It’s official: COVID-19 does discriminate and we’re not all in the same boat. A study has found the proportion of blue-collar workers in a local government area is the biggest determinant of the spread and impact of COVID-19 COVID19Vic
Anyone who says otherwise probably isn’t thinking about how social inequality makes some people more susceptible to a deadly pandemic than others.
He concluded that the proportion of blue-collar workers in a local government area was the biggest determinant of the spread and impact of COVID-19. In Sydney, this translated to an additional 848 cases for every percentage-point increase in blue-collar workers, based on the average population of an LGA. In Melbourne, it led to an additional 895 cases per percentage point.
Without access to convenient and affordable testing, people are more likely to mingle with others while infectious, or stay home and miss out on work or social opportunities. The Australian Catholic University study found areas with a high proportion of “culturally and linguistically diverse” residents were also hard hit by the pandemic - but the correlation is weaker than for blue-collar workers.
Sydney LGAs with the highest proportions of CALD residents are located in the western suburbs or in other multicultural localities such as Strathfield in the inner west or Ryde in the northern suburbs. Barnes says social inequality could also hamper the rollout of vaccine booster shots for adults and first doses for children aged five to 12, since in 2021 wealthy areas consistently showed higher levels of vaccination.
In Sydney, the labour force fell from 3 million in May 2021 to 2.75 million in September, a decline of 8.3 per cent. This was even worse for women, with a decline of 9.2 per cent. Medical historian Peter Hobbins, the head of knowledge at the Australian Maritime Museum, says the link between inequality and the spread of a pandemic has been a feature of Australian society since the early days of colonisation.
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