UK launches review into why ethnic minorities are being hardest hit by coronavirus

A third of intensive care patients in UK are from ethnic minority backgrounds

A handout image released by 10 Downing Street, shows Britain's Health Secretary Matt Hancock speaking during a remote press conference to update the nation on the Covid-19 pandemic, inside 10 Downing Street in central London on April 15, 2020. The British government was under pressure Wednesday to set out its plans to end the coronavirus lockdown, as the country's death toll approached 13,000. Figures announced by the health ministry on Wednesday showed that 12,868 people have died from the coronavirus, a rise of 761 over the previous day.
 - RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / 10 DOWNING STREET / ANDREW PARSONS " - NO MARKETING - NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS
 / AFP / 10 Downing Street / Andrew PARSONS / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / 10 DOWNING STREET / ANDREW PARSONS " - NO MARKETING - NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS
Powered by automated translation

The UK has launched a review into why a high proportion of people from ethnic minorities are dying from coronavirus.

A third of coronavirus patients in intensive care units are from black, Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds.

Many of the frontline medics who have died from the virus have been from these communities.

On Thursday, the UK death numbers rose by 861 overnight to 13,729.

Downing Street has said the NHS and Public Heath England (PHE) would take the lead in the investigation.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said: "We have seen, both across the population as a whole but in those who work in the NHS, a much higher proportion who've died from minority backgrounds and that really worries me.

"I pay tribute to the work they've done, including those who were born here, moved here, and given that service to the NHS."

Despite only making up 14 per cent of the population of England and Wales, ethnic minorities represent a third of the patients in intensive care with coronavirus, according to the Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre (ICNARC).

Chaand Nagpaul, head of the British Medical Association, said this was "extremely disturbing and worrying".

"We have heard the virus does not discriminate between individuals, but there's no doubt there appears to be a manifest disproportionate severity of infection in BAME people and doctors," he said.

The first 10 doctors who died with coronavirus in Britain were from ethnic minorities. Among them were Alfa Sa'adu, Jitendra Rathod, Mohamed Sami Shousha and Syed Haider.

In a letter to the government, several opposition Labour MPs said deaths represented "serious concerns" and had called for an urgent investigation.

Sunder Katwala, the head of thinktank British Future, also said a large number of Filipino nurses, hospital porters and other staff had been affected by coronavirus.

"South Asians live in more deprived areas and have more cardiovascular disease and diabetes," said Kamlesh Khunti, an expert in ethnic minority health. who led the ICNARC study.

They also often live in larger, multi-generational households and so "social isolation may not be as prevalent".

Zubaida Haque, deputy director of the race equality Runnymede, said ethnic minorities were also more likely to be in low-paid jobs or be key workers - as transport and delivery staff, healthcare assistants, hospital cleaners and social care workers.

"All of which bring them into more contact with coronavirus and so increase their risk to serious-illness and death," she told the BBC.