Latest News On Disparities

Latest KFF Health News Stories

Anti-Immigrant Vitriol Complicates Vaccine Rollout in Southern States

KFF Health News Original

Inoculating the millions of undocumented workers who produce America’s agricultural bounty will be key to achieving herd immunity against covid-19. But garnering the trust of these workers is proving complicated, particularly in the South, where the last four years have been marked by workplace raids and anti-immigrant vitriol.

Farmworker Camps to Urban Tent Cities: Tailoring Vaccine Info to Where It’s Most Needed

KFF Health News Original

Concerns arising in western North Carolina provide a window into the challenges facing health workers across the country as they seek to persuade vulnerable populations to be inoculated against covid.

Community Health Workers, Often Overlooked, Bring Trust to the Pandemic Fight

KFF Health News Original

As the pandemic brings long-standing health disparities into sharper view, community health workers are being asked to help the public health response. This fast-growing workforce helps fill the gaps between health care providers and low-income communities by offering education, advocacy and outreach.

Food Guidelines Change but Fail to Take Cultures Into Account

KFF Health News Original

For decades, the federal government has tried to guide our eating habits. They once again revised recommendations, but they didn’t incorporate ethnic and cultural differences of the American diet. Here’s why.

Advocates View Health Care as Key to Driving LGBTQ Rights Conversation

KFF Health News Original

A state ban preventing local governments from enacting nondiscrimination ordinances expired Dec. 1, opening the door for a new wave of local nondiscrimination laws.

Even With Senate Control, Democrats Will Need Buy-In From GOP on Key Health Priorities

KFF Health News Original

With a majority too small to eliminate the filibuster, Democrats will not have enough votes in the Senate to pass many of their plans without Republicans and will also have only a razor-thin majority in the House. This combination could doom many Democratic health care proposals, like offering Americans a government-sponsored public insurance option, and complicate efforts to pass further pandemic relief.

Illinois Is First in the Nation to Extend Health Coverage to Undocumented Seniors

KFF Health News Original

As the pandemic hits Latino communities especially hard, Illinois is expanding public health insurance to all low-income noncitizen seniors. Advocates hope other states follow its lead.

High-Poverty Neighborhoods Bear the Brunt of COVID’s Scourge

KFF Health News Original

COVID infection rates in California are consistently higher in low-income neighborhoods than more affluent areas, according to an analysis by ZIP code. Our findings underscore the heightened risks borne by millions of low-wage workers whose jobs are deemed essential.

California Lawmakers to Newsom: Give All Immigrants Health Coverage

KFF Health News Original

Given the pandemic’s disproportionate hit on minority communities, two Democratic lawmakers are pushing Newsom to agree to offer health care to all unauthorized immigrants. They planned to unveil legislation Monday — and a new strategy to make it happen.

What Doctors Aren’t Always Taught: How to Spot Racism in Health Care

KFF Health News Original

Activists across the country are demanding that medical schools eliminate the use of race as a diagnostic tool, recognize how systemic racism harms patients and reckon with some of medicine’s racist history.

The Trump Medicaid Record: Big Goals, Yet Few Successes

KFF Health News Original

The Trump administration sought to shrink the federal-state health program for low-income Americans and give states more flexibility. But Democrats and the courts thwarted most of those efforts.