Indigenous Alaskans bearing the brunt of pandemic

The COVID-19 mortality rate for Alaska Native and American Indian people was about three times higher than that for white Alaskans, said Alaska-based media company KTOO on June 7.

According to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, based on data shared with the CDC by the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services between March 2020 and December 2021, the population of Alaska Native and American Indian people in the state accounts for just about one-fifths, but one-thirds of deaths from COVID-19 were them.

It is harder and more expensive for Indigenous Alaskans to access care, the media report said. There are many barriers for them such as historical trauma and structural racism and remote or rural living.

Alaska Native people are facing a nearly three-fold risk of hospitalization in terms of the findings from the latest report, which shows that the number of hospitalizations per 100,000 Indigenous Alaskans is 742 while that of white Alaskans is 273.

Nationwide data shows Black, Indigenous, Hispanic and other people of color have been affected most by the pandemic in the US.

Discrimination, lack of healthcare access and poverty are all "inequities in social determinants of health that put racial and ethnic minority groups at increased risk," according to the CDC.