Valerie Rawlston Wilson is the director of the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy (PREE). On June 22, 2020, she released testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and Labor, in which she discussed the inequalities of the US public health infrastructure, as exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’re all in this together” has become a rallying cry during the coronavirus pandemic. While it is true that COVID-19 has affected everyone in some way, the magnitude and nature of the impact have been anything but universal. Evidence to date suggests that Black and Hispanic workers face much more economic and health insecurity from COVID-19 than white workers.
Valerie Wilson
Provisions in the Heroes Act to expand testing capacity in underserved communities, and developing a national system of testing and contact tracing, are the first steps toward health equality. Targeting these efforts in high-unemployment and high-poverty communities serves the dual purpose of providing employment as well as adequate access to testing and other critical health services necessary for healthy communities.
Prior to the pandemic, workers of color were already more likely to be uninsured compared to white workers. However, the loss of employment due to COVID-19 means a greater number of works are losing health insurance. A report by Ben Zipperer and Josh Bivens estimated that 16.2 million workers likely lost their employer-provided health insurance as a result of unemployment. The Heroes Act and the recently introduced Medicare Crisis Program Act help to address the need for comprehensive health insurance with full coverage for COVID-19 testing and treatment, as well as paid sick leave and paid family leave.
Source: Testimony • By Valerie Wilson • June 22. “Inequities Exposed: How COVID-19 Widened Racial Inequities in Education, Health, and the Workforce: Testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and Labor.” Economic Policy Institute, www.epi.org/publication/covid-19-inequities-wilson-testimony/.
