It’s generally acknowledged that among health disorders that predispose a person to more severe COVID there are many that are correlated with race, ie. socioeconomic factors such as lack of access to affordable health care. You note that there is research that controls for race alone vs. these predisposing disorders. I might be persuaded if you provided references/links to one or more of these research reports. In the absence of evidence of a distinct and exclusively racial predisposition to COVID, it seems that claiming race as a factor unnecessarily inflames racial animosity and gives white folks who seek to claim ‘reverse racism’ something to squawk about. Wouldn’t a system that assigns points for the disorders that actually predispose one to more severe COVID cover more people of color in proportion with their additional predisposition to these disorders due to racially correlated socioeconomic disadvantage? Such a system would preferentially serve those so disadvantaged without unnecessarily stirring up racial animosities.