WBHM The "Right to Breathe Caravan" toured several north Birmingham neighborhoods Saturday, calling for environmental and racial justice in communities that have faced decades of industrial pollution. Read more.
On the day he’s born, the average white resident of Jefferson County is expected to live about 3.5 years longer than the average Black resident. Jefferson County’s Black residents have higher rates of death due to heart disease, diabetes, stroke and “malignant neoplasms,” or cancerous tumors, than their white neighbors, according to the Jefferson County Health Action Partnership’s 2018 Community Health Equity Report, which studied county and state health statistics. Infant mortality and low birth weights are twice as likely to occur among black newborns as white ones. These differences are clear when data is broken down by ZIP code. Historically Black neighborhoods, such as College Hills, Fountain Heights and Titusville, show some of the lowest life expectancies and highest rates of disabilities and infant mortality in the county. Majority-white areas tend to show better health outcomes, an effect that is most pronounced in high-income areas such as Mountain Brook and Vestavia Hills. In this, Jefferson County mirrors the rest of the nation. Black Americans generally have more health problems and chronic illnesses, and consequently shorter life expectancy. Read more. The Legacy of Race is an ongoing series about how the history of racism and segregation in Alabama affect the society we live in today. Read the stories published so far.
Pastors, elders and the leadership team at Valleydale Church in north Shelby County closed to in-person worship in March because of the coronavirus but reopened June 7. Then COVID-19 surged again in Alabama, surpassing by far the number of infections the state had seen earlier in the year, and that church, along with many others, had to close again a few weeks later. Pastors, rabbis and other religious leaders across the state are watching data from the Alabama Department of Public Health, the CDC and other sources as they consider when it’s safe to reopen for their congregations. Read more.
U.S. Attorney Jay Town is resigning from his position with the U.S. Department of Justice after nearly three years on the job. Read more.
Jefferson County Health Officer Dr. Mark Wilson wrestles with how the state’s most populous county can decrease the daily number of COVID-19 cases, which has been steadily rising for the past two weeks. The county inked a record 343 cases from Wednesday, marking a high point in what has been an upward trend for the county. This past week, July 3-10, 10,659 people were tested in the county, with 1,417 of them testing positive for COVID-19. That’s an average of 202 new cases per day and a positive test rate of 13.3%, Wilson said. There also were 19 deaths during the week. “The situation is horrible,” Wilson said. Read more.
It’s a longstanding problem for the counties that make up Alabama’s Black Belt — named for the black, fertile soil used to grow cotton but also home to a large share of the state’s Black population. The counties suffer high rates or poverty and poor health, and the COVID-19 pandemic has brought out the worst of both issues. While the counties that are home to the state’s largest metro areas have seen large raw numbers of positive tests since the outbreak began in March, the Black Belt counties and a handful of counties in the northern part of the state have seen numbers that show their residents are proportionally more hard-hit than those in the Big 4 counties. Read more.
The Birmingham Board of Education wants to know what qualities members of the public would look for in a new superintendent. Read more.
With COVID-19 patients already filling beds at a record pace, hospitals across Alabama are bracing for an influx of people infected at Fourth of July gatherings. Statewide hospitalizations Wednesday were 1,110, the highest number yet, Dr. Don Williamson, president and CEO of the Alabama Hospital Association said Thursday. The state also had 163 admissions, the highest one-day number of new patients due to COVID-19. The state was down to 206 intensive care unit beds available, which is 12% of capacity, the lowest rate yet during the pandemic. “The concern is that all the numbers we are using to monitor the outbreak moved in the wrong direction,” Williamson said. Read more.
The Jefferson County Commission took a step toward supporting Medical West hospital’s making its new home in McCalla with the rezoning of four parcels bordering Interstate 459. Today’s action rezones the property from A-1 agricultural to institutional-2. Medical West is an affiliate of the University of Alabama at Birmingham Health System. The rezoning came with repeated reference to the hospital having to remain in unincorporated Jefferson County. Read more.
Alabama reached an unwelcome milestone in its battle with the COVID-19 virus, as the number of new cases reported each day has passed the 1,000 mark in moving averages for the first time. The BirminghamWatch weekly analysis of data reported by the Alabama Department of Public Health shows that the 7-day moving average of new cases has jumped to 1,140.29 per day, the second highest since the outbreak began; the average peaked at 1,212.29 on July 5. The longer-term 14-day moving average now stands at a record high of 1,057.14, after surpassing 1,000 two days prior. Read more.
