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Could protests cause COVID-19 spikes? Tough to tell.
If coronavirus infections surge in the wake of protests against police brutality and racism, it won’t necessarily mean that the protests are what’s causing the increase. That’s because the protests have been happening around the same time that…
Racism can erode physical well-being
The chronic stress of experiencing discrimination can gradually erode people’s physical well-being over time, according to Mary Bassett, director of the François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard University. Bassett was one of several experts…
How racism impacts human health
After Boston Mayor Marty Walsh declared on June 12 that racism is a public health crisis in Boston, several local public health experts—including Jarvis Chen, research scientist in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Harvard T.H.…
Turning the words ‘racism is a public health crisis’ into action
June 18, 2020 – Mary Bassett, director of the François-Xavier Bagnoud (FXB) Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard University at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, discusses Boston Mayor Marty Walsh’s June 12 declaration that racism…
Want to learn more about racism? Here’s a place to start.
While reflecting on the killing of George Floyd, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Dean Michelle Williams decided to read Toni Morrison’s “The Origin of Others,” a book of essays based on Morrison’s Norton lectures. Williams was…
Experts: Health care system’s racial bias contributes to COVID-19 disparities
Discrimination in the health care system is contributing to stark disparities in how COVID-19 is sickening and killing people of color, according to health care experts. In a June 15, 2020 article in USA Today, experts talked about…
#ShutDownSTEM marks researchers’ commitment to ending racism
Researchers around the world are pausing work on Wednesday, June 10, 2020 to express support for ending racism in the scientific community and society as a whole, and to take time to reflect on ways to do so,…
Police killings can harm mental health of entire African American community
When police kill unarmed African Americans, the entire African American community in the state in which it occurs can suffer long-term negative mental health impacts, according to social scientist David R. Williams. In an interview on CNN’s “The…
Op-ed: ‘Racism is a public health crisis’
Racism is killing black Americans—both by fueling police violence against them and by propelling adverse socioeconomic conditions that contribute to serious health issues, according to a June 4, 2020 op-ed in the Washington Post by Harvard T.H. Chan…
Op-ed: Racism underlies both lethal policing and COVID-19 disparities
As protests against police brutality and racism rage across the U.S., some commentators have expressed concern that large numbers of people in close proximity will increase the spread of COVID-19, and some have even compared these risks to…
