(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Robert Gehrke.
| Feb. 14, 2021, 1:00 p.m.
Back in the spring and well into 2020, the coronavirus was taking a dramatically disproportionate toll on Utah’s racial and ethnic minority communities.
In some weeks, more than half of the new cases were detected in the Hispanic and Latino community, even though they make up about 14% of the state’s population. In June, a Latino Utahn was seven times as likely to contract the virus as a white resident, while Pacific Islander and Black residents were five times and three times more likely to get the virus.
The reasons were not a mystery. These Utahns were more likely to work in essential services, often lived in multi-generational homes and had less access to health care. And they paid a terrible price.