#race & #COVID19

"the avg county-lvl death rate from Covid-19 is 12/100,000 people. Counties with a Black pop above 85% had a rate up to 10x higher. For every 10% pt increase in a county’s Black population, its Covid-19 death rate roughly doubles.”

statnews.com/2020/06/15/who… "The reason why [Black people] face higher death rates is not bc they have higher rates of uninsured, poverty, diabetes, or these other factors.” … [or not explained by age, sex, comorbidities, and income]

That leaves other factors: systemic racism.

"Black people make up the majority of low-wage workers who remain on the frontlines in positions that don’t permit them.. to work from hom.. paid sick leave, or.. PPE."

Covid-19 meets racism meets the killing of a Black American by police statnews.com/2020/06/02/my-… via @statnews @statnews Thanks to a history of redlining and race-based residential segregation, many of these low-wage workers are living in close, cramped housing that makes social distancing all but impossible. On top of this...

#Belgium is in the US press crosshairs after yesterday’s #TrumpPressConference w #DrBirx on #COVID19

So, I must repeat: Belgian numbers incl suspected untested cases, mostly in care homes, which acct for ~1/2 deaths (2/3 yesterday). The other countries on the list do not. 1/n So you would need to maybe double the numbers of the others to make comparable.

It is in fact a reflection of strength of the Belgian health system, not an indictment of it, that these cases are reported and that the system is also transparent and honest about them. 2/n

Some tentatively +ve news, but how much will a treatment cost?

Early peek at data on Gilead coronavirus drug suggests patients are responding to treatment statnews.com/2020/04/16/ear… via @statnews @statnews @MSF says price of remdesivir is unknown. "However, as the drug entered clinical trials in China for Covid-19 in Feb, it was estd that Gilead may charge $260/treatment-course in the country. Prices may be as high as $1,000/treatment-course in the US.”
economictimes.indiatimes.com/https://econom…

It is perturbing that Belgium has a gd quality health system, w ICU that is well < capacity, no dramatic shortages of PPE, and yet we still have 3rd highest fatalities per cap in the world, trailing just behind Italy and Spain by a few days...

brusselstimes.com/all-news/belgi… Of course, this is partly because Belgium is much more transparent with reporting non-hospital deaths, unlike eg Netherlands. Only 54% of deaths were in hospital, so this leads to very significant diffs in reporting. Belgian testing is also 50% > Netherlands; 70% > UK.

My mother, an MD in her 90s who saw some of the last polio cases in #Canada as an intern in the 50s, notes that many compare #COVID19 to #SpanishFlu but not to polio epidemics before/after WW2, eg she remembers a lockdown in ’37. I googled and found this:
cpha.ca/story-polio Ofc, it is because #COVID19 is a flu-like infection, but other relevant similarities. Also very infectious, most #polio cases were minor gastrointestinal illness, whereas minority more serious. Higher CFR, e.g. peak in ’53 in Canada had 9000 cases and 500 deaths, CFR = 5.6%. 2/3

Such sad news. He has been such a massive inspiration for me, for his immense wisdom and his exemplary humility. I never took a course with him, but he was my teacher in the truest sense. Journey well and may we meet again.

https://twitter.com/MarionOuma/status/1243525886529482756

So good that we managed to publish this interview with @tmkandawire in @DevandChg last year, before he passed, interviewed by Kate Meagher, a friend and colleague of his.

This excellent piece by @tomaspueyo has already been read loads. I read, lost track of it, but just found again thanks to the long threads by @ingridharvold

My only issue is with the calc of death rates. These are technically correct, but… 1/n

medium.com/@tomaspueyo/co… @tomaspueyo @ingridharvold … as @tomaspueyo himself notes, they are overestimates of the actual death rate because they do not include all of the infections not detected and confirmed. But then he seems to imply that the fatality/case rates do imply the actual mortality rate, which has problems. 2/n

On bungled US response to #coronavirus and the importance of relevant stats and strong public capacity in health care systems, by a infectious disease expert:

theguardian.com/world/2020/mar…

"One of the biggest [unknowns] is that we don’t know how many people are infected…” 1/n “...We don’t know how many people are currently infected, we don’t know how many people were infected and then got over it, we don’t know how many people were infected and never got sick. Without knowing the denominator, we don’t know what the case fatality rate is…” 2/n

The last two articles in the forthcoming debate in @DevandChg on 'Social Policy Under The Global Shadow Of Right‐Wing Populism’, which I edited, are finally online & open access.

James Putzel on "The ‘Populist' Right Challenge to Neoliberalism"
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/de… @DevandChg Second on a fascinating account of social policy under Modi, by Ajay Gudavarthy and G Vijay:

"Social Policy and Political Mobilization in India: Producing Hierarchical Fraternity and Polarized Differences”
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/de…

@socialpolicyind @Jayati1609 @DevEconNetwork

The intro of the forum I edited, an article in its own right, setting the terms of debate and research agendas, is finally out, early view and fully open access.

