Voice raised calling on US to protect every individual without discrimination against pandemic

By Wang Xinyuan

The Poor People's Campaign, a US organization for the rights of the poor, in collaboration with UN economists recently produced “A Poor People’s Pandemic Report”, indicating that while novel coronavirus did not discriminate between rich and poor, the US society and government did.

According to the report, death rates in poor counties in the US almost doubled the death rates of those in rich counties. The 300 counties with the highest death rates have a poverty rate of 45% on average.

The report has pointed out that during the third phase of the pandemic, death rates were 4.5 times higher in the group of counties with the lowest median income compared to those in the group with the highest median income.

The latest Omicron has had a death rate nearly three times higher in counties with lower median incomes. Lack of access to health insurance by people in poor counties is believed to be a highly relevant factor.

“The risk of hospitalization from COVID-19 is roughly three times higher among American Indian and Alaska Native people compared with whites, while the risk of death is approximately double,” China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian cited another research during a recent regular press conference when commenting on this issue. The Indigenous people suffer from persistent “discrimination, marginalization, inability to see preferred clinicians, and systemic underfunding” of relevant medical services, as well as lack of access to running water, healthy food and basic public utilities.

The findings of relevant report and research have all pointed sharply to the US government and society’s deliberate disregard for and discrimination against the poor and ethnic minorities, which has obviously restricted their ability to get treatment.

Voices from the international community have been raised to call on the US government to truly value and protect the life and safety of each and every individual without discrimination.