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Comment and Society

Race is a social construct, but racism can cause real biological harm

Research exploring the effects of racism on the brain suggests there is reason to be concerned about potential long-term damage, finds Layal Liverpool

By Layal Liverpool

5 June 2024

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Simone Rotella

It has been more than four years since Darnella Frazier, then a teenager, captured on camera the murder of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, by white police officer Derek Chauvin in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Yet the impact on Frazier’s brain of what she witnessed could linger for much longer.

“I still hold the weight and trauma of what I witnessed,” Frazier wrote in a social media post on the one-year anniversary of Floyd’s murder. “I’m not who I used to be. A part of my childhood was taken from me.”

Burgeoning evidence suggests racism causes stress and trauma that can …

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