Where Do We Go From Here? Beyond the Racial Data
Widespread disparities have been revealed. What now? A deeper dive: Black-owned businesses, Georgia's conflicted reopening, nurses and postal workers, the pandemic's impact on African nations & more.
Speak Patrice Presents: Coronavirus News for Black Folks is an independent newsletter that aims to empower our community by sharing coronavirus (COVID-19) news and stories as they relate to the Black Diaspora.
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Where do we go from here?
Over the past several weeks, most national news publications in the U.S. and U.K. have reported on the disproportionate number of COVID-19 cases and deaths among Black communities, proving what many in our community have know all along: “When white folks catch a cold, Black folks get pneumonia.”
So what now?
Countless journalists, activists, scientists, scholars, and community organizers have been consistently calling out these disparities for the past several decades, pointing to systemic racism as the source. But the sudden attention this glaring issue has recently received supports the patronizing belief that recent statistics gathered by state institutions trump both first-hand accounts and histories. Why do those in power demand statistics to admit what we’ve long since known to be true? Our cross-cultural experiences, our generational suffering, our disparate deaths?
This dismissal of Black people’s lived experiences and realities as truth is a gaslighting that only fuels the source of these disparities and dampens the solutions, all of which are rooted in an overhaul and reimagining of the “normal” that so many seem intent on returning to. Today’s newsletter highlights more specific explorations of how these COVID-19 disparities are impacting industries with high Black employment, as well as states, cities, counties, and countries that haven’t received a national spotlight. There are also examples of individuals and communities creating their own solutions to pressing COVID-19 needs. This leadership has been vital amid a racial time bomb that many still seem to be puzzled by despite so many receipts.
The aim of Coronavirus Newsletter for Black Folks isn’t to simply push news about and for Black communities during this pandemic. Rather than simply scraping the internet for articles, I comb through as much news as possible every week, reading each story to make sure it (1) provides valuable, actionable, and insightful information, (2) recognizes a diversity in publications by representing a wide breadth of news sources, particularly in our communities, and (3) adds a new dimension to the larger story of the pandemic.
Our mission is to offer a nuanced, inclusive, empowering look at how this moment is impacting our communities, and emphasize the humanity within the data. Thank you for supporting this newsletter and please consider taking this survey to help us stay on track.
— Patrice Peck, founder
📰 Today’s Black Folks Bulletin: 51 stories
🔥Must Read: 8
🇺🇸National: 14
📍Local: 15
🌍International: 4
💭Op-Ed: 6
🎥Video: 4
MUST READ STORIES
Africa's 43% jump in virus cases in 1 week worries experts
Gerald Imray, Associated Press
“…the middle of a crisis is not the time you can suddenly build up an infrastructural base that you need 20 or 30 years to build.”
Black Businesses Left Behind in Covid-19 Relief
Natalie Hopkinson and Andre Perry, City Lab
“Congress allocated just $10 million to the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) out of the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief bill.”
Jon Greig, Blavity
“…African American men began reporting incidents of racial profiling for adhering to the CDC’s guidance…”
A Nurse Explains Who Can Call Her a Hero and What She Thinks of All the Applause
(The nursing, psychiatric, and home health aide workforce is 88.3% women and 37.2% Black, according to 2019 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. For comparison, Black women constitute 13.7% of the U.S. population.)
Shannon Palus, Slate
“The ones that really bother me are when companies like Walmart call us heroes when they’re not protecting the health of their essential workers, and they’re essentially giving us more patients.”
VIDEO: The 'Open America' Protests Are a Classic Example of the Power of White Privilege
Jessica Moulite, The Root
“Could you even imagine a group of black people with guns drawn on the steps of a government building? Exactly.”
Related & Highly Recommended: Right-wing protesters now getting the Tea Party treatment — fawning press coverage
“Everyone’s Coughing, Everyone’s Agitated” (Rikers Island Prison Complex)
Julia Craven, Slate
“…with this whole pandemic going on, everything is, ‘Wash your hands,’ and, ‘Do this.’ But it doesn’t make sense, if we don’t have the necessities to keep ourselves sanitized.”
COVID-19 robs us of people, not just numbers: Where’s the Humanity?
Bemnet Meshesha, theGrio
“It is time to reshape the conversation around any life lost to COVID-19 with respect to the tremendous value they have already added and would have added.”
U.S. NATIONAL NEWS
Job Losses Higher Among People Of Color During Coronavirus Pandemic
Danielle Kurtzleben, NPR
“…a survey from the left-leaning Data for Progress found that 45% of black workers have lost jobs or had their hours cut, compared with 31% for white workers.”
