Expert insights: Income inequality and COVID-19

By now, many are aware that the pandemic has affected lower-income groups the most within countries, including in Canada. But what most do not know is that income inequality - the economic distance between higher and lower-income groups within individual countries - is also driving national COVID-19 infection and death rates. The specific impacts are only just becoming clear. As researchers in economics and epidemiology, we are interested in how economic inequality has impacted COVID-19 outcomes. The pandemic has given researchers like us a unique opportunity to study the relationship between inequality and health across various countries. Working independently to study the pre-vaccine phase of the pandemic, our teams approached the research question from different perspectives. We brought together economists who are concerned with the analysis and economic impact of income inequality, and epidemiologists who study how social factors influence health.