Violence increased most in marginalized neighborhoods early in the COVID-19 pandemic

During the first five months of the pandemic in 2020, low-income communities of color experienced significantly greater increases in firearm violence, homicides and assaults compared to more affluent, white neighborhoods.

Previous studies showed increases in violence in U.S. cities during the pandemic but did not indicate where violence was highest or increased most within those cities.

“We found that zip codes with higher concentrations of low-income Black people and people of color experienced substantially higher rates of violence from March to July 2020 than did zip codes with higher concentrations of high-income white people,” said Julia Schleimer, the lead author of the study and a research data analyst at VPRP.