A Latino family in Long Beach lost three loved ones to COVID 19 in just three weeks.
Mrs. Valerie Levario said her father perished on 10 December, her aunt on 23 of the same month, and her husband, Armando Padilla, the 29 December.
He spoke that it is a totally devastating experience, especially because of the impossibility of being close to each of his beings dear ones in the last moments, to hold their hands when saying goodbye.
The lady does not know how her father, Fabián Levario, became ill, or how her aunt, Deborah Levario, or her husband got infected.
Their deaths are not related to end-of-season meetings. year, as the family avoided them to precisely prevent the risk.
They are deaths that are added to another 5, 000 of Latinos in California in the last month.
That tragic story is similar to many why CNN journalist Feith Abubéy could not contain her tears when speaking live this Tuesday.
The reporter was going to talk that she went to about ten hospitals when the crying interrupted her. He wanted to recover over and over again, but couldn’t. His impact was greater because he had repeatedly seen the devastation of the pandemic, which disproportionately affects Latinos in California.
As of this Tuesday, more than died in California , or 00 people victims of COVID 19 and half of them are Latino, according to data from the California Department of Health. There have been about 5, 000 Latino deaths in less than a month.
The second lowest ethnic group in the pandemic in California is that of white residents, but their total is just over 9, 000 people.
Latinos die at 22 percent more than all other Californians combined.
He 41 percent of all people who have perished during the pandemic in California are family members who earn less than 40, 000 annual dollars .
The death rate of Latinos in the pandemic is 80. 5 per one hundred thousand inhabitants, while for all other ethnic groups together it is 66 deaths p or every hundred thousand residents.
In Los Angeles the disparity is worse. The Latino death rate from COVID 19 is 117 people for every one hundred thousand inhabitants. Comparatively, only 50 white or Anglo-Saxons die from the same percentage of people.
All this is official state data and Los Angeles County.
These are socioeconomic disparities that Latinos face and that are reflected in the impact that the pandemic has about the community, explained to Real America News the deputy director of the Latino Coalition for a Healthy California, Dr. Seciah Aquino.
“ Unfortunately, our community has always received less financial support to preventively take care of its health, for example with health programs like Medical ”, said the doctor.
To this is added that more Latinos than any other group are “essential workers who are economically dependent on their work; that means that if we stop going to work, we may not be able to feed our family ”, according to Dr. Aquino.
Without help from the state or the federal government, “we have to continue working but not only for ourselves, because if Latinos don’t work, who is going to do it in the stores, who would do it in the field, in health services ”, exemplified the doctor.
But, apart, the California’s medical community “has to regain the trust of Latinos and African Americans,” because as communities that have limited access to health services, even in the midst of the pandemic they are distant.
“When a community sees that their neighborhood doctor, who they trust, is interested in getting vaccinated and will get the COVID vaccine 19, it is easier for the community to think in terms of ‘if it is good for he must also be good for us. ”
Dr. Aquino explained that what is best in California is to include to all people in health systems, regardless of their immigration status, income level or area of residence, “so that we are better prepared and healthier not only in the face of this pandemic, but in the face of any health contingency.”
He warned that a health plan that integrates everyone should not see the Latino community as if they were doing it a favor, because “we produce some of the greatest wealth in the country and in the state ”; for example, California agriculture translates to more than $ 50, 000 million dollars annually.
Aquino recalled that the purchasing power of Latinos is 1.5 trillion dollars in the country; “Only the undocumented people contribute $ 11, 640 millions to the national economy and in $ 1, 550 millions of dollars to the state ”.
“It is good to recognize that strength to use it together as a community for our health,” said Dr. Aquino.
