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US racial inequality may be as deadly as COVID-19

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  • Elizabeth Wrigley-Field

    (Department of Sociology and Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455)

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic is causing a catastrophic increase in US mortality. How does the scale of this pandemic compare to another US catastrophe: racial inequality? Using demographic models, I estimate how many excess White deaths would raise US White mortality to the best-ever (lowest) US Black level under alternative, plausible assumptions about the age patterning of excess mortality in 2020. I find that 400,000 excess White deaths would be needed to equal the best mortality ever recorded among Blacks. For White mortality in 2020 to reach levels that Blacks experience outside of pandemics, current COVID-19 mortality levels would need to increase by a factor of nearly 6. Moreover, White life expectancy in 2020 will remain higher than Black life expectancy has ever been unless nearly 700,000 excess White deaths occur. Even amid COVID-19, US White mortality is likely to be less than what US Blacks have experienced every year. I argue that, if Black disadvantage operates every year on the scale of Whites’ experience of COVID-19, then so too should the tools we deploy to fight it. Our imagination should not be limited by how accustomed the United States is to profound racial inequality.

Suggested Citation

  • Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, 2020. "US racial inequality may be as deadly as COVID-19," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 117(36), pages 21854-21856, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:nas:journl:v:117:y:2020:p:21854-21856
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Jaeger, David A. & Arellano-Bover, Jaime & Karbownik, Krzysztof & Martínez Matute, Marta & Nunley, John M. & Seals Jr., R. Alan & Almunia, Miguel & Alston, Mackenzie & Becker, Sascha O. & Beneito, Pil, 2021. "The Global COVID-19 Student Survey: First Wave Results," IZA Discussion Papers 14419, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Hasan, Iftekhar & Krause, Thomas & Manfredonia, Stefano & Noth, Felix, 2022. "Banking market deregulation and mortality inequality," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 14/2022, Bank of Finland.
    3. Richardson, Eugene T. & Malik, Momin M. & Darity, William A. & Mullen, A. Kirsten & Morse, Michelle E. & Malik, Maya & Maybank, Aletha & Bassett, Mary T. & Farmer, Paul E. & Worden, Lee & Jones, James, 2021. "Reparations for Black American descendants of persons enslaved in the U.S. and their potential impact on SARS-CoV-2 transmission," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 276(C).
    4. Héctor Pifarré i Arolas & Enrique Acosta & Christian Dudel & Jo M. Hale & Mikko Myrskylä, 2021. "U.S. racial/ethnic mortality gap adjusted for population structure," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2021-023, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    5. Hoda S. Abdel Magid & Jacqueline M. Ferguson & Raymond Van Cleve & Amanda L. Purnell & Thomas F. Osborne, 2021. "Differences in COVID-19 Risk by Race and County-Level Social Determinants of Health among Veterans," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(24), pages 1-9, December.
    6. André Peres Barbosa de Castro & Marina Figueiredo Moreira & Paulo Henrique de Souza Bermejo & Waldecy Rodrigues & David Nadler Prata, 2021. "Mortality and Years of Potential Life Lost Due to COVID-19 in Brazil," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(14), pages 1-17, July.
    7. Pınar E. Dönmez, 2022. "The COVID-19 Pandemic, Academia, Gender, and Beyond: A Review," Publications, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-13, September.
    8. Harell, Allison & Lieberman, Evan, 2021. "How information about race-based health disparities affects policy preferences: Evidence from a survey experiment about the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 277(C).

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