Citation: Shahid, Hina Javaid, and Sufyan Abid Dogra. 2022. The Muslim Gaze and the COVID-19 Syndemic. Religions 13: 780. https://doi.org/10.3390/ rel13090780 Academic Editor: Jeff Levin Received: 15 January 2022 Accepted: 8 August 2022 Published: 25 August 2022 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affil- iations. Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/). religions Article The Muslim Gaze and the COVID-19 Syndemic Hina Javaid Shahid 1,2, * and Sufyan Abid Dogra 3 1 Muslim Doctors Association, London E16 2DQ, UK 2 Allied Health Professionals CIC, Suffolk IP23 7BH, UK 3 Bradford Institute for Health Research, Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Bradford BD9 6RJ, UK * Correspondence: chair@muslimdoctors.org Abstract: COVID-19 has replicated and intensified pre-existing health inequities by creating a vicious syndemic that brings together concurrent biological, psychosocial and structural epidemics with synergistic interactions that reinforce unequal outcomes. In the UK, the Muslim community has been disproportionately impacted by excess morbidity and mortality from COVID-19. This article uses a transdisplinary lens in the context of COVID-19 to analyse the role of Islamophobia as a fundamental driver of health inequities in Britain’s Muslim community. It highlights multilevel policy reforms and recommendations that centre community empowerment, social justice and cultural humility to close the gap and achieve justice and good health for all. Keywords: public health; health inequalities; Muslims; Islamophobia 1. Introduction COVID-19 was declared a pandemic on 11 March 2020. It was first reported in China in December 2019, although evidence suggests it was circulating in Europe before this (Amendola et al. 2021). The virus spread to all continents, except Antarctica, in less than four months. To date, almost 171,396 people have died and over 21 million people have been infected in the UK. COVID-19 has not been a leveller but has been a great revealer, shining a light on pre-existing disparities in society; those who already experienced social and health inequities on the margins of society have been disproportionately impacted, further increasing marginalisation. After campaigning by community and faith groups on publishing data by faith groups, the government published its report in June 2020, which showed that Muslims had the highest risk of dying from COVID (Office for National Statistics 2020a). There are mul- tiple reasons for the disproportionate numbers of deaths related to COVID-19 among British Muslims, such as living in deprivation, poverty, structural inequalities, racism and Islamophobia. However, after accounting for deprivation and ethnicity, this excess risk disappeared, consistent with structural discrimination, racism and Islamophobia as the main drivers of disparities in the Muslim community as these are exacerbated in a post-9/11 political context in West. These structural disparities are not new; prior to COVID-19 it was well known that Muslims face some of the worst outcomes in domains of social mobility, housing, education, employment and income as well as pre-existing poor health outcomes (Ali 2015). A more appropriate term for COVID-19 is that it is a syndemic, bringing together concurrent biological, psychosocial and structural epidemics with synergistic interactions that reinforce unequal outcomes. The excess disease burden of COVID-19 experienced by Muslims in the UK necessitates a new framework for health policy and action that predicts, controls and mitigates risks to close an unacceptable, unfair and unjust gap. This paper is a critical analysis; at the time of writing the world is grappling with the Omicron variant of coronavirus. Application of lessons learnt is vital and urgent as we continue to enter cycles Religions 2022, 13, 780. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel13090780 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/religions