On December 2019, COVID-19 or "coronavirus disease, 2019" emerged in a food market in Wuhan, China. Since its emergence, millions of people have been infected, with cases reported in almost every country on Earth. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that, as of July 30th, 2020, there have been 4,405,932 cases of the Coronavirus in the United States. Additionally, there have been 150,283 deaths from the virus. The state of California alone has a total of 475,305 reported cases, despite Governor Newsom's mandatory shelter-in-place order. Consequently, coronavirus cases and deaths in the United States remain by far the highest in the world. The coronavirus pandemic has also highlighted shortcomings and exacerbated social inequities within the United States, sparking the onset of advocate groups and youth activism in initiatives like BLM and Stop AAPI Hate. 

Coronavirus-related hate crimes against Asian Americans have spiked significantly nationwide, as the imagery of Asian identified people flooded the news and social media as disease carriers and perpetual threats. From February 9th through March 7th alone, 471 cases related to xenophobia or discrimination were reported, and ten claims per day were identified by the Asian Pacific Policy & Planning Council (A3PCON), Chinese for Affirmative Action (CAA) organizations, and the Asian American Studies Department at San Francisco State University (Jeung). These cases range from verbal assaults to violent attacks. Asian Americans, in the past, have faced discriminatory and biased American immigration and public health policies. For Asian Americans during this global health crisis, they are facing a pandemic of health and a pandemic of hate. APID/A has identified individuals who have been experienced discrimination amid the epidemic. "Earlier this year, he [President Donald Trump] regularly referred to the coronavirus as the "Chinese virus" — a term that critics said did not distinguish between China, the Chinese government, and people of Chinese ethnicity." (Cheung, Feng, & Deng, 2020). The Coronavirus has also been referred to as "kung flu," placing blame abroad instead of addressing the fracturing healthcare system in the United States. The Coronavirus's origin of China has associated the virus to people of Asian descent and made them easy targets of racist and hate crimes. 

Coronavirus's impact can be felt around the world, as parts of society are facing unprecedented problems and highlighting some that have always been there. With high healthcare costs, lack of medical personnel and equipment, and overlapping systems between public and private sectors, the United States is immensely vulnerable to the Coronavirus. "Before the crisis even began, the United States had fewer doctors and fewer hospital beds per capita than most other developed countries.” Health care workers face a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) because of "the supply chain. The U.S. has been making fewer masks, gowns, and gloves domestically, and instead relied on importing those items from other countries." However, the countries that manufacture PPE products had their factories shut down because of the Coronavirus or use the items for themselves. Additionally, to the international factories shutting down, schools and businesses have been forced to shut down to slow the spread of the virus. As a result, schools have moved to remote learning and online classes. Remote learning raises concerns that disproportionately affect low-income students as additional barriers are raised against equitable access to education. Additionally, teachers find it harder to teach online and worried about the academic progress for the children. Similarly to schools being close, unessential businesses are being forced to close suddenly. “More than 99% of all businesses are small businesses, and they employ about half the US workforce. Most small businesses lack the cash reserves to weather a month-long interruption, and forecasts indicate more than 2 million workers could lose their jobs in just one week as a result of the coronavirus pandemic." The Coronavirus has created a drastic shift in many industries that have caused and highlighted issues within our society. In our project, we aim to educate others regarding these circumstances about Asian Americans and the APID/A community.