May 5, 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed deeply entrenched inequities in cities across the US. Inequities in COVID-19 outcomes are observed at multiple levels: between individuals belonging to different social groups (e.g., by race, occupation, education); between neighborhoods; and between cities. The Urban Health Collaborative has partnered with the Big Cities Health Coalition (BCHC) to develop a public facing data dashboard that allows users to describe, visualize, and compare health and health determinants in COVID-19 outcomes in the 30 U.S. cities belonging to the BCHC. As the pandemic continues, it is important to highlight changes over time.

The COVID-19 Inequities Dashboard launched on January 21, 2021. Throughout this year the team has regularly maintained and updated city level trend data for the 30 BCHC cities, neighborhood-level data for 14 cities, race/ethnicity data for 17 cities, and age-adjusted data for 13 cities. COVID-19 case surveillance data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is also recent in the dashboard as of March 2021.

In addition to new data and data sources, updates to dashboard features have also been incorporated. The dashboard now displays plots to visualize inequities in COVID-19 outcomes, both by race/ethnicity and by neighborhood. The website also features an article, “Demystifying Big Cities as COVID-19 Hotspots”, which examines the effects of city size, population density, and overcrowding on COVID-19 incidence."

In order to continue providing the most up-to-date data and features, the team anticipates developing elements for future updates, such as including the most recent CDC COVID-19 Case Surveillance Data when released at the end of April and a repository to download the publicly available data that has been compiled. The team will also be adding a new section on the dashboard for tracking equity issues in COVID-19 testing access using spatial metrics and testing site data and releasing articles on how the spatial accessibility metrics were selected.

To view the dashboard and learn more, visit www.covid-inequities.info.