Working to Die? How Black Women Health Care Workers Survive A Pandemic
Jallicia A. Jolly, Ms. Magazine
“What remains largely absent from discussions about ‘health care heroes’ and COVID-19 are the structural constraints that many Black women navigate as they give care while fighting to survive illness and inequalities.”
(Black people — especially women — constitute 20 percent The United States Postal Service workforce, compared to ~13% of the country. They also represent the majority of USPS workers in most cities associated with social and economic disparities.)
Alanis King, Business Insider
“…USPS spokesperson Dave Partenheimer told Business Insider that 1,219 employees had tested positive for COVID-19, in addition to ‘some deaths.’”
Advocates Say Black Businesses Get Sidelined In $484 Billion Relief Package
Tanya A. Christian, ESSENCE
“‘Businesses of color were locked out of round one of the SBA PPP, and the Senate’s new proposal fails to ensure that they will have access to the new $310 billion.’”
Ramsey Orta transferred to prison infirmary due to sickness
(Ramsey Orta filmed Eric Garner’s murder by an apparent police chokehold in 2014 and was arrested on drug charges following an alleged campaign of targeted police harassment.)
Stephon Johnson, New York Amsterdam News
“‘We do not know whether he is sick, if correctional officers have made good on their threats to give him COVID-19, or if they are messing with his food […] All we know is that he had a really high temperature, and that he was transferred to medical.’”
Rep. Maxine Waters Says Her Sister Is Dying Of Coronavirus
Amaya Woodley, Blavity
“‘I’m going to take a moment to dedicate this legislation to my dear sister who is dying in a hospital in St. Louis, Missouri right now, infected by the coronavirus…’”
African American pastors call for equal treatment for people of color in coronavirus response
Amara Walker and Maria Cartaya, CNN
“Three times they were sent back home and into their families and into their communities, being positive but not deemed worthy of a test […] This is my reality. This is all our reality as pastors. And we will not be silent anymore.’”
Kenneth J. Williams Jr., BLAVITY
“…if I become ill, I would go into preterm labor and have the baby early. I would be delivering a premature infant into a hospital that is potentially full of very sick people and that doesn't have ventilators or doesn't have the resources needed to support my daughter.”
Advocates Call For Juvenile Justice, Decarceration Amidst COVID-19 Threat
Amber Butts, ESSENCE
“…at least 101 youth and 55 juvenile detention staff throughout the nation have tested positive for COVID-19, the Chronicle of Social Change reports.”
AUDIO: Why Covid-19 Is Killing Black People
Kai Wright and Veralyn Williams, WNYC Studios
“Kai Wright speaks with Arline Geronimus, a public health researcher, about what happens to black people’s bodies — on a cellular level — while living in a racist society. Plus, we hear from senior producer Veralyn Williams’ dad, an essential worker in New York who’s doing his best to weather the pandemic.”
HOW BLACK MOMS CAN HAVE EMPOWERED HOSPITAL BIRTHS DURING CORONAVIRUS
Tomi Akitunde, Mater Mea
“[If] there is something big going on or somebody's trying to change the plan, you always want to know why so that you can know, ‘Is it legit or am I being pushed into something out of someone else's comfort or discomfort?’”
Celebrity Makeup Artist Sir John Gives Back Through Social Media Challenges
Shalwah Evans, ESSENCE
“We live off of touch and feel and giving all that what we have artistically to our clients and our people. So it can be a really trying time for us.”
Kimberly Wilson, ESSENCE
“Crump made a personal commitment to donate Nike sneakers to five nurses…”
Beyoncé Pledges $6 Million to Mental Health Efforts During the Coronavirus
Rebecca Alter, Vulture
“In our major cities, African-Americans comprise a disproportionate number of workers in these indispensable occupations, and they will need mental health support and personal wellness care, including testing and medical services, food supplies and food deliveries, both during and after the crisis.”
