COVID-19’s Impact on the LGBTQ Community Is Profound and Exacerbates the Structural Violence We Already Suffer

A Statement By the Flint Hills Human Rights Project

COVID-19’s impact on our LGBTQ community needs to be understood using a wide lens.

Even before the pandemic, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and non-binary folks struggled on two levels: access and life chances. We struggled to access safe, affirming, and affordable healthcare; we struggled to escape poverty, being unsheltered, incarcerated, and subjected to violations of our bodily autonomy; we struggled to get and maintain employment; we struggled to access education and advancement opportunities; we struggled to protect our young ones. Now, we are struggling even more.

As LGBTQ people we are more likely than the general U.S. population to live in poverty. We are more likely to lack access to medical care, paid medical leave, or basic necessities during the pandemic. Many of us have compromised immune systems due to cancer, HIV, and other health conditions that likely put us at risk for more severe COVID-19 cases and higher likelihood of dying from COVID-19. The LGBTQ community was more likely to experience poverty before the pandemic, but we have been disproportionately impacted by job-loss during the pandemic with 64% of LGBT households experiencing employment loss compared to 45% of non-LGBTQ households; 56% of LGBTQ folks have experienced wage and work hour reduction or mandated unpaid leave compared to 35% of non-LGBTQ workers; 47% of LGBTQ workers lost their job, business, or have been furloughed while that number is 32% for non-LGBTQ workers; and 38% were unable to get medical care or delayed getting medical care, compared to 19% for the non-LGBTQ population.[1] And because of workplace discrimination, outing oneself and saying “I need more safety precautions taken to do a job because of an immune compromised partner” can be too risky. That is what we know.

What we do not know is if we are more likely to get COVID-19, or have more significant complications, or how many of us have died from this virus. We are not counted in the breakout tallies of COVID-19 cases or mortality numbers or in any of the COVID-19 statistics. Not only are we not counted, but the cis-heteronormativity that affected our lives before has made every day work and medical access all the more difficult. 

We are all suffering from an increase in structural violence. In solidarity with some of the most underserved members of our community we want to spotlight the experiences of our young people and our incarcerated siblings.

Our Young People

LGBTQ youth face particular struggles under COVID-19. Many are forced to stay in a home with family members that are not affirming of their gender or sexual identity. Because of quarantine and online school, the lack of peer and social support can lead to depression, suicidal ideation, substance abuse, and mental health crisis.[2]  The economic strain that COVID has caused has also increased housing instability. Even before the pandemic, LGBTQ  youth were disproportionately impacted by homelessness and housing instability. Since COVID, our young ones have experienced twice as much housing instability and that number continues to grow.[3] Traditionally, with housing insecurity comes a corresponding increase in death from suicide.[4] For trans and non-binary youth as well as LGBTQ youth of color the risk of negative outcomes is even greater.[5]

Economic strains can lead to substantial increases in housing instability, with LGBTQ youth disproportionally impacted by housing instability. Even before the spread of coronavirus, LGBTQ youth are represented at over twice the overall youth rate in reports of unstable housing (Baams, Wilson, & Russell, 2019). And LGBTQ youth who experienced housing instability were twice as likely to report seriously considering suicide and three times as likely to report attempting suicide compared to LGBTQ youth who had not (The Trevor Project, 2019b). Individuals who experience unemployment due to COVID-19, may subsequently be at increased risk for housing instability and homelessness.

LGBTQ youth in foster care face worse struggles. LGBTQ youth are over represented in the foster care system. There are nearly twice as many LGBTQ youth in foster care as there are in the general population.[6]  Queer kids often face higher levels of discrimination, mistreatment, and trauma in foster care. Here in Kansas, we allow religious firms that discriminate against LGBTQ parents in the adoption and foster care process, so families and caretakers are less likely to understand and affirm the queer youth they are entrusted to care for. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration on Children, Youth, and Families reports that LGBTQ youth are over two times as likely to be treated badly while in foster care when compared to their peers.[7] Some specific examples include:

• 78% of queer youth in foster care had to be removed or ran away from their placements because of the denigrating treatment they were subjected to because of their queerness

• 100% of queer youth in group homes reported being harassed

• 70% of queer youth reported being subjected to physical and/or sexual violence in group homes

This treatment leads many queer youth to escape this hostility by running away, and getting their basic needs met through underground survival economies. Because of the lack of affirming foster care placements, the hostility and violence they are subjected to in group homes, and the survival economies they are forced to engage in to escape that hostility, our young people end up experiencing high rates of lifelong poverty and disproportionate rates of incarceration for crimes of survival. For queer youth of color, the added violence of structural racism translates to increased police surveillance, even higher risk of incarceration, longer prison sentences, denial of bail, and higher rates of both suicide and murder.

Our young ones are experiencing remarkable lessened life chances.  

