Mayor Says Virus Has Hit Black, Hispanic New Yorkers Hard

6
Voters masked against coronavirus line up at Riverside High School for Wisconsin's primary election Tuesday April 7, 2020, in Milwaukee. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. (AP Photo/Morry Gash)

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City’s death toll from the coronavirus has been disproportionately high in black and Hispanic communities, and the city is starting an outreach campaign for those residents, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Wednesday.

Join our WhatsApp group

Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email


“We’re seeing folks who have struggled before really being hit particularly hard,” de Blasio said at a City Hall briefing.

Preliminary data indicates that black people account for 28% of the city’s COVID-19 death toll, even though they are just 22% of the city’s population, while Hispanic people are 34% of the city’s virus death toll and 29% of its population.

De Blasio said of the racial disparities: “It’s sick. It’s troubling. It’s wrong. And we are going to fight back with everything we’ve got.”

Dr. Oxiris Barbot, the city’s health commissioner, noted that the communities that have been hit the hardest by the virus “have had higher rates of underlying chronic illness” than other New Yorkers.

State health officials reported Tuesday that more than 4,000 people have been killed by the virus in New York City.

De Blasio acknowledged Wednesday that official death tolls are lower than reality because people who have died at home without being tested for the virus are not included.

De Blasio said the city would embark on a multimillion-dollar public service campaign to reach non-English speaking communities with information about the virus.

Although the figures released Wednesday show racial disparities in who has died of the virus, the disparities are not as great as those that have been reported elsewhere in the country.

Figures released by Michigan’s Department of Health and Human Services show 40% of those who have died from COVID-19 are black in a state where African Americans are just 14% of the population.

In TV appearances earlier Wednesday, de Blasio acknowledged that the city’s official coronavirus statistics have missed hundreds of people who died at home without ever being tested for the virus, and said the city would start including such victims in its COVID-19 tally.

“The blunt truth is coronavirus is driving these very tragic deaths,” de Blasio said on CNN’s “New Day.” He added, “We’re not talking about, you know, 10 people, 20 people. We’re talking about something like 100, 200 people per day.”

The city’s Fire Department has recorded as many as 200 deaths at home daily in recent weeks, far more than the average 25 deaths at home before the pandemic.

De Blasio said the city would start including in its official tally of deaths people who died at home without a test.

Speaking on Fox 5’s “Good Day New York,” he said, “What I’ve said to our health care experts is we should just acknowledge this is overwhelmingly being driven by the coronavirus. Not every death, but clearly the vast majority, are related to the coronavirus. We should count them as part of the overall very painful count.”


Listen to the VINnews podcast on:

iTunes | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Stitcher | Podbean | Amazon

Follow VINnews for Breaking News Updates


Connect with VINnews

Join our WhatsApp group


6 Comments
Most Voted
Newest Oldest
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Concerned New Yorker
Concerned New Yorker
3 years ago

Yet Mayor DeBlasio, who claims to be a progressive, recklessly sends out ticket givers on the streets of New York City to inflict pain on those that pay his salary. Most of those ticket givers are black or Hispanic. This Mayor, by his actions, proves that he is a racist.

Donny
Donny
3 years ago

DiBlasio has blood on his hands. Bloomberg bought ventilators for NYC and DiBlasio sold them because of high maintenance costs.

Yankel
Yankel
3 years ago

It hit everyone equally, These dreck liberals will always pander to blacks in order to make everything a racial issue.

Triumphinwhitehouse
Triumphinwhitehouse
3 years ago

Too bad de bozo couldnt find 3 million $ in a $96 billion budget since he was too busy in the gym figuring how to give thugs mets tickets

Secular
Secular
3 years ago

Well let’s see :

Turns out the Chinese Virus (Wuhan virus/ Kung Flu) is racist after all – targeting the elderly a and minorities.

Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin work !
Take them as outpatients before symptoms are severe (under a Doctor’s supervision- of course)

Impeach Cuomo now , only cares about abortion, but has no issue getting between patients and doctors.

PaulinSaudi
PaulinSaudi
3 years ago

Yankel, Black Americans were dying at seven times the rate of other groups. That bears mentioning.