Assignment: COVID 19 In Ethnic Minority Groups Essay

this is a sociology question, need 300 to 400 words, two references, APA

Minority ethnic groups have been disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, with the clearest evidence from the UK and the USA.1–4 While the exact reasons for this remain unclear, they are likely due to a complex interplay of a number of factors rather than a single cause. Reducing these inequalities requires a greater understanding of the causes. Research to date, however, has been hampered by a lack of theoretical understanding of the meaning of ‘ethnicity’ or the potential pathways leading to ethnic inequalities.

In this paper, we describe a framework for understanding the pathways that have generated ethnic inequalities in COVID-19—to our knowledge, the first of its kind. Current research provides only a partial understanding of some of these pathways. Future research and action will require a clearer understanding of the complex dimensions of ethnicity and an appreciation of the complex interplay of social and biological pathways through which ethnic inequalities arise. Our framework highlights the gaps in the current evidence and pathways that need further investigation in research that aims to address these inequalities.

Understanding ethnicity
Ethnicity is socially constructed.5 It can be defined as a ‘social group a person belongs to, and either identifies with or is identified with by others, as a result of a mix of cultural and other factors including language, diet, religion, ancestry, and physical features traditionally associated with race’.6 Ethnicity is therefore a complex concept which includes multiple dimensions including country of birth, language, religion and culture. Although it is socially constructed, it may be associated with biological attributes such as skin colour, that influence the unequal treatment of people within racist societies. The act of categorising people into ethnic groups is a social process, influenced by particular social, cultural and historical contexts. For this reason, ethnic categories differ across the world, with the same term often referring to different groups of people—for example, the term ‘Asian’ is often understood as referring mainly to East Asian people in the USA whereas in the UK the same term is typically interpreted as including people from the Indian subcontinent.5

In this paper, we therefore use the term ethnicity throughout but include the concept of race within this term (as defined above) and consider racial inequalities as core to ethnic inequalities. This reflects a tradition in the UK of focusing on ethnic inequalities in health, but we acknowledge inter-related dimensions on inequality are often given greater emphasis in different countries. For example, in the USA the term race is more widely used, with the socially constructed nature of racial categories also explicitly acknowledged by public health researchers.7 Similarly, in many European countries outside of the UK the health of migrants (classified on the basis of country of birth) has often been the focus of research, rather than minority ethnic groups—at least in part due to a lack of data collection on ethnicity. While we use terminology related to ethnicity throughout the remainder of the paper, we believe our framework and the arguments expressed broadly apply to inequalities related to migrant status and similar related inequalities. The use of ethnicity also allows us to include inequalities experienced within broader racial groups—for example, by white traveller and gypsy communities across Europe.8 We also note that ethnic groups that experience disadvantage can be numerical majorities in some countries and our use of the term minority ethnic also refers to relative power within society.9

While not all minority ethnic groups in all countries experience worse health than the majority ethnic group,10 differences in health across ethnic groups, in terms of both morbidity and mortality, have been repeatedly documented in the UK and other countries.11 It is important to note that the health and related experiences of minority ethnic groups are not homogenous, with different patterns seen depending on which health outcomes are studied.5 While understanding by current researchers has largely moved on from racist scientific thinking of the 19th century that narrowly viewed these differences through a biological lens,7 this is not universally the case.12 The multiple dimensions of ethnicity influence health through their interaction with wider social processes. In the past, social disadvantage, and particularly experiences of racism, have been downplayed as explanations for these differences. However, there is now increasing recognition of the role of structural racism. Processes of racialisation are contingent on socio-historical context, such that some groups may be more or less racialised at different times. For example, white Irish people living in the UK were subject to substantial and overt racism in the early 20th century, with other racial groups (such as white Eastern European and travelling community groups) being more targeted at the end of the century.

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