https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210519080448.htm

"Media coverage has examined how and why COVID-19 is disproportionately impacting communities of color to some degree. However, it is critical that we continue to examine and explain the degree to which the pandemic has widened the divide among race/ethnic and class groups in the U.S. and exposed the systemic and institutional cracks in our health care system in terms of health care equity for people who are under-represented and populations that face disadvantages," said Adam Bress, Pharm.D., M.S., lead author of the paper, an associate professor of population health science in the Division of Health System Innovation and Research at the University of Utah School of Medicine in Salt Lake City and an investigator at the VA Salt Lake City Health Care System. "COVID-19 has also reminded us that when we design interventions, it is important to consider health equity from the beginning rather than as an afterthought."

A panel of frontline clinicians, researchers and leaders from diverse backgrounds recently convened virtually at the 4th Annual University of Utah Translational Hypertension Symposium to discuss how the pandemic has worsened inequities in blood pressure control and to highlight the environmental and socioeconomic factors contributing to disparities within the health care system, as well as strategies to help close the gap going forward.