UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge

Done in collaboration with the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Initiative, this report compares the overall Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) death and vaccination rates of Latinos and non-Hispanic whites (NH Whites) and describes the geographic pattern of these rates across neighborhoods in New York City (NYC). As the first major epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic, NYC is an important case study. During the initial three months of the pandemic, there were 203,000 confirmed cases with a crude fatality rate of 9.2 percent overall and 32.1 percent among those hospitalized. NYC is home to 2.6 percent of the nation’s population, but 5.7 percent of the nation’s COVID-related deaths occurred there.

The available data on the pandemic reveal that Latinos were disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 infections, hospitalization, and deaths. Given this disparity, prioritizing this population for vaccination is critically important. The effort should focus on immunizing individuals in predominantly Latino neighborhoods to lower contagion risk, given that elevated risks are associated with both individual and neighborhood characteristics. To assess whether vaccines are adequately reaching this population, we analyze available data to compare outcomes for Latinos and NH Whites (see Appendix on the pdf of the report for a more detailed discussion on specific data and methods).