Location of Katrina Deaths Upends Previous Assumptions

The work was done by Knight Ridder and suggests that many of the assumptions about those who died in Katrina are perhaps misplaced.

Knight Ridder took addresses where bodies were recovered from data from Louisiana state officials and and plotted them on maps of Orleans and St. Bernard parishes. Those locations were then compared with census data on income in those neighborhoods. A number of bodies were excluded including those recovered from hospitals and nursing homes, and body collection points.

What does the study show?

- the victims weren’t disproportionately poor
- they also weren’t disproportionately African American
- the elderly were disproportionately impacted though many had cars in the driveway

- Knight Ridder via The Olympian