"The Dark Sides of Social Policy: From Neoliberalism to Resurgent Right‐wing Populism"

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.11… This Forum Debate explores the confluence of neoliberal, populist, conservative and reactionary influences on contemporary ideologies and practices of social policy, with a focus on the poorer peripheries of global capitalism. Several fundamental tensions are highlighted… 2/n

Very imp ed on another RCT gone badly awry (the ECHO , with serious implications for women’s health via WHO guidelines on contraception and HIV from ECHO trial, by Sathyamala in BMJ.

bmj.com/content/367/bm…

@LancetGH
@NimiHoffmann
@sanjaygreddy
@peripheralecon
@gatesfoundation @LancetGH @NimiHoffmann @sanjaygreddy @peripheralecon @gatesfoundation 'WHO’s current guidance dilutes its previous advice to “also always use condoms” while using intramuscular medroxyprogesterone and instead recommends offering “pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) in settings where the incidence of HIV is above 3%.”

First 6 articles of the forum debate issue of @DevandChg that I am editing, on Social Policy under the Global Shadow of Right-wing Populism, online early and some open access. Fascinating stuff:

Politics of social policy in Turkey by Aysa Bugra
doi.org/10.1111/dech.1…

1/n @DevandChg Policy Merchandising and Social Assistance in Africa: Don't Call Dog Monkey for Me, by @jotadesina
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/de…

2/n

Next up at #2019SPiA conference with @jotadesina presenting his paper on 'don't call dog monkey', about donors merchandising various social policies.

Teaser: it will soon be published by @DevandChg

@sarchisp @UNRISD @CODESRIA Next up is @MarionOuma on (un)democratic social policy making with social protection in Africa.

Should note that she just graduated and is now Dr. Brilliant woman scholar rising. @ingridharvold take note!

Important: 'Despite repeated public warnings, private cos were unwilling to invest... it has been 35 years since a new class of antibiotics... has entered the market.

Big Pharma has failed: the antibiotic pipeline needs to be taken under public ownership theconversation.com/big-pharma-has… 'Even worse, the injection of over £520m of public money since 2016 has not prevented the industry from further contracting. Between 2016 and 2019, major producers, such as Sanofi, Novartis and AstraZeneca shuttered their antibiotic-development divisions.'

Links protests in Chile to health care inequities.

Good summary of how so-called ‘universal’ health care is not at all universal, but instead is deeply bifurcated, as across LA and elsewhere.

Violent protests in Chile linked to health-care inequities
thelancet.com/journals/lance… "Technically, Chile has universal health care, with everyone covered under the public National Health Fund. However, the country has a two-tier system, in which the public system covers about 78% of the population and private insurers cover about 17%."

@DinaPomeranz @ingridharvold @sebacampanario Hi @DinaPomeranz, I can’t keep up with your tweeting! @ingridharvold is far more able in these tweeting matters. Perhaps it is generational, although she also seems superhuman in her speed of very articulate replies! She has already made most of the points I wanted to make. 1/n @DinaPomeranz @ingridharvold @sebacampanario To reiterate though, yes, some mainstream econs like to dabble in other disciplines, albeit it is often done in a cavalier cherry picking manner. We see this in e.g. demography, where many econs will dabble and draw w/out seriously considering the sophisticated insights... 2/n

Thanks @DinaPomeranz, very thoughtful thread and gives me appreciation for your shorter tweets!

If I may add one (big) point. I appreciate your point on the WC typifying big theories with little evidence. However, I think there is a fundamental difference of opinion here.

1/n @DinaPomeranz While WC policies were clearly coming out of big (monetarist) theories (as IMF programmes today still do),at the same time, it also represents the beginning of the end of (early) development economics by the ‘counter-revolution’ (to quote John Toye 1993, hardly a radical).

2/n

“Migration and empire are not marginal events: they are central to our national story."

Migration and empire 'should be taught in English schools'

theguardian.com/education/2019… As Arthur Lewis used to say, in the decades before WWI, 50 million Europeans emigrated abroad to the temperate settler colonies or ex-colonies (US and South America), while another 50 million Chinese and Indians emigrated across the tropical colonies as indentured labourers.

Yanking people 'out of poverty' whether they want it or not.

Key point for me: "Their vacated land will be leased by government-run agribusinesses to grow cash crops like pepper or medicinal plants.”

Beijing’s relentless march to eliminate poverty  ft.com/content/c8e6c8… This has already been going on for a while in Tibetan areas, including forced boarding schools, etc. The pace is dizzying, far faster than we can manage know the consequences. Even as we research something, it changes in the time we write up our results…

I am not saying I endorse MMT, but this argument by Edwards is very problematic for so many reasons and is quite reactionary. 1/n

@CriticalDev @DevEconNetwork

Modern Monetary Disasters by Sebastián Edwards @ProSyn prosyn.org/abhrrN8 @CriticalDev @DevEconNetwork @ProSyn Recall that Garcia in Peru declared a partial default in '85, because the economy was already in turmoil since the '82 internl debt crisis. It was perhaps futile, but Edwards does not recognise the roots of the crisis. Indeed, that is why he came to power in the first place. 2/n