Kentucky governor promises health-care coverage to '100 percent' of 'black community'

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (D) has announced his commitment to combating racial inequalities in health care exposed during the coronavirus pandemic.

COVID-19 has disproportionately infected and killed black people across the U.S., including in Kentucky. Its population is 8.4 percent black, but 16 percent of those who died of coronavirus are black. Beshear brought up that disproportionate data in a Monday press conference, and then announced he was committing to "begin an effort to cover 100 percent of our individuals in our black and African American communities, everybody."

Racial inequality has always been rampant in the health care industry, contributing to black Americans' disproportionately low survival rates when it comes to cancer, giving birth, and health outcomes as a whole. Beshear acknowledged those longstanding issues, but added that COVID-19 had "laid them bare." So in an effort to guarantee everyone the "human right" that is health care, Beshear announced a plan to guarantee everyone can access health care, promising "we are going to be putting dollars behind it and we're going to have a multi-faceted campaign to do it." Beshear didn't mention any sort of numbers or steps toward achieving that goal.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Watch his whole announcement below. Kathryn Krawczyk