Bay Area

Opinion: Racist Harassment of Asian Health Care Workers Won’t Cure Coronavirus

Published

5 years ago

April 16, 2020

On his way to work, a doctor was told to “go back to f—— China.” An Asian nurse delivering medicine to a sick patient was spat on. And parents at a children’s hospital refused care from health care staff with “Asian appearances.”

Violent hate crimes against Asian Americans have surged across the United States recently due to xenophobic perceptions that all Asian people are carriers of COVID-19. But some forms of harassment have been directed specifically at the Asian physicians and nurses risking their own health and safety to battle the spread of the virus in hospitals across the country.

“It’s really heartbreaking,” said UC Berkeley ethnic studies professor Catherine Ceniza Choy. “These health workers are parents, they’re daughters and sons. They are sisters and brothers. They’re our neighbors. … This is an additional level of trauma, anxiety and stress that we don’t need to place on them.”

UC Berkeley ethnic studies professor Catherine Ceniza Choy is also the author of Empire of Care: Nursing and Migration in Filipino American History. (Photo courtesy of Kirsten Lara Getchell).

Catherine Ceniza Choy, UC Berkeley ethnic studies professor.

UC Berkeley ethnic studies professor Catherine Ceniza Choy is also the author of Empire of Care: Nursing and Migration in Filipino American History. (Photo courtesy of Kirsten Lara Getchell)

Choy has taught at Berkeley since 2004 and has long studied Asian American history and ethnic studies. Some of her research has focused on the reasons why Asian countries, most notably the Philippines, have become the leading exporters of nurses to the United States.

According to the Pew Research Center, the Asian population in the U.S. is the fastest-growing ethnic group in the country. Some of that growth comes from Asian-born health care workers that migrate here. A Thomson Reuters report found that, of health care professionals surveyed in the United States, 17% were foreign-born, and Asian-born staff made up the most.

In California alone, 25% of active registered nurses are either Asian-born or Asian American, according to research from the Healthforce Center at UCSF.

Despite having so many Asian health care workers on the front lines combating COVID-19, the history of associating Asians as disease carriers is repeating itself, said Choy.

“There’s a longer history of blaming Asia and Asian migrants and, by extension, Asian Americans for outbreaks of disease,” she said. “COVID-19 is just the most current example of this history.”

Choy talked with Berkeley News about that history and the reasons xenophobia can halt collective attempts to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

Berkeley News: What has the experience been like for Asian health workers amidst this pandemic?

Cathy Ceniza Choy: We’re seeing reports of how stressed health workers are because of the incredible numbers of patients coming in with symptoms of COVID-19, and because they don’t have the personal protective equipment to protect themselves from the virus.

They have to go home to their families, and they don’t want to expose them, so many of them are isolating themselves away from their family members. It’s so heartbreaking. Many of them are also Asian migrants or Asian American.

Historically, the U.S. has been the leading recipient of over 150,000 Filipino nurse migrants who have come to this country to work in hospitals that are often serving the most underserved populations, in inner-city hospitals, as well as rural areas.

They are also currently on the front lines of fighting this pandemic.

So, we need to be very careful not to blame these health workers for this disease, because, in addition to being human beings, they are taking care of our parents, our siblings, our spouses. They might be taking care of you, and they don’t need that added stress while trying to save lives.

For most of us right now, in terms of honoring the shelter-in-place orders, we’re able to do that because there are health workers like Filipino nurses, and Asian Indian immigrant physicians, who comprise the largest number of foreign-trained physicians in the U.S.

We can be with our families because they are doing what they do.

What is the history of blaming Asians for the spread of disease, and how does that history relate to today?

Tragically, there is a longer history of this association between Asians as disease carriers, and a longer history of blaming Asian and Asian migrants and, by extension, Asian Americans, for outbreaks of disease. COVID-19 is just the most current example of this history.

Chinese Americans and Chinatowns in the U.S. were linked to smallpox outbreaks in the 19th century. In the early 1900s, Japanese arrivals to the U.S. were racially profiled and also targeted for examination because they were associated with the bubonic plague.

This has also impacted Filipinos in the Philippines, which was an official U.S. colony from 1898 to 1946. Health officials would refer to Filipino bodies as ‘incubators of leprosy.’ They used outbreaks of cholera in the Philippines to justify U.S. colonialism, saying that white Americans could bring health in the form of sanitation.

COVID-19, unfortunately, has been called the ‘Chinese virus.’ That is a misnomer because pandemics and diseases see no national borders. They don’t recognize color. They don’t see the ethnic enclave borders of a Chinatown or a Chinese restaurant.

But we know that President Trump and some of our politicians have used that reference in their communication about COVID-19.

As we’ve seen, though, the historical linkage between Asian bodies and disease, and the rise in hate crimes, have impacted all Asians and the Asian diaspora throughout the world — not solely Chinese and Chinese Americans.

