| The results are in and here's what it shows: Black and Latino Texans suffered from COVID-19 deaths at a higher rate than their white counterparts during the early days of the pandemic.
That's what a study out of Rice University found, at least. As Sam González Kelly puts it, the study sought to assess the impact of COVID-19 on communities of color by analyzing the economic burden they suffered as a result of their death rates, alongside the air quality levels across the state.
You can see how they managed to calculate it all, but another thing researchers found was that for the 50 most populous counties in Texas, those with a high share of Black and Latino residents had a higher rate of COVID-19-related deaths.
The study follows a raft of research that shows communities of color have been hit hard by the pandemic. Last year, a study found that such communities could cost the state $2.7 billion in excess medical spending.
"It’s upsetting, and it’s easy to get desensitized seeing article after article about the impact of COVID-19 on minority populations, but…I hope this study and others will motivate change in Houston and elsewhere," said Sylvia Dee, a Rice climate scientist and an author of the new study. | 
