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Recent literature shows that within the U.S., some communities of color have higher risks of heat-related mortality than White people. Consistent with trends in earlier years, between 2018-2021, AIAN people were most likely to die due to heat compared to all other racial and ethnic groups, and Black people had a higher rate of heat-related deaths compared to White people.
In this data note, we use 2019 American Community Survey (ACS) data to examine how demographic characteristics as well as measures of health coverage and other social and economic factors that drive health and health care vary for Asian and NHOPI people overall and by subgroups.
Rapidly rising rates of deaths by suicide and drug overdose among people of color, along with disproportionate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, further underscore inequities in access to mental health care and treatment and highlight the importance of centering equity in diagnostics, care, and treatment.
Over the course of the pandemic, racial disparities in cases and deaths have widened and narrowed. However, overall, Black, Hispanic, and American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN) people have borne the heaviest health impacts of the pandemic. While Black and Hispanic people were less likely than their White counterparts to receive a vaccine during the initial phases of the vaccination rollout, these disparities have narrowed over time and reversed for Hispanic people.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. population experienced the most significant two-year decline in life expectancy in roughly a century, according to new research by KFF, with data showing that COVID-19 deaths disproportionately impacted people of color and exacerbating longstanding racial disparities in life expectancy. While overall U.S. life expectancy declined by 2.
This analysis examines trends and racial disparities in life expectancy, leading causes of death by race and ethnicity, and discusses the underlying factors that drive disparities in life expectancy.
There were gains in coverage across most racial and ethnic groups between 2019 and 2023 after several years of rising uninsured rates during the first Trump administration. The coverage gains between 2019 and 2023 were largely driven by increases in Medicaid coverage, reflecting policies to stabilize and expand access to affordable coverage that were implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A KFF survey of Asian patients at four community health centers serving a predominantly Asian, low-income population finds a third (33%) of them have felt more discrimination based on their race/ethnicity since the COVID-19 pandemic began.
This brief provides insight into recent experiences with racism and discrimination, immigration-related fears, and impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic among Asian immigrant survey respondents at four community health centers.
Disparities in health and health care for people of color and underserved groups are longstanding challenges. This brief provides an introduction to what health and health care disparities are, why it is important to address disparities, the status of disparities today, recent federal actions to address disparities, and key issues related to addressing disparities looking ahead.
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