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A new study has found that New York City health inspectors gave only Asian restaurants a disproportionate number of citations at the start of the pandemic.

The study from New York University analyzed data from the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and looked at monthly averages of citations by cuisine type from January 2017 to February 2020. From that, they created a predictive model to identify if January 2020 to February 2020 followed the same pattern over the last three years. 

They found that citations for Asian restaurants increased .66% but the change in gaps between predicted and actual citations showed that restaurants with Asian food had an increase of 617% from December 2019 to February 2020.

Hua-Yu Sebastian Cherng, the lead author of the study, said, “The COVID-19 pandemic created a racial reckoning among many Asian Americans as physical and verbal attacks spiked during this period. And while we know Asian restaurants suffered due to widespread stereotypes, both existing and new, few studies have uncovered how government institutions may have perpetuated these inequalities.” 

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