COVID-19 hits Broward County’s Black population hard

The new coronavirus shattered Monete Hicks’ world in a way she couldn’t imagine, killing two of her children before they even reached their 25th birthday.

The Lauderhill mother’s story illustrates the toll COVID-19 is inflicting on Broward County’s Black community.

Twenty of the 29 people under the age of 45 who have died with coronavirus in Broward County as of Friday are Black, far higher than their percentage of the population, according to a South Florida Sun Sentinel review.

Blacks make up nearly 70% of under-45 deaths in Broward County, the highest percentage of counties in South Florida. About 35% of the county’s under-45 population is Black.

Hicks’ children — Byron Francis, 20, and Mychaela Francis, 22 — died just 11 days apart.

As protesters call attention to injustices in the criminal justice system, the pandemic is shining a light on longstanding racial health disparities, said Joseph West, a professor at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine’s Department of Public Health Services.

“Systemic racism is real,” he said. “Housing segregation is real. Food deserts are real. It becomes compounded and generational.”

Blacks have higher rates of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, asthma and other underlying conditions that put them at a greater risk of dying of COVID-19, regardless of age.

What’s created that divide is a lack of access to health care, poverty, racism and distrust of the medical system, West said.

Older Americans are most at risk of dying from the coronavirus, but medical examiner records show that younger people are also dying. Almost always their deaths are accompanied by underlying conditions. The list of younger Black people who have died of COVID-19 includes a 38-year-old man with morbid obesity; a 35-year-old woman with diabetes, kidney failure, obesity, hypertension and a heart muscle disease called cardiomyopathy; a 22-year-old woman with obesity, diabetes, chronic kidney disease and a hardening of the arteries caused by chronically high blood pressure; and a 35-year-old man with end-stage kidney disease, diabetes and hypertension.

Behind the statistics are people like Byron and Mychaela Francis.

Byron Francis loved to play video games and was affectionately known by friends as “Big Teddy Bear,” his mother Monete Hicks said. On the morning of June 27, his sister, Mychaela, found him struggling to breathe, Hicks said.

He was taken to the hospital and died that day.

Then just three days later, Mychaela Francis went to the emergency room with shortness of breath and fever. Her condition worsened, and she died on July 8.

Mychaela worked as a cashier at Little Caesars and dreamed of designing clothing, Hicks said.

Hicks said the family had mostly stayed at home with the exception of a trip they took from June 12-15 to Universal Studios in Orlando. Byron Francis, though, didn’t join them at the theme park, she said.

“It is real. Take it seriously,” Hicks said. “Wear your mask. If you don’t have to go out, don’t go. If you are positive, let people around you know.”

Mychaela and Byron Francis both had asthma and were obese, according to medical examiner records.

The disparities are not confined to Broward County. Of the 81 people under the age of 45 who have died with COVID-19 in South Florida, only seven were listed in medical examiner records as white, all others were Black, Hispanic, or Asian.

In Miami-Dade County, Blacks make up half of the county’s 28 under-45 deaths, despite making up only 18% of the population in that age bracket.

Statewide, Blacks make up 43% of Florida’s 137 under-45 deaths, despite comprising 32% of the state’s population in that age bracket.

The trend has been different in Palm Beach County, where Hispanics make up the majority of under-45 deaths.

One possible explanation is Palm Beach County is home to poorer Latino communities than neighboring Miami-Dade and Broward counties, said Dr. Terry A. Adirim, a senior associate dean for clinical affairs at Florida Atlantic University.

Two zip codes — Lake Worth Beach’s 33460 and Belle Glade’s 33430 — have emerged as coronavirus hotspots in Palm Beach County, she said. Lake Worth Beach has a large Guatemalan immigrant population, while Belle Glade is home to migrant farm workers.

The disparities show that public health officials need to do more to reach and help people of color, Adirim said.

“At the end of the day, if you want to prevent death and severe illness, you need to go to those populations most at risk,” she said. “These populations are citizens, too, and they deserve to have resources focused on their areas.”

Delarie Lettsome, 52, a Sunrise resident, said she’s seen firsthand the issues in the Black community that are driving the higher death rate.

Black families often are crowded together in multi-generational houses with grandparents and siblings to make ends meet, she said. Tight budgets mean money isn’t available for doctor visits and healthy food. Hourly work at grocery stores, restaurants and warehouses means people are exposing themselves to the virus instead of working safely at home.

“Black people need to be smart and realize that this virus is wiping us out,” Lettsome said during a walk at Plantation Central Park. “If wearing a mask is going to give me a fighting chance, I’m wearing one.”