BROOKLYN, NY – Brooklyn City President Eric Adams went to great lengths to ensure that New York did not experience structural racism issues with coronavirus vaccine distribution.
Adams announced on Sunday that he has teamed up with civil rights attorney Norman Siegel to file a Freedom of Information Act motion requiring the city to release its racial and ethnic data on those who have received the COVID-19 vaccine to date.
The data, says Adams, will help determine whether the vaccines are being distributed fairly.
His request comes weeks after he first talked about the lack of public data and after recent studies into how Black Americans were dramatically underrepresented among vaccinated people in other parts of the country.
“We can’t afford to wait any longer,” said Adams. “… We need real-time data on the racial breakdown of those who have been vaccinated, and we need it now … The longer we wait to get a clear picture of our vaccination, the more we risk doing the same. ” Mistakes we made in the early days of the pandemic. “
When asked about the dates on Monday, Mayor Bill de Blasio said in his briefing that he plans to release them later this week.
“It is absolutely critical that we show the people of the city how to do this, and it’s part of making sure we act to erase the differences that have permeated the COVID experience,” said de Blasio.
Adams has argued that the data should be shared through a real-time reporting system since the start of the distribution process. The City Council’s Black, Latino and Asian Caucus (BLAC) has also called for the real-time reporting system.
A survey by the Kaiser Health Foundation found that white Americans were two to three times more likely to receive the vaccine than black Americans in at least 16 states. The survey did not include New York.
Adams’ appeal was supported by Donovan Richards, Queens Borough President, BetaNYC, and several councilors.
It is because the city’s vaccine distribution, while its capacity increases, is slowing down as the federal government runs out of doses.
De Blasio said the city still had 19,032 initial doses as of Monday – nothing but a drop in the bucket for a city that has given a total of 628,831 doses the size of Louisville, Kentucky.
The deficit caused the city vaccination centers to postpone at least 23,000 first dose appointments and to temporarily close the vaccination centers. De Blasio said Monday that the planned “mega-locations” for vaccines at Citi Field, Yankee Stadium and Empire Outlets have been postponed.
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