Q & A: Why the LGBT community is at greater risk from COVID-19

More than 200,000 LGBT adults in California have medical conditions that increase their vulnerability to the effects of COVID-19, according tonew research byKathryn O ’Neill, a policy analyst with theWilliams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.O ’Neill willshare her findings in a webinar hosted by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research at noon on  Monday, June 29. She gave UCLA Newsroom a preview.You found that of 1.7 million LGBT Californians,an estimated210,000 have asthma, 110,000 have diabetes, 80,000 have heart disease and 110,000 have HIV — all of which can make the effects of COVID-19 more severe. Are those unusually high rates?Yes, the LGBT community experiences these conditions at a greater rate than the general population. I say LGBT in this case instead of LGBTQ, because the data I used didn ’t include an option for people to identify as queer or other identities, but I expect most of these findings apply to them as well.A lot of previous research exists that shows this population is at heightened risk in various realms. That includes an increased likelihood of poverty, especially among certain groups, like bisexual women or transgender people. In this data, we found that as of 2018, about 612,000 LGBT Californians were already living below 200% of the federal poverty level, about 140,000 were unemployed and more than 300,000 faced food insecurity. All of those figures are likely getting worse now, since about 814,000 were working in industries that ...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news