Community leaders call for steps to end racism targeting Asian Americans

By Ester Wells Medill Reports Some Asian Americans are risking death from COVID-19 rather than turning to medical care where they fear health care professionals won’t understand their language and often don’t respect their medical requests, said Chhaya Chhoum, framing the larger Asian experience in the crisis through the challenges confronted by one family her […]

Bar association group links environmental racism to higher pandemic rates, lead poisoning, and lasting tolls for tribal nations and communities of color

By Leonna McAfee Medill Reports The civil rights arm of the American Bar Association is calling for legal reforms to prevent pollution threats and other environmental injustices linking tribal communities and communities of color to everything from higher COVID-19 contagion to increased lead poisoning.  The ABA’s Section of Civil Rights and Social Justice held a […]

Riders at risk of massive service cuts as MTA billions in debt amid COVID crisis

New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), the largest transportation network in North America, is at a crossroads, operating on a $12 billion deficit through 2024. While foregoing an immediate fare hike, the MTA has threatened mass layoffs and service cuts of up to 50% as it faces the “the worst financial crisis in agency history.”

Education in isolation: Create community over curriculum, educators say

The transition to remote learning has been rapid and demanding for parents, teachers and students alike. Over the past year, educators have reinvented and sometimes thrown out their traditional curricula in favor of new ones workable in a virtual space. Parents juggle work, home and school life simultaneously and under one roof. Students are adapting to a new educational landscape that requires more discipline, self-reliance and flexibility than many are used to in the classroom.

2020 warming trend may intensify infectious diseases, scientists say

Global warming may make infectious diseases such as COVID-19 more widespread, warn health and climate experts. They say increasing temperatures are changing disease progression and interaction among people in ways that make it hard to predict and prepare for future public health crises.

Community activists to prevent Mercy Hospital closing

“I am a proud member of the Black Leaders Building Together Coalition and the Chicago Health Equity Coalition that have come together to make sure that safety-net hospitals in the City of Chicago receive the support they need to thrive and that we actually achieve health care equity in the City of Chicago,” said Jitu Brown, national director of the Journey for Justice Alliance and former education organizer of the Kenwood Oakland Community Organization (KOCO)during a Wednesday afternoon press conference on 26th St. nearMercy Hospital. (Marc Monaghan/Hyde Park Herald)

By Kelly Milan Medill Reports Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr., and community activists held a press conference outside Mercy Hospital in Bronzeville on Tuesday to call on Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Gov. J.B. Pritzker to save Mercy Hospital from closing amid the pandemic. “This is a life-or-death issue,” said Jackson, head of Chicago-based nonprofit organization […]

Revised COVID-19 eviction ban draws ire of Chicago housing activists

By Courtney Kueppers Medill Reports  When the coronavirus pandemic first began, Ivy Abid felt like she had to find a way to help people. So the 35-year-old high school teacher started answering calls on a hotline set up by Chicago housing activists for tenants in need. In the spring, Abid and other Chicago Tenants Movement volunteers […]