Latest News On Disparities

Latest KFF Health News Stories

As COVID Cuts Deadly Path Through Indiana Prisons, Inmates Say Symptoms Ignored

KFF Health News Original

Since the start of the pandemic, prisoners and their families have contradicted state officials about the conditions inside Indiana prisons. Many inmates report they’ve had no way to protect themselves from close contact with other inmates and staff members. They believe contracting the coronavirus is inevitable.

Racial Status And The Pandemic: A Combustible Mixture

KFF Health News Original

The novel coronavirus is affecting black Americans disproportionately, which some community leaders and public health experts say is not surprising. So why didn’t anyone sound an alarm?

Free Clinics Try To Fill Gaps As COVID Sweeps Away Job-Based Insurance

KFF Health News Original

The volunteer medical providers at the Tree of Life Free Clinic in Tupelo, Mississippi, give crucial health care to the uninsured in the best of times, drawing crowds who line up for hours. Amid the current COVID pandemic, clinic staffers were advised to close. Instead, they chose to adapt — even without critical N95 masks to protect themselves — as the economic crisis intensifies the need for free care.

Long-Standing Racial And Income Disparities Seen Creeping Into COVID-19 Care

KFF Health News Original

Many health officials around the nation have not released data on the ethnic and racial demographics of people tested for the new coronavirus. But public health experts said the anecdotes are adding up, and they fear the response to the pandemic will result in predictable health care disparities.

School Districts Grapple With Quarantines, Face Masks And Fear

KFF Health News Original

In the wake of the coronavirus outbreak, school districts, especially those with large Chinese student populations, are in uncharted territory as they apply new federal travel rules to their students. Some also are weighing requests from parents that are more about fear than science, such as whether to allow students with no travel history to stay home from school.

Must-Reads Of The Week From Brianna Labuskes

KFF Health News Original

Happy Friday! In news that is technically really good and exciting but is also kind of icky: yarn made from human skin could eventually be used to stitch up surgical wounds as a way to cut down on detrimental reactions from patients. As CNN reports, “The researchers say their ‘human textile,’ which they developed from […]

Reduce Health Costs By Nurturing The Sickest? A Much-Touted Idea Disappoints

KFF Health News Original

Nearly a decade ago, Dr. Jeffrey Brenner and his Camden Coalition appeared to have an answer to remake American health care: Treat the sickest and most expensive patients. But a rigorous study in the New England Journal of Medicine shows the approach doesn’t save money. “We built a brilliant intervention to navigate people to nowhere,” Brenner tells the “Tradeoffs” podcast.