Exploring Ethnicity in Hospital Patients with COVID-19 in South London

Ethnicity was found to be an independent risk factor in COVID-19 outcomes in the UK and the USA during the pandemic surge. London, being in the epicentre and having one of the most ethnically diverse population in the UK, was likely to have experienced a much higher intensity of this phenomenon. Black Asian and Minority ethnic groups were more likely to be admitted, more likely to require admission to intensive care, and more likely to die from COVID-19. We undertook an analysis of a case series to explore the impact of ethnicity in hospitalised patients with confirmed COVID-19 during the 3 months of the pandemic. Our results demonstrated that although the proportion of Asian and Black patients were representative of the local population distribution, they were much younger. The prevalence of comorbidities was similar but logistic regression analysis showed that male sex (OR 1.4, 95% CI 1.1-1.9; p=0.02), age (OR 1.03, 95% CI 1.02 - 1.04, p<0.001), those in the ‘Other’ [Odds ratio 1.7 (1.1-2.6) p = 0.01] and ‘Asian’[Odds ratio 1.8 (1.1-2.7) p=0.01], category were at higher risk of death in this cohort. Our results, therefore, are consistent with the overall data from the UK and USA indicating that ethnicity remains a significant additional risk and hence our clinical services must ensure that adequate provision is made to cater to this risk and research must be designed to understand the causes.