Our Incarcerated Siblings

LGBTQ people are subjected to incarceration in juvenile, immigration, jails, and federal prison facilities at profoundly high rates. According to Reuters, for LGBT people overall, we are incarcerated at a rate three times higher than the general population. For Lesbian and Bisexual women the rate is even more stark, being over represented from the general population at a rate of eight times greater.[8] In terms of sentences, queer women are subjected to longer sentences than their straight peers. For queer men, they are more likely than straight men to have sentences that exceed a decade.[9]  For our queer siblings of color, things are even more dire. LBGTQ folks of color are overrepresented in prisons, jails, and detention centers. For our trans siblings of color, they experience high levels of abuse while in prison[10] and experience discrimination during parole hearings that keep them incarcerated for longer.[11]

With incarceration comes higher contracting of COVID-19. In the U.S. carceral system 1 in 5 of those incarcerated has tested positive for COVID-19, a rate more than four times that of the general population. In some prisons, that rate translates to more than half of all incarcerated people testing positive and many dying without getting the care they need.[12]

In Kansas, our vaccination plan has been hotly debated as some within the State Legislature oppose vaccinating incarcerated prisoners ahead of the general population. During the Kansas vaccine rollout, Sen. Richard Hilderbrand called for Kansas Governor, Laura Kelly to reverse her position that inmates should receive the vaccine during phase two. Several states have prioritized prisoners by placing them near the top with other populations living in close and crowded conditions like nursing homes and long-term care facilities. Close to 20 states have placed prisoners in the second tier of their vaccine rollouts. Here in Kansas, our incarcerated siblings are being threatened with denial to medical care and access. For so much of our lives we are treated as less-than. To deny access to life saving medical care is to treat so many of us as disposable.    

Conclusion

COVID-19 continues to expose and exacerbate disparities in access and life chances. When LGBTQ youth lack affirming foster care placement, we are setting them up for a life of lessened opportunities, a system that ushers them through a foster care to prison pipeline, and a remarkably higher risk of becoming sick without access to life affirming or sustaining care.  When our incarcerated siblings are at increased risk of contracting COVID-19 but denied prophylactic and life sustaining care, we are treating our queer family members as even more disposable.

Taken together, this series of observations show the need for policy changes and targeted support to provide access to safe, affirming, affordable healthcare, financial security, shelter, alternatives to incarceration, and resources for healing from the violence we have been subjected to.

Recommended Citation: “COVID-19’s Impact on the LGBTQ Community Is Profound and Exacerbates the Structural Violence We Already Suffer.” (2021). Manhattan, Kansas: The Flint Hills Human Rights Project.

[1] Movement Advancement Project (December 2020) “The Disproportionate Impacts of COVID-19 on LGBTQ Households in the U.S.” Available at: https://www.lgbtmap.org/file/2020-covid-lgbtq-households-report.pdf

[2] Green, A.E., Price-Feeney, M. & Dorison, S.H. (2020). Implications of COVID-19 for LGBTQ Youth Mental Health and Suicide Prevention. New York, New York: The Trevor Project. https://www.thetrevorproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Implications-of-COVID-19-for-LGBTQ-Youth-Mental-Health-and-Suicide-Prevention.pdf

[3] Baams, L., Wilson, B.D.M, Russell, S.T. (2019). LGBTQ youth in unstable housing and foster care. Pediatrics, 143(3).e20174211.

[4] Fowler, K. A., Gladden, R. M., Vagi, K. J., Barnes, J., & Frazier, L. (2015). Increase in suicides associated with home eviction and foreclosure during the US housing crisis: findings from 16 national violent death reporting system states, 2005–2010. American Journal of Public Health, 105(2), 311-316.

[5] Price-Feeney, M., Green, A. E., & Dorison, S. (2020). Understanding the mental health of transgender and nonbinary youth. Journal of Adolescent Health.

[6] “LGBTQ Youth In the Foster Care System” Human Rights Campaign Foundation. Available at: https://hrc-prod-requests.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/files/assets/resources/HRC-YouthFosterCare-IssueBrief-FINAL.pdf?mtime=20200713134001&focal=none

[7] U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration on Children, Youth and Families (2011). Information Memorandum on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Questioning Youth in Foster Care. Available at: http://www.nrcyd.ou.edu/publication-db/documents/acyf-cb-im-11-03.pdf

[8] Carolyn Crist (December 23, 2016) “LGBT Individuals More Likely to Be Incarcerated” Reuters. Available at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-lgbt-incarceration-usa/lgbt-individuals-more-likely-to-be-incarcerated-idUSKBN14C1ZI

[9] Carolyn Crist, 2016.

[10] US Transgender Survey (2015). Report on the Experience of Black Respondents https://www.transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTSBlackRespondentsReport-Nov17.pdf; US Transgender Survey (2015). Report on the Experience of Latino/a Respondents https://www.transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTSLatinReport-Nov17.pdf; US Transgender Survey (2015). Report on the Experience of American Indian and Alaska Native Respondents https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTS-AIAN-Report-Dec17.pdf; US Transgender Survey (2015). Report on the Experience of Asian, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Respondents https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTS-ANHPI-Report-Dec17.pdf.

[11] Law, Victoria. (April 5, 2016). “Discrimination in Parole Hearings Keeps Trans Prisoners Behind Bars, Advocates Say.” Truthout. https://truthout.org/articles/discrimination-in-parole-hearings-keeps-trans-prisoners-behind-bars-advocates-say/

[12] Beth Schwartzapfel, Katie Park, and Andrew Demillo (December 18, 2020) “1 in 5 Prisoners in the US has had COVID-19, 1,700 have died” ABS News. Available at: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/prisoners-us-covid-19-1700-died-74797059