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Pulse oximeters are one of the most commonly used tools in medicine. The small devices, which resemble a clothespin, measure blood oxygen when clipped onto a fingertip, and they can quickly indicate whether a patient needs urgent medical care.

Health providers use them when they take vital signs and when they evaluate patients for treatment. Ever since the pandemic started, doctors have encouraged patients with Covid to use them at home.

But in Black patients, the devices can provide misleading results in more than one in 10 people, according to a new study.

The largest burden of Covid-19 has undoubtedly fallen on people older than 65; they account for around 80 percent of deaths in the United States. But if we momentarily eclipse that from our mind’s eye, something else becomes visible: The corona of this virus.