COVID-19 and People With Disabilities: Social Inequalities in the Distribution of Pandemic Vulnerability
Disability in the Time of Pandemic
ISBN: 978-1-80262-140-2, eISBN: 978-1-80262-139-6
Publication date: 26 January 2023
Abstract
Purpose
This chapter addresses the growing need to analyze the relationship between COVID-19 vulnerability and disability status at the national scale in the US. It presents a quantitative study that seeks to determine whether US counties more vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic contain significantly higher percentages of people with disabilities (PwDs), in general, and socially disadvantaged PwDs (based on their ethnicity/race, biological sex, age poverty, and employment status), in particular.
Methods/Approach
Vulnerability to COVID-19 is measured using the COVID-19 Pandemic Vulnerability Index (PVI) model developed by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, which integrates multiple variables into relevant indicators that are weighted and combined to formulate a county-level PVI score. These scores are linked to a wide range of disability-related variables from the 2019 American Community Survey five-year estimates. Statistical analyses are based on multivariable generalized estimating equations that extend the generalized linear model to account for spatial clustering.
Findings
US counties more vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic are characterized by significantly higher percentages of PwDs, when vaccination is considered in estimating the PVI. These counties also contain significantly higher percentages of ethnic/racial minority, female, below poverty, and unemployed PwDs, in multiple timeframes of the pandemic.
Implication/Value
The findings provide important insights and new knowledge on the relationship between COVID-19 vulnerability and socially disadvantaged PwDs in the US. The county-level associations highlight the need for additional data and more detailed analysis to examine the differential impacts of this pandemic on PwDs, as well as formulate appropriate intervention strategies.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgments
This research is funded, in part, by the Geospatial Fellows Program supported by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) under grant number 1743184. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. The author is also thankful to Jacob J. Aun, Master's student in Sociology at the University of Texas at El Paso, for his assistance with this study.
Citation
Chakraborty, J. (2023), "COVID-19 and People With Disabilities: Social Inequalities in the Distribution of Pandemic Vulnerability", Carey, A.C., Green, S.E. and Mauldin, L. (Ed.) Disability in the Time of Pandemic (Research in Social Science and Disability, Vol. 13), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 15-29. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-354720230000013002
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2023 Jayajit Chakraborty. Published under exclusive licence by Emerald Publishing Limited