Don’t let fear-associated stigmatization and discrimination toward people of Asian descent triumph in the midst of COVID-19

Read this article in your language:

Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, Urdu, Hindi, Korean, Vietnamese, Khmer and Spanish

The US now has the most confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). As the number continues to climb, reports of incidents of coronavirus-related xenophobia, racism, discrimination, harassment, and physical violence toward people of Asian descent have grown.  The University of Chicago Medicine’s Center for Asian Health Equity and our community partner, Asian Health Coalition, a strong advocate for human equality and health equity, condemn any form of racism, discrimination, and violence.

This is not the first time in history that a specific ethnic group is singled out and subjected to discrimination due to fears resulting from an infectious disease outbreak. Russian Jewish immigrants in New York City were subjected to discrimination during the cholera outbreak in 1892. In 2002, during the SARS outbreak, which originated in China, East Asians were targeted.  When the Ebola outbreak emerged in 2014, Africans bore the brunt.  

While the nation continues to identify and implement strategies for disease containment, fear associated stigmatization and discrimination will only hamper our public health efforts with COVID-19. Furthermore, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has already been felt by individuals, families, and communities across the United States and around the world.  Now more than ever, we must stand and work together to slow down and stop the transmission of COVID-19 rather than propagate fear of any kind. 

Here are the facts as we know:

  • The outbreak of novel coronavirus, now called COVID-19, was first identified in the city of Wuhan in China in December 2019
  • COVID-19 was declared as a pandemic by the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020.  
  • By March 29, 2020, the COVID-19 had spread to over 200 countries and territories with over 700,000 confirmed cases and 30,000 deaths.
  • Everyone can help stop stigma related to COVID-19 by knowing the FACTS and sharing them with others in your community.

Coronavirus does not discriminate based on race and ethnicity, but fear does. We must not allow fear, stigmatization, and discrimination to triumph over our solidarity to combat this COVID-19 pandemic.  

Additional resources:   Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, World Health Organization 

 

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Skip to content