CDC

Save Black Lives from COVID-19

“We are the number one target for this disease. We have pre-existing conditions, and yet we’re told to go home when we visit the emergency room. We know that there must be some form of regulation in place for testing and getting testing sites and equipment into the community,” said Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-Michigan).

Black Communities Deserve Health Equity During COVID Crisis

Data revealed from pockets of the country have made clear that the pandemic is having a disproportionate impact on Black Americans. The Trump administration’s lack of transparency and failure to release racial data on a national level has undermined efforts to develop a targeted response to the crisis. As a result, too many of our communities are left without fair and equitable access to testing, care and treatment. 

COVID-19 and Black People

At present the CDC has noted that those with chronic lung disease, moderate to severe asthma, serious heart conditions, those immunocompromised including cancer treatment, severely obese, diabetic, with renal failure, or liver disease are at higher risk for severe illness. That warning should be clearly heard by the African American community. We are 2.2 times more likely to have diabetes, 20% more likely to have high blood pressure, and 30% more likely to be obese. The incidence of COPD (lung disease) in our women is 34% higher than in White women. Bottom line, if we acquire the virus, bad things are more likely to happen. That’s pass number one.

U.S. Sports Pauses Amidst the Coronavirus Pandemic

As the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has taken the world by storm, professional and amateur sports leagues across the country have had to respond swiftly and cautiously. Just moments before the NBA’s Utah Jazz game tipped off against the Oklahoma City Thunder in Oklahoma City on Wednesday, Mar. 11, 2020, the game was canceled. A decision that came after the NBA announced the league would be suspended until further notice as one player from the Jazz tested positive for coronavirus. It was only two days prior that the player who tested positive, NBA All-Star Rudy Gobert, jokingly touched every microphone and

The Human and Economic Toll of Gun Violence is Staggering

The September 18 state-by-state examination of the economic costs of gun violence, reveals numbers that the committee called “staggering.” For instance, in 2017, for the first time, the rate of firearm deaths exceeded the death rate by motor vehicle accidents. Nearly 40,000 people were killed in the United States by a gun in 2017, including approximately 2,500 school-age children – or more than 100 people per day and more than five children murdered each day. Sixty percent of gun deaths each year are firearm suicides, researchers said.

Healing Our Heart, Mind and Body

Recently I received a call and was asked if I knew someone who wanted to join the team of some of the best and brightest people working on a research project in the area of HIV/AIDS. The project was entitled, “Healing Our Heart, Mind and Body”. It’s not too often to be presented with an opportunity to work with both friends and people you admire. So, when Dr. Gail Wyatt asked if I knew of a person, in particular a man, that wanted to work on this project with her and her team, I said “I’ve got just the right guy for you—ME!”

Ellison Wins Minnesota Attorney General Democratic Primary

In this July 18, 2018, file photo, Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., asks a question at a House Committee on Financial Services hearing in Washington. Ellison decided to leave Congress for a chance to make a difference as his state’s attorney general, but an ex-girlfriend’s late accusation of domestic abuse clouded what had been his race to lose. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)   Rep. Keith Ellison, the deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee and first Muslim elected to Congress, won his party’s nomination Tuesday for Minnesota attorney general in a race clouded in the final days by an ex-girlfriend’s allegation

When Children are Forced to Protect Themselves 2018 Vote for Your Lives

The assaults on the 16 students and one school staff member represent the fifth school shooting in 2018. It also marks the 187th school shooting since April 20, 1999; 18 years ago, at 11:19 a.m. when 13 people were killed and 20 were injured in a similar attack. While the latest shootings garnered outrage across the globe, young people in African American communities were reminded of the everyday gun violence that riddles homes and doorsteps in poor communities on a daily basis with little or no fanfare.