Fifty Percent of People Testing Positive for COVID-19 in Kansas City are Black

Jae Bennett began coughing last Saturday afternoon after visiting some Kansas City homeless camps as part of his job with a nonprofit.

By that evening, his dry cough had worsened and his temperature climbed to 104 degrees.

For the next 48 hours, he frantically searched for a place to get tested for the new coronavirus. He eventually found a clinic and was tested Monday, but it wasn’t easy.

“You have to do your due diligence,” Bennett said. He suspects many people in his shoes, especially other black Kansas Citians, might give up and not get tested at all.

Because of a widespread lack of testing, it is likely that only about 10% of coronavirus cases here are being reported, according to the Kansas City Health Department. As of Friday, 1,097 cases and 44 deaths have been reported in the five-county Kansas City metropolitan area. But the preliminary data already points to a troubling trend.

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