NPR Poll: One in Five US Residents with Serious Illness Couldn’t Access Care During COVID-19 Pandemic

August 8, 2022

A newly released survey from NPR shows that the COVID-19 pandemic severely impacted access to care for approximately 20% of people from US households where one or more residents has a serious illness. The poll, performed in collaboration with the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation, found significant disparities in care between different racial and ethnic groups, despite high insurance coverage across all groups.

According to , “Among households where anyone had been seriously ill in the past year, 35% of American Indian and Alaska Native households and 24% of Black households had trouble accessing care for serious illness, compared with only 18% of White households. Among Black respondents who had seen a provider in the past year, 15% said they were disrespected, turned away, unfairly treated, or received poor treatment because of their race and ethnicity, compared with only 3% of White respondents who said the same.”

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