Saturday, November 2

COVID-19

Doctors can’t treat COVID-19 effectively without recognizing the social justice aspects of health
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COVID-19, SOCIAL JUSTICE

Doctors can’t treat COVID-19 effectively without recognizing the social justice aspects of health

Recent data shows that black, Latino, indigenous and immigrant communities are disproportionately affected by COVID-19, due in large part to the persistent legacy of structural racism – practices and policies that systematically benefit white people and harm people of color. From the Bronx and Queens, New York to the Mission District in San Francisco, to the Navajo Nation and black communities of New Orleans, Detroit and Oakland, the message is clear: COVID-19 highlights our societal failures at the intersections of public health, health care and social justice. If health inequities weren’t severe and oppressive enough, add on the layer of police brutality that takes black lives on a regular basis. No matter where we look, our system has continually devalued black bodies and lives. As an...
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Coronavirus-related debt will live in digital profiles for years – hurting Americans’ ability to get jobs, apartments and credit
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COVID-19

Coronavirus-related debt will live in digital profiles for years – hurting Americans’ ability to get jobs, apartments and credit

Long after the COVID-19 health emergency ends, many Americans will still suffer from the long tail of the pandemic’s economic devastation. For people on the country’s economic fringes, the proliferation of data analytics tools to monitor consumer life – driven by companies that profit from gathering personal data – will magnify today’s financial hardship. These companies scrape data from your public records, social media interactions, purchase history and smartphone location tracking. Using powerful technologies, they fuse your data into digital profiles that landlords, employers, lenders and other gatekeepers to life’s necessities use to sort and screen people. As a clinical law professor who represents low-income people in consumer cases, I’m concerned that the pandemic’s economic fall...
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As states reopen, tensions flare between the rule followers and rule breakers
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COVID-19, IN OTHER NEWS

As states reopen, tensions flare between the rule followers and rule breakers

Since Republicans, on average, are five times more likely than Democrats to believe it’s safe now to resume normal business activity, reopening the economy has often been framed as a partisan issue. But within households, many families are having their own arguments about how lax or strict they should be about the threat of the virus. Is it OK to have friends over? Can we invite Aunt Sally to our birthday party? Can dad slip away to the golf course? Can mom get a haircut? These conflicts reflect two very different mindsets: Some are uneasy about opening up and going against official guidance like wearing masks. Better be safe than sorry, the thinking goes. Others balk at being told what to do, and feel anxious or even angry about the constrictions being put in place. These differences a...
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During COVID-19 A Community Rallies to Change Prison Rules
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COVID-19, HEALTH & WELLNESS

During COVID-19 A Community Rallies to Change Prison Rules

Here at the Washington State Reformatory in Monroe, four living units—each housing roughly 200 prisoners—share one recreation yard. And around this time of year, I could watch as teams gathered almost daily to compete on the soccer field or practice around the baseball diamond, as countless residents strolled the quarter-mile track, which surrounds both. Outside the track, some played horseshoes, bocce, handball, basketball, and used the array of pullup and dip bars, while others sat at cement tables slapping cards and banging dominoes. Needless to say, our yard isn’t small. All this changed in early April, after news that the first cases of COVID-19 inside a state prison had been confirmed at Monroe Correctional Complex, where the reformatory is. Courageous fellow residents, refusing to...
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The coronavirus pandemic moved life online – a surge in website defacing followed
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COVID-19, TECHNOLOGY

The coronavirus pandemic moved life online – a surge in website defacing followed

One consequence of the public’s compliance with social distancing and quarantines during the COVID-19 pandemic is a sharp decline in most types of crime. It looks like people staying home made communities less conducive to crime. Unfortunately, the news isn’t as good as those numbers alone suggest. Other settings are seeing an increase in crime following the stay-at-home orders. One is the household, where domestic violence is likely to have increased in the past two months. As researchers who study cybercrime, we’re finding that criminal activity seems to be on the rise in the online world, as well. At the same time, many people are relying more heavily than before on online services for work, entertainment and shopping. This makes them more likely to become the targets of different typ...
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HOTTOPIC: 4 ways COVID-19 has exposed gaps in the US social safety net
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COVID-19

