Title
Authorizing the Committees on People with Disabilities & Special Needs and on Public Health & Human Services to hold joint hearings regarding the racial and ableist disparities of coronavirus infections and impacts in Philadelphia.
Body
WHEREAS, The pandemic outbreak of COVID-19 and associated public and private reactions to it have caused untold loss, death, illness, and hardship, but not equally across the population, with particular burden on black and brown people, people with disabilities, and their overlapping communities, including in the City of Philadelphia; and
WHEREAS, To avoid confusion with the unrelated SARS disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) refers to the strain of the virus known formally as the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (or SARS-CoV-2) as COVID-19, which is the abbreviation for the name of the illness it causes, coronavirus disease 2019; and
WHEREAS, COVID-19 amplifies racial inequalities, due to the preexisting health status of American racial minorities, the higher risk of exposure associated with their jobs, and their lack of ability to obtain quality care; and
WHEREAS, COVID-19 may cause most people infected with it mild to moderate respiratory illness that will recover without special treatment, some number will be asymptomatic yet contagious, but older people and those with underlying medical problems like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, and cancer are more likely to develop serious (sometimes fatal) illness; and
WHEREAS, For racial and ethnic minorities in the United States, health disparities have included higher rates of premature death and of all the chronic diseases that exacerbate COVID-19 compared to the rates among whites; and
WHEREAS, Black and brown people are also overrepresented among the "essential workers" such as health care, grocery, and public, unionized (sanitation, postal, transit, among others) employees; and
WHEREAS, Cur...
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