As part of the COVID-19 recovery, we need to understand how COVID-19 and the associated public health response disproportionately affected key communities. However, the absence of national race disaggregated data has limited understanding of the specific challenges faced by African, Caribbean, and Black (ACB) people in Canada.

 

 

The African, Caribbean, and Black Community PHAC-funded COVID-19 Impact (APCI) study was undertaken in collaboration with community stakeholders to rectify the scarcity of data on the impact of COVID-19 on the social determinants of health and access to healthcare services in ACB communities across the country.

 

We have created an APCI study Data Visualization Dashboard where you can see and use visualizations of data collected from 1,556 people who completed the APCI survey between May and July 2021.  By creating this data visualization dashboard, we hope to enable and inspire community members, researchers, policy makers, front-line service providers and other stakeholders to use these data to inform programming, policy, research, and advocacy to improve the health and well-being of ACB people across Canada.

 

Once you arrive at the Dashboard homepage, go to the top right corner and click on ‘Sections’. From there you can choose the survey topic that you'd like to explore including data on Mental Health & Wellness; Financial status, housing stability, and food security; Domestic Violence; Racism, stigma, and discrimination; Substance use and harm reduction services; and Sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections (STBBI) prevention, testing, and treatment services. For each question, you can look at the data for the overall sample and then by one of four socio-demographic characteristics: Age Group, Gender, Ethnic Identity, and Province. If you click on ‘Methods’ you can read more about how we conducted the APCI study and how we created the Data Visualization Dashboard. 

 

The interface is friendly so go ahead and try it now by clicking here: https://apci.research.sfu.ca/

 

For example, if you are writing a grant application and need specific data on how the COVID-19 response affected mental health among ACB youth, you can easily download a visual from the dashboard that summarizes this data. If you are writing a research proposal and need specific data on gender differences in the impacts of the COVID-19 response on experiences of domestic violence, you can examine these data on the dashboard and download the relevant figures. If you are giving a World AIDS Day presentation about disruptions in access STBBI services among ACB people by province, you can examine these data on the dashboard and download the visual to include in your slides. There are so many ways that we can learn from and use the APCI data as summarized on the data visualization dashboard.

 

By creating this dashboard, we hope that these data will contribute to evidence-informed actions to improve equity, health, and quality of life in ACB communities across Canada.

 

If you have any questions or feedback, please contact the APCI Data Visualization Dashboard team at co-creath@uottawa.ca.
 
Thank you very much
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Margaret Nansumba
Internationally Educated Medical Graduate and Health science researcher

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