HOTTOPIC: 4 ways COVID-19 has exposed gaps in the US social safety net

The United States is experiencing its steepest economic slide in modern history. Tens of millions of Americans have filed new unemployment claims as the coronavirus shutters businesses and forces companies to lay off staff. People need support to help them through the crisis in a few key ways – cash to meet immediate financial needs, health care to cover them should they become ill and housing even if they can’t make rent. Despite federal stimulus efforts north of US$2 trillion – so far – it is likely that some of those currently being affected will fall through the cracks. As a scholar who studies how people enroll in public programs, I and my colleague Cecille Joan Avila, who researches social programs related to women’s health, have seen how well-intentioned policies can sometimes fai...
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Clap all you like now, but workers with meaningful jobs deserve to be valued in a post-coronavirus economy too
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COVID-19, HEALTH & WELLNESS

Clap all you like now, but workers with meaningful jobs deserve to be valued in a post-coronavirus economy too

The coronavirus recession has laid bare how illogically the U.S. labor market values work that matters. In the United States, as elsewhere, citizens have been extolling the role of essential workers – such as nurses, grocery suppliers and delivery drivers – by, for example, rewarding them with nightly claps. Yet many of these employees receive low pay and few protections, suggesting a different appreciation of their worth in the market. But in highlighting this disconnect, perhaps the crisis has also provided an opportunity to reimagine an economy that values jobs for something more than just wealth creation: meaningfulness. A moral market? Meaningfulness has to do with how much one’s work matters in a moral sense, which is not always signified by how much money a job pays. It often rela...
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Memorial Day: Why veterans are particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus pandemic
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COVID-19, IN OTHER NEWS

Memorial Day: Why veterans are particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus pandemic

As the nation takes a day to memorialize its military dead, those who are living are facing a deadly risk that has nothing to do with war or conflict: the coronavirus. Different groups face different degrees of danger from the pandemic, from the elderly who are experiencing deadly outbreaks in nursing homes to communities of color with higher infection and death rates. Veterans are among the most hard-hit, with heightened health and economic threats from the pandemic. These veterans face homelessness, lack of health care, delays in receiving financial support and even death. I have spent the past four years studying veterans with substance use and mental health disorders who are in the criminal justice system. This work revealed gaps in health care and financial support for veterans, eve...
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Coronavirus A New Era Of Looming Unknowns And New Normals
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COVID-19

Coronavirus A New Era Of Looming Unknowns And New Normals

As the United States loosens coronavirus-related restrictions, some of us are beginning to look up from where we are, to look ahead. We have undoubtedly entered a new era of looming unknowns and new normals, from record unemployment to face masks—an era to be further shaped by our youngest generation. As such, we’d be wise to consider what today’s children can tell us about the future. I’m a Gen Xer with a 7-year-old. Since March, I’ve been a stay-at-home-working-mum-home-schooler and have spent unprecedented time with my (occasional) bundle of joy. Accordingly, I’ve learned that I’m a terrible math teacher, I should lock the door when I’m on a Zoom call, and I should have appreciated the precious alone time on my morning commutes. This pandemic re-emphasizes the ways in which global trag...
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5 reasons students should consider taking a gap year now
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COVID-19

5 reasons students should consider taking a gap year now

With many colleges and universities still deciding when to re-open their campuses after they were shuttered due to COVID-19, many high school seniors are thinking about taking a gap year. Putting off college during the pandemic might enable them to get the on-campus experience they desire in 2021 instead of going to school remotely this fall. Traditionally, a gap year is a semester or year of learning through experience. It is typically taken after high school and before college or starting a career. However, some college students choose to take a gap year while they’re still in college or before going to graduate school. As the coordinator of a research group that examines the impact of taking a gap year, here are five ways that students will benefit from the gap year experience. 1. Avo...
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