health, education and employment opportunities… Addressing the overall twin conditions: coronavirus and ongoing health needs of people in public housing, nursing homes, prisons, assisted living, the homeless and similarly situated environments is paramount." - Fredette West (African American Health Alliance)
• “We have learned a lot during the COVID-19 pandemic. The naked truth is that minority older adults are less likely to have access to quality health care, healthy housing, aging and social services and other supports. The adverse effects of these disparities are even more evident in the disproportionate share of positive cases and deaths from COVID-19 among both residents and staff in U.S. nursing homes with predominately minority populations. Estimates are that nursing home resident and staff member deaths account for at least 30 percent of all deaths from COVID-19 in the United States. To further compound the impact of racial and ethnic disparities on health outcomes, nursing homes are staffed predominately by minorities who on average make $13.38 an hour to support multiple residents at once. One of the greatest predictors of the rapid spread of COVID-19 in a nursing home is the zip code/location where the majority of staff lives. If workers live in a low income/poor community, and work in a nursing home without proper protection or supervision, the virus is likely to spread faster, infecting both residents and workers. So racial disparities, often magnified in poor neighborhoods, impact health outcomes for nursing home and home care residents, families, care partners and staff." - Sarah L. Szanton, PhD, ANP, FAAN (Johns Hopkins University Center on Innovative Care in Aging)
• “We further know that the stress caused by racism and hate incidents can have a cumulative effect on the physical health of people of color on both individual and structural levels. Researchers identify racism and discrimination as one of the root causes of racial health disparities. With Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders already facing significant health inequities due to language barriers, fear of public charge classification, cost barriers, prevalence of diabetes and other chronic diseases, and cultural stigma, it is now more important than ever to reduce the burden of health disparities on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders." - Rita Pin Ahrens (OCA - Asian Pacific American Advocates)
