The COVID-19 pandemic is disproportionately hurting Hawaii's Pacific Islander and Filipino communities

USC News Article

By: Anita  Hofschneider

This article examines how non-Hawaiian Pacific Islanders, and Filipinos in Hawai`i are disproportionately being impacted by the novel coronavirus and the reasons why.

Hawaii among nation’s worst for COVID racial disparity

KHON2 News Article

By: Gina Mangieri

Even with the recent COVID-19 spikes, Hawaii officials tout the state’s low numbers compared to the mainland. But Hawaii is among the nation’s worst places for racial disparities among COVID victims. KHON2 looked at COVID rates by race nationwide and found the virus is attacking the Pacific Islander community in Hawaii to an extent unseen just about anywhere else in America by other minority groups.

Latinx Populations Have Higher Rates of Coronavirus

Johns Hopkins Medicine Newsroom

​

Out of 37,727 adults and children tested between March 11 and May 25 across five Johns Hopkins Health System hospitals, including emergency departments, and 30 outpatient clinics in the Baltimore-Washington area, 6,162 tests came back positive. Of those tests, the positivity rate for Latinx was 42.6%, significantly higher than those who identified as Black (17.6%), other (17.2%) or white (8.8%).

Obesity Linked to Severity of COVID-19 Infection

Johns Hopkins Medicine Podcast

By: Elizabeth Tracey

Although preexisting conditions such as heart disease, diabetes or high blood pressure have been linked to greater susceptibility to the virus, obesity wasn’t on the radar as a risk factor early in the coronavirus outbreak. That’s because only about 6% of Chinese people and 20% of Italians are obese. The United States, on the other hand, has a 40% rate of obesity in adults, making researchers wonder if this might factor into the younger population’s showing up with severe disease.