Race and Ethnicity in the Pandemic

Abstract

This study begins with the historical understanding of race and its modern perspectives as a social construct amid social identity and critical race theories. Next, race and ethnicity are explored within the context of COVID-19, whereby those of non-white backgrounds are seeing different disastrous health outcomes and experiencing heightened levels of racism in the pandemic. Examples and analyses from around the world are then provided, which have resulted in health disparities and increased racism against non-white people, such as the high-rise apartment building disasters, rural Indigenous communities, and the Black Lives Matter movement. Adding fuel to the fire, there have been rumours internationally of certain ethnic groups carrying and spreading COVID-19.