In 1935, the Social Security Act was passed. It included age, and unemployment benefits as well as disability insurance for Americans. However, this act excluded those who worked in farms or as domestic help, pertaining to the jobs held by mostly to people of color. Lawmakers argue that the decision to exclude farmers and domestic help was fueled by the racial prejudice of that period. Because of this, African Americans, in particular, were denied access to healthcare while the system catered primarily to White Americans. Today, implicit bias still exists within practicing doctors and medical institutions which shows itself in medical statistics.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, racial minority groups, particularly African Americans have suffered disproportional death rates compared to the majority. According to Southern University, African Americans are faced with increased risk in diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease, all increasing the severity of Covid-19. Because African Americans and other minority groups are less insured, they are, “Less likely to seek any healthcare in the first place because it is outright unaffordable. That rationing of care can spell death for those suffering silently from COVID-19” (3). Through the pandemic, we can see that racial disparities in other sectors have compounded along with the disparities in healthcare which are shown in the death rates of ethnic minorities.
Today, Black Americans are twice as likely to die from preventable illnesses than White Americans. Medical News Today states that implicit racial bias can lead professionals to misdiagnosis patients, neglect proper pain management, and skip crucial medical examinations. This continued pattern of practice has resulted in a lower life expectancy for Black Americans compared to other racial minorities. The reason why this is an example of systemic injustice is that the healthcare system of the 1930’s still affects the healthcare system today with African Americans as a whole, receiving poorer healthcare compared to other Americans due to implicit biases still at play. In the end, the healthcare system today will continue to enforce the disparity if the discrimination in medical institutions is not addressed.
sources: Racism in healthcare: Statistics and examples (medicalnewstoday.com)
Scholarly Perspectives on COVID-19, Part 4: Social Inequalities Writ Large • Southwestern University
Great showcase. Your post did an excellent job of explaining why this is a systemic injustice. The video at the end helped provide further context.
Great job, you brought up some great points of systemic issues in our healthcare system. With the Covid pandemic the issue is only getting worse. Its become a problem for many minorities. I got a better understanding of the issue with the data you presented and the video.
In these times it’s easy for people to just categorize everyone as struggling somehow or someway because of COVID. I think that this is actually my second time seeing a correlation between racial disparities and COVID. Great job bringing up a topic that is known but not really addressed to light.
This is a great correlation between the pandemic and a systemic injustice in our society. The first paragraph is interesting to me because I live in a rural area where there are several farms that hire seasonal workers, and they do not receive any benefits that people who work jobs for a company would receive. In the third paragraph I found it interesting that African Americans are twice as likely to die from preventable illnesses than white Americans. I believe that something should be done to fix this injustice for African Americans.
Your post did a very good job of highlighting the issues of the health care system and how it directly correlates to systemic injustice. It is awful that some African Americans and minorities are choosing not to get treated or get healthcare simply because they cannot afford to. Every person should have the opportunity to get treated for an illness, injury, or whatever they may be experiencing, especially during this time, and the fact that some can’t because of the issues going on within the healthcare system is awful. Along with this, I felt that your addition of the chart and the video really attributed to the points you were making and show the issues you were discussing. Overall, great post and very informative.