‘Those numbers take your breath away’: Covid-19 is hitting Chicago’s black neighborhoods much harder than others, officials say

Decades of inequality and institutional racism affecting black communities is becoming evident in covid-19 data, Chicago officials said Monday, as Mayor Lori Lightfoot sounded the alarm over significant racial disparities in deaths and coronavirus cases across the city. In Chicago, black Americans account for 68 percent of the cityís 118 deaths and 52 percent of the roughly 5,000 confirmed coronavirus cases, despite making up just 30 percent of the cityís population, according to data from the Chicago Department of Public Health.