Today, we marked 20 million #COVID19 cases worldwide. It took about six months to get to 10 million cases, that number doubled to 20 million in a little over 6 weeks. With 5 million positive tests in the US, one country accounts for a quarter of the world’s confirmed caseload. pic.twitter.com/ybBfaRtlJ6
— Akshaya Kumar (@AkshayaSays) August 11, 2020

The United States reached the grim milestone of more than 5 million confirmed cases of Covid-19 this week, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. The novel coronavirus has claimed about 164,000 lives in the US so far, with 1,082 deaths reported on Tuesday alone. The United States leads the world in the number of Covid-19 deaths and infections, accounting for a quarter of cases globally.

New cases are accumulating as the US Congress remains in a stalemate over the passage of a new Covid-19 relief bill. The enhanced unemployment benefits it had previously approved have expired, even though people continue filing claims for unemployment insurance at “alarmingly high levels,” reports the New York Times.

Immigrants remain among the groups hit particularly hard by the crisis. “Immigrants are especially vulnerable in this pandemic because many are in jobs on the front lines,” writes Human Rights Watch’s Thomas Rachko. “Many essential workers, including doctors, nurses and medical staff, maintenance workers, delivery persons, farmworkers, foodservice staff, meat processing workers, and street vendors, are immigrants. Additionally, fear of the US government’s harsh immigration enforcement measures may keep immigrant families from seeking financial relief or medical care.”

The US Congress should pass legislation that doesn’t discriminate against immigrants. Rachko says that the CARES ACT, a Covid-19 relief package passed in March, fell short of protecting immigrants from the pandemic and excluded far too many people, including tax-paying immigrant families and millions of undocumented workers, many of whom who pay taxes.

As more than 5 million have now tested positive for #Covid19 in the US, Congress should ensure relief bills assist immigrant families.

Inclusion without discrimination protects lives, supports the economy, & protects the rights of all community members.https://t.co/Vf3mIs7ezP pic.twitter.com/BzYTgzPhY9
— Thomas J. Rachko, Jr. (@ThomasRachkoJr) August 11, 2020

Black and brown people continue to be disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. Last month, the New York Times reported that Black and Latinx people are 3 times more likely than white people to contract the novel coronavirus and nearly twice as likely to die from it. Even youth are feeling the disparities: A report released last week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that Black and Hispanic children have higher rates of hospitalization due to Covid-19 compared to their white peers.

Even as Black and brown communities bear the brunt of the crisis, new research suggests that there may be systemic racial bias in the formula the federal government uses to allocate Covid-19 relief funds to hospitals. And a July study showed that Black businesses received worse treatment than white ones when they tried to get loans through the Paycheck Protection Program.

Human Rights Watch’s Akshaya Kumar addressed the glaring racial disparities and systemic racism driving them on Twitter.

👀👀👀 While the overall rate is 45 deaths for every 100,000 people in Los Angeles county
For Latino residents, it’s a rate of 68
For Black residents, it’s a rate of 54
For Asian residents it’s a rate of 35
For white residents, it’s a rate of 26https://t.co/4lUnTcZGfL
— Akshaya Kumar (@AkshayaSays) August 11, 2020

This isn’t just an issue in LA, check out these statistics from around the country https://t.co/46PBr1onr7
— Akshaya Kumar (@AkshayaSays) August 11, 2020

But this isn’t just one of those unavoidable sad realities, it’s a dynamic that’s exacerbated by US government policy. See for example this study about the way aid was distributed to hospitals https://t.co/7uwzszWn2W pic.twitter.com/YlwqDXonvf
— Akshaya Kumar (@AkshayaSays) August 11, 2020

All this is even worse if you’re a health worker of color. @TheLancet found Black, Asian, and minority ethnic health-care workers are at high risk of infection, with at least a 5x increased risk of COVID-19 compared with white general community. https://t.co/TXlw5ulVr6
— Akshaya Kumar (@AkshayaSays) August 11, 2020

Kumar writes that the devastation facing communities of color during the pandemic aren’t an unfortunate coincidence but instead “a dynamic that’s exacerbated by US government policy.”