LOCAL NEWS
GEORGIA —
Georgia woman, 99, celebrated as oldest patient to survive COVID-19
Blue Telusma, theGrio
Georgia's Covid-19 reopening pits white governor against black mayors
Kenya Evelyn, The Guardian
Ashleigh Atwell, Atlanta Black Star
KILLER MIKE: It's Too Early, GA ...I'M NOT REOPENING BARBERSHOPS, YET
TMZ Live
Lawsuits blame Atlanta senior care home in COVID-19 deaths
Carrie Teegardin and Brad Schrade, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
CBS LA
MICHIGAN —
Michigan Creates Task Force to Investigate Coronavirus Impact on Black Communities
Joe Jurado, The Root
Metro Detroit funeral homes overwhelmed amid coronavirus deaths
Keith Matheny, Detroit Free Press
CALIFORNIA —
Activists work to flatten curve in Sacramento’s African American communities
Marlei Martinez, KCRA
African Americans Dying At ‘Disproportionately Higher Rates’ Of Coronavirus In California
MASSACHUSETTS —
‘We are suffering’: Advocates push for racial equity in Boston’s coronavirus recovery
Danny McDonald, The Boston Globe
LOUISIANA —
'I will not be bullied': LaToya Cantrell firm in decisions about coronavirus stay-home orders
Jessica Williams, nola.com
NEW YORK —
NYC Workers Strike After New Jersey Building Porter Dies Of COVID-19
Sydney Pereira, Gothamist
INDIANAPOLIS —
African Americans 3X more likely to test positive for coronavirus in Marion County
Ashley Smith, FOX59
D.C. —
Coronavirus pandemic brings Ben's Chili Bowl, iconic DC business, to its knees
Trish Turner, ABC News
NORTH CAROLINA —
Gaston County launches mobile testing in African American communities
Brandon Goldner, WCNC
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
PHOTOS: Lockdown In The World's Most Unequal Country (South Africa)
Tommy Trenchard, NPR
“Khayelitsha is the largest of Cape Town's densely populated townships, with a population in the hundreds of thousands. Residents say it has been virtually impossible to act on the government's health warnings.”
Ethnic minorities dying of Covid-19 at higher rate, analysis shows (United Kingdom)
Caelainn Barr, Niko Kommenda, Niamh McIntyre and Antonio Voce, The Guardian
“The Guardian analysis found that of 12,593 patients who died in hospital up to 19 April, 19% were Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) even though these groups make up only 15% of the general population in England.”
Malawi Health Workers Face Stigma, Discrimination Over COVID-19
Lameck Masina, VOA
“Even some landlords have vacated (evicted) the health workers that are renting their houses to say, ‘No you can’t be in my house, you guys are infected, so, you will infect my house.’”
COVID-19 Restrictions Hurt East Africa's Fight Against Locusts
Simon Marks, VOA
“Travel restrictions meant to slow down the coronavirus are hurting efforts to combat swarms of locusts that are ravaging crops in East Africa, posing a serious threat to regional food security.”
OP-ED
If Workers Are So Essential, Pay Them Like It
Michael Arceneaux, Essence
“…no matter how much your earning income is, chances are you’re only one or two checks away from nothing.”
My Mother Is Busy Getting Ready to Die
LeRhonda S. Manigault-Bryant, The New York Times
“She has not been, and most likely will not be, tested for the virus or receive a diagnosis of having it. Still, hers is the body of all the black people at the bottom of the pandemic.”
We Need An Agricultural Revolution (Jamaica)
Peter Espeut, The Gleaner
“…no government since independence has identified any crop or set of crops to plant on the tens of thousands of acres of idle sugar lands.”
Related: Dry Cry - Manchester Farmers Losing Millions To Drought Amid COVID-19 Fallout
Bakari Sellers: What the Surgeon General gets wrong about African Americans and COVID-19
Bakari Sellers, The Philadelphia Tribune
“…we must approach recovery efforts with a racial lens that takes into account the disparities that put us in this situation.”
Lovoria Williams and Alona H. Pack, Kentucky New Era
“As restrictions are encouraged, we urge Kentucky nurses to recognize that while compliance is a challenge for everyone, the cultural context of compliance are varied and we caution nurses to avoid perpetuating a narrative that seems to blame Blacks for dying.”
VIDEO
Low Pay, High Risk: Nursing Home Workers Confront Coronavirus Dilemma
By Emma Cott, Ben Laffin and Elie Khadra, The New York Times
Ramadan 2020 and COVID-19: How Will Black Muslims Be Affected?
Peter J. Rickards, The Roo
‘This Is Crazy’: 6 Kids, 1 Dog and a Mom With Covid-19
Corina Knoll, Alexandra Eaton, and Benjamin Laffin, The New York Times
theGrio launches Facebook Watch series covering plight of Black-owned businesses during COVID-19
DeMicia Inman, theGrio
WE WANT TO SHARE YOUR PANDEMIC STORIES:
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Thank you for reading. And thank you for the second look, Treye and Tian Jun.
Stay tuned for more “Essential & Black” interviews and original content on how Black salons, stylists, and nail technicians in Georgia are navigating the reopening of their industry and whether they’ve decided to accept clients again.
Stay safe and take care ✊🏿💗