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| Faces of the uninsured |
Pahola Zambrano
Washington Hoy
05/27/2005
| Pahola Zambrano |
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| Inés Lima: One among too many uninsured
Hispanics. |
Inés Lima, immigrant of Bolivia, came with a desire of a better
life. She came more than willing to work for and earn the promise
of equality and opportunity. Things often impossible to obtain in
her native Bolivia. But as Inés has now learned, those promises
have also been denied to her in the land of opportunities.
She has lived first hand how unfair and unpromising the system can
be. As a a hardworking taxpayer, Inés expected to be offered
benefits by her employer. Benefits such as health coverage, that most
Americans feel entitled to.
But those expectations passed on as Inés was confronted with
the imbalanced structure of health coverage for inmigrants. With a
family to support and a low paying job without benefits it was near
impossible for Inés to obtain medical insurance coverage.
When she fell ill with a serious condition in which one of her lung
filled up with fluid, Inés tried to find help to cover the
cost for the surgery that she urgently needed. Not qualifying for
any government subsidized health coverage and finding no one to help
her, Inés chose to leave the country to get operated in Bolivia.
Having to leave the country and her job for six months put a toll
on her economic situation and left her without even being able to
afford her rent on her return.
This story is all too familiar for Latinos. Disparities in health
coverage for Hispanics is an overwhelmingly alarming problem. While
Hispanics make up 13% of the U.S population, they make a staggering
32.% of the uninsured in comparison to 11 % of whites while they make
68% of the total population (2002, U.S Census Bureau).
The problem that many Hispanics like Inés have is that Latinos
are more likely to have lower paying jobs. Those lower income jobs
are less likely to offer coverage by employer and not enough money
comes in to pay a premium. The likelihood of having health insurance
rises with income.
Another common factor to this problem is the ineligibility of many
immigrants to programs such as Medicaid. Undocumented immigrants are
denied entrance in federal programs in many states leaving them to
stall on receiving preventive care, making the group to have higher
rates of illness and premature death. According to the institute of
medicine, each year more than 18,000 adults in America die because
they lack coverage “Cost effectively, it is smarter to expand
coverage, If you don’t have access to health care, you get sick.
Sick people exhaust the system,” says Britt Weinstock, Director
of Minority Health Initiatives.
Putting it in a socioeconomic perspective, it’s not only an
issue of inequality or health but also one of threat for America’s
future. |
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