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Nichole Green

Shannon Sanchez

English 1010

11 April 2020

Who is more at risk of getting very ill from Covid-19?

In late December 2019, Wuhan China discovered a new virus after many people came

down with pneumonia-like symptoms in a short amount of time. This virus was named

“coronavirus disease 2019” abbreviated as Covid-19. (CDC, 2020) On February 11th, 2020, The

World Health Organization (WHO) announced on Twitter that they decided to give the new

disease a name to avoid association with a place, person, animal or group. (WHO, 2020) A

month later, on March 11, 2020, the director of WHO Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus

announced that the disease has become a pandemic. (World Health Organization, 2020) Since

then there have been various perspectives on who is more at risk of getting extremely sick from

the virus.

Everyone seems to have heard about the issue of who is more at risk of becoming very ill

from the Coronavirus, but there is some disagreement about the severity of the issue. Some

acknowledge that older people and people who live in nursing homes, as well as people with

health conditions like chronic lung disease, moderate to severe asthma, heart conditions,

immunocompromised people, and severe obesity, are more at higher risk for severe illness from

the coronavirus but feel that for the majority of people they will not be affected as bad by the

virus. Others point to statistics that show the virus is worse for people who have type A blood

when they compared hospitalization data with people who tested positive that were not
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hospitalized. Still, others say that African Americans in rural southern states could be more at

risk of serious illness due to having health conditions and having a lack of access to health

services due to poverty.

On March 26, 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated their

report, "People who are at higher risk for severe illness" they state that people over the age of 65

years old and older are more at risk to get the Coronavirus. As well as people who have

underlying conditions like chronic lung disease or moderate to severe asthma, serious heart

conditions, immunocompromised people, severe obesity and people who live in a nursing home

or other long-term facility. (CDC, 2020)

On March 20, 2020, Maria Cohut, PH.D., published an article in Medical News Today

explains that people who have type A blood were more at risk of being hospitalized due to the

Coronavirus than people with other blood types. The Southern University of Science and

Technology, in Shenzhen, China are researching different blood types with coronavirus. They

looked at blood groups of 2,173 individuals that were hospitalized, and they compared it with

3,694 general population in Wuhan. They found that people who have type A blood and more

hospitalizations than other people with different blood types. The study has not yet been peer-

reviewed because they are still in the process of studying the effect of coronavirus on people

with varying types of blood. However, they are publishing everything to their online platform.

However, other experts in the field of medicine are telling the public in England that people with

type A blood should not worry about these findings because there is very little evidence of these

claims at this time. (Cohut, 2020)

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On April 2, 2020, Charles M. Blow reported in the New York Times article “The Racial

Time Bomb in the Covid-19 Crisis” that pre-existing health conditions of Diabetes type 1 could

leave southern states vulnerable in the Covid-19 crisis. Charles M. Blow annalized another

article “In the American South, Covid-19 Could Find Fertile Ground” by Undark, and He

explains that Undark left out an important piece of information that the highest percentage of

black people live in the Southern States. Mr Blow states, “We may be waiting for a racial time

bomb to explode with this disease.” He worries that black Americans may have a false sense of

security because, in the early days of the virus, Africa only had a few cases of the coronavirus.

This could lead people to think that their ethnicity could protect them. He says, “that African

Americans should not look to Africa as a model.” He also points out that in America there is a

“racial disparity in prior health conditions.” Mr. Blow explains the CDC’s health findings that

non-Hispanic African Americans often have high blood pressure and heart disease. He also

explains that the 2015 National Medical Association Scientific Assembly did a test that showed

African American patients have a higher percentage of 77% to have Diabetes Type-1 over non-

Hispanic white patients. In the South, many states refused to expand medicaid under the

affordable care act. He reports that the southern rural communities have a hospital crisis, and

they also have “higher poverty rates, mortality rates, and lower life expectancies than other rural

regions of the country.” (Blow, 2020) Mr. Blow shows the facts of the situation throughout his

article to back his claim that African American people are more at risk of becoming very ill from

the disease.

After I read these articles about who is most at risk of becoming seriously ill from the

Coronavirus, I now agree with all of the different perspectives. People older than 65 years, those

who live in nursing homes, people with underlying conditions, moderate to severe asthma,
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people of certain ethinic backgrounds, those living in rural areas, people with diabetes, and

people who have heart conditions are all at risk from Coronavirus. Even though some people

may not have these underlying conditions, or show symptoms, they can still unknowingly be

carriers of the disease and spread it to those who do such as their friends, family, neighbors and

strangers. The issue of who is most at risk from Coronavirus matters to every human being on

our earth. Everyone is affected in some way or another.

Works Cited

Blow, Charles M. “The Racial Time Bomb in the Covid-19 Crisis.” The New York Times,

The New York Times, 2 Apr. 2020. www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/opinion/coronavirus-

black-people.html

Cohut, Maria, PH.D. Is blood type linked to COVID-19 risk? Medical News Today, 2020.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/is-blood-type-linked-to-covid-19-risk

National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. People who are at higher

risk for severe illness. CDC, 2020. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-

extra-precautions/people-at-higher-risk.html

(WHO), World Health Organization. “ BREAKING ‘We Now Have a Name for the #2019nCoV

Disease: COVID-19. I'll Spell It: C-O-V-I-D Hyphen One Nine – COVID-19’-

@DrTedros #COVID19 Pic.twitter.com/Kh0wx2qfzk.” Twitter, Twitter, 11 Feb. 2020.

https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1227248333871173632

World Health Organization. “WHO Director-General's Opening Remarks at the Media Briefing

on COVID-19 - 11 March 2020.” World Health Organization, World Health

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Organization. https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-opening-

remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-covid-19---11-march-2020