COVID-19 may hit the poor hardest with a Great Depression

Image credit: Lannon Harley - COVID-19 may be the making of this generation's Great Depression, which would have profound long-term health implications for the socially disadvantaged, according to a health equality expert from The Australian National University (ANU). Professor Sharon Friel, Director of the Menzies Centre for Health Governance at ANU, said the coronavirus does not discriminate when infecting people, but the impact of howAustralia's economic and social services systems respond is very socially patterned.  "Poor people, the precariously employed, those with big existing debts, the homeless,people with disabilities, the socially marginalised - these are the vulnerable people who will feel the disastrous effects of this global pandemic most," she said.   "They will suffer for many, many years to come."  Professor Friel has written an article with the CEO of VicHealth, Dr Sandro Demaio, about this unfolding crisis for the  Medical Journal of Australia .  "COVID-19 will have significant impacts on health inequities in Australia through the economic and social fallout resulting from necessary pandemic mitigation measures compounding an already inequitable society," they wrote.   "The existing embedded inequities in the social determinants of health will amplify the COVID-19 response effects, exposing socially disadvantaged groups even more.