A family in Detroit is grieving after experiencing devastating losses to Covid-19. A man and his father died within 6 hours of each other, sending the family reeling and amplifying concerns about racial bias in the US health care system.
Gary Fowler died in his home on April 7, after desperately seeking coronavirus testing and treatment without success. As USA Today reports:
Gary Fowler, 56, went to the emergency rooms of three metro Detroit hospitals in the weeks leading up to his death, begging for a coronavirus test, begging for help because he was having difficulty breathing, but he was repeatedly turned away, Gambrell said.
"My dad passed at home, and no one tried to help him," Gambrell, 33, said through tears. "He asked for help, and they sent him away. They turned him away."
In the hours before his death, breathing was so difficult, Fowler slept sitting up in the bedroom chair, while his wife, Cheryl, dozed in the bed by his side. When she woke, her husband of nearly 24 years was gone.
Before he took his last breaths, Fowler scrawled on a piece of paper, "Heart beat irregular ... oxygen level low."
The day prior, Fowler’s father had died from Covid-19 at the age of 76.
Fowler’s stepson, Keith Gambrell, who has also tested positive for the coronavirus, said in a CBS News interview that he believes that racial bias played a role in Fowler’s death. "I honestly believe it was because my father was black,” he said. “They didn't honestly take his symptoms serious enough to give him a test."
While the latest funding bill provides money for testing, some states are already ramping up their testing programs. But tests have been difficult to get in many places.@Jerickaduncan spoke to one family, now mourning a man they say was turned away from getting tested 3 times. pic.twitter.com/XkYwnC3FJK
— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) April 22, 2020
Gambrell told USA Today that in the hours following Fowler’s funeral, Fowler's wife had to be put on a ventilator due to Covid-19 complications after being turned away from the first hospital they tried. The ordeal has tested the family’s resilience.
"This coronavirus is gonna cause so much PTSD for people. It's sad," Gambrell said. "There's going to be a major fallout after this. It's not right at all.”
About one third of coronavirus cases in Michigan are among African Americans, despite Black people only comprising 14 percent of the state’s population. A recent analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that Michigan isn’t alone – the latest data shows that across the country, people of color, especially African Americans, are being disproportionately slammed by Covid-19.
With experts expecting a second wave of the coronavirus to hit the United States this fall, 2020 candidates must offer solutions to America's racial barriers to adequate health care as Election Day approaches. Continue following us for more coverage and analysis of the racial disparities related to Covid-19 and how US leaders can address them.