Ivan Natividad

Posts by Ivan Natividad

Related Topics:Coronavirus covid 19 discrimination discrimination health care workers Racism

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Oakland Post: Week of May 21 – 27, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of May 21 – 27, 2025

Published

3 days ago

May 25, 2025

Oakland Post

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Chevron Richmond Installs Baker Hughes Flare.IQ, Real-time Flare Monitoring, Control and Reduction System

While the sight of flaring can cause concern in the community, flares are essential safety systems that burn pollutants to prevent them from being released directly into the atmosphere. They activate during startup and shut-down of facility units or during upsets or equipment malfunctions. The typical flare stack is about 200 feet high so that vapors are well above street levels.

Published

1 week ago

May 19, 2025

Oakland Post

Image courtesy The Richmond Standard.

The Richmond Standard

Chevron Richmond recently installed flare.IQ, a real-time, automated system that will improve the facility’s flaring performance.

The technology, developed by Panametrics, a Baker Hughes business, uses sensors to monitor, reduce and control flaring in real time. It collects and assesses data on refinery processes, such as temperature, pressure, gas flow and gas composition, and adjusts accordingly to ensure flares burn more efficiently and cleanly, leading to fewer emissions.

“The cleaner the flare, the brighter the flame can look,” said Duy Nguyen, a Chevron Richmond flaring specialist. “If you see a brighter flame than usual on a flare, that actually means flare.IQ is operating as intended.”

“A key element in Baker Hughes’ emissions abatement portfolio, flare.IQ has a proven track record in optimizing flare operations and significantly reducing emissions,” said Colin Hehir, vice president of Panametrics, a Baker Hughes business. “By partnering with Chevron Richmond, one of the first operators in North America to adopt flare.IQ, we are looking forward to enhancing the plant’s flaring operations.”

The installation of flare.IQ is part of a broader and ongoing effort by Chevron Richmond to improve flare performance, particularly in response to increased events after the new, more efficient hydrogen plant was brought online in 2019.

Since then, the company has invested $25 million — and counting — into flare minimization. As part of the effort, a multidisciplinary refinery team was formed to find and implement ways to improve operational reliability and ultimately reduce flaring. Operators and other employees involved in management of flares and flare gas recovery systems undergo new training.

“It is important to me that the community knows we are working hard to lower emissions and improve our flaring performance,” Nguyen said.

Also evolving is the process by which community members are notified of flaring incidents. The Community Warning System (CWS), operated by Contra Costa County is an “all-hazard” public warning system.

Residents can opt-in to receive alerts via text, e-mail and landline. The CWS was recently expanded to enable residents to receive notifications for “Level 1” incidents, which are considered informational as they do not require any community action.

For more information related to these topics, check out the resources included on the Chevron Richmond, CAER and Contra Costa Health websites. Residents are also encouraged to follow @chevronrichmond and @RFDCAOnline on Facebook and X (formerly Twitter), where additional information may be posted during an incident.

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Oakland Hosts Town Hall Addressing Lead Hazards in City Housing

According to the city, there are 22,000 households in need of services for lead issues, most in predominantly low-income or Black and Latino neighborhoods, but only 550 to 600 homes are addressed every year. The city is hoping to use part of the multimillion-dollar settlement to increase the number of households served each year.

Published

1 week ago

May 18, 2025

Oakland Post

iStock.

By Magaly Muñoz

The City of Oakland’s Housing and Community Development Department hosted a town hall in the Fruitvale to discuss the efforts being undertaken to remove lead primarily found in housing in East and West Oakland.

In 2021, the city was awarded $14 million out of a $24 million legal settlement from a lawsuit against paint distributors for selling lead-based paint that has affected hundreds of families in Oakland and Alameda County. The funding is intended to be used for lead poisoning reduction and prevention services in paint only, not water or other sources as has been found recently in schools across the city.

The settlement can be used for developing or enhancing programs that abate lead-based paint, providing services to individuals, particularly exposed children, educating the public about hazards caused by lead paint, and covering attorney’s fees incurred in pursuing litigation.

Most of the homes affected were built prior to 1978, and 12,000 of these homes are considered to be at high risk for lead poisoning.

City councilmember Noel Gallo, who represents a few of the lead-affected Census tracts, said the majority of the poisoned kids and families are coming directly from neighborhoods like the Fruitvale.

“When you look at the [kids being admitted] at the children’s hospital, they’re coming from this community,” Gallo said at the town hall.

In order to eventually rid the highest impacted homes of lead poisoning, the city intends to create programs and activities such as lead-based paint inspections and assessments, full abatement designed to permanently eliminate lead-based paint, or partial abatement for repairs, painting, and specialized cleaning meant for temporary reduction of hazards.

In feedback for what the city could implement in their programming, residents in attendance of the event said they want more accessibility to resources, like blood testing, and information from officials about lead poisoning symptoms, hotlines for assistance, and updates on the reduction of lead in their communities.

Attendees also asked how they’d know where they are on the prioritization list and what would be done to address lead in the water found at several school sites in Oakland last year.

City staff said there will be a follow-up event to gather more community input for programming in August, with finalizations happening in the fall and a pilot launch in early 2026.