Members of the LGBT community are at increased risk for severe COVID-19 symptoms, according to a report released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
According to the report, the CDC found that members of the LGBT community are more likely to have underlying health conditions that put them at greater risk of contracting the coronavirus and experiencing severe symptoms of the disease.
The report uses data from the 2017-2019 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, a collection of health surveys that collects demographic and health-related information from uninstitutionalized U.S. residents over the age of 18 to determine health disparities.
“When adjusting for age, sex, and survey year, people with sexual minorities have higher prevalences than heterosexual people of self-reported cancer, kidney disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), heart (including myocardial infarction, angina or coronary heart disease), obesity, smoking, diabetes, asthma, hypertension and stroke, ”the report states.
The report adds that ethnic and racial minority groups who are also members of the LGBT community have a higher risk of suffering severe coronavirus symptoms compared to their heterosexual counterparts. In addition, members of the LGBT community are more likely to experience discrimination and stigmatization that can increase the risk of disease and limit their access to adequate health care, according to the agency.
“People who are members of sexual and racial / ethnic minority groups may therefore experience a convergence of different social, economic, and environmental disadvantages that increase chronic disease disparities and the risk of COVID-19-related adverse outcomes.” , concludes the report. .
From the earliest stages of the pandemic, the CDC has stated that those with underlying health conditions, including older adults and immunosuppressed, are at increased risk of suffering more severe symptoms and even death as a result of coronavirus. .
The agency has also released data stating that black Americans are up to almost three times more likely than white Americans to die from coronavirus.
The Campaign for Human Rights (HRC), the country’s largest LGBT rights organization, published data in 2020 that echoed these CDC findings.
The report released by the organization indicated that members of the LGBT community were at increased risk of contracting the disease due to a number of factors, such as high-exposure jobs at COVID-19, a wealth gap. and lack of health coverage.
“This report states what advocates and LGBTQ organizations have always known: that our community is at greatest risk and disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 health crisis,” said Alphonso David, president of HRC. “It is critical that marginalized communities are fully captured by the collection of government data so that they can be addressed quickly.”
The authors of Thursday’s CDC report said the current “COVID-19 surveillance systems” do not capture information about sexual orientation and called for more data to be collected on the LGBT community and the coronavirus.