Are racial health disparities playing out in the long COVID? These health researchers are trying to find out

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the black community in northeastern Ohio particularly hard recently. Studies show. Now, researchers at the National Institute of Health (NIH) are trying to determine whether the long COVID-19 will also disproportionately affect black people.

“We know that minorities suffer more from acute COVID, so when they get it they seem to die more of it and have more severe disease,” said University Hospitals (UH) researcher Grace McComsey, who is involved in the NIH study. . “We don’t know for a long time yet COVID.”

It’s a question that closely affects Yvonka Hall, executive director of the Northeast Ohio Black Health Coalition (NEOBHC). Even though her organization continues to offer free vaccination clinics and health fairs, Hall said she herself was struggling with the effects of long COVID.

“COVID-19 was like playing ping pong with my body,” Hall said.

The pandemic has hit communities of color particularly hard as many suffer from underlying health conditions like high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease and obesity, said Dr. Charles Modlin, director of the Office of Inclusion. , Diversity and Equity of Metrohealth.

Many researchers believe that the increased prevalence of these conditions in some communities is linked to social determinants of health, such as access to fresh food, good transportation, and a healthy environment.

“Where I practice, I know the food deserts. I know the lack of access to care. I know the transport problems. I know patients who go to work sick because they are the sole breadwinners,” said Dr. Carla Harwell, medical director of Otis Moss Jr. Medical Center, who practices in the Fairfax neighborhood of Cleveland.

McComsey said she wanted to better understand how this reality affects the long COVID. She is a researcher for the NIH Researching COVID To Enhance Recovery (RECOVER) study., who is currently recruit 17,000 people across the country. So far, 1,500 Northeast Ohio residents, who either have long COVID or have had a previous COVID-19 infection but are currently showing no symptoms, have signed up for the first phase — 35% are African American, McComsey said.

During the first phase of the study, which will last four years, researchers will observe who suffers from long COVID and how it affects them. Currently, researchers are sorting long-standing COVID patients into categories, said Dr. Nora G. Singer, rheumatologist at Metrohealth.

“Then we investigate how COVID caused these symptoms,” she said.

It’s very important to enroll enough minorities in the study to understand how long COVID affects different people of different races and ethnicities, McComsey said.

“That’s why we’re so focused on enrolling enough African Americans, enough Hispanics, and other groups as well, to make this a really diverse study,” she said.

Building trust in communities of color is key to creating a diverse study, she said.

Reverend Tony Minor, denominational coordinator in Cleveland for the RECOVER study, said he thinks the level of trust between medical systems and communities of color and other vulnerable populations is improving.

“The issue is how the black and brown patients felt during the medical treatments,” he said. “There are times when they meet people who are impatient with them and who are prejudiced [and] don’t seem to care.

McComsey said UH is trying to be more visible in communities that don’t normally come to them to participate in studies. The system deployed a mobile research unit to bring the lab to the people, she said.

During the clinical phase of the study, which will be the second phase, researchers will assess the medical treatments available for long COVID. In the United States, only between four and seven percent of people enrolled in clinical trials are minorities, according to McComsey.

“It’s not acceptable,” McComsey said.

Minor said recruiting efforts for the first phase made him optimistic. Agencies, churches, pastors and community activists have stepped up to recruit people of color for RECOVER, he said. “They did everything they could to try to get people to react, and I think that’s really good stuff,” Minor said.

Partnerships are important, but funding grassroots organizations embedded in communities really matters when it comes to getting people of color to participate, said Hall of the Northeast Ohio Black Health Coalition.

“We need to do everything we can to make sure equity is about funding, engagement and access,” she said.