Eric Moreno is a Content Curator with the Salud America! program at UT Health San Antonio. He specializes in covering the topics of health equity and family and social support. He holds a BA from the University of Texas at San Antonio and an MA from Gonzaga University.
The east side neighborhood of San Antonio (63.2% Latino) struggles with socioeconomic hardships, health disparities, and a lack of access to quality healthcare. In the past few years, the nonprofit Eastside Promise Neighborhood (EPN) has sought ways to improve conditions for residents in the city’s east side. To solve the gap in the availability of healthcare options in the area and fight health disparities, the EPN partnered with a provider, CommuniCare Health Partners, to open a new health clinic in the area.
Latinos in need in San Antonio
San Antonio’s historic east side neighborhood is home to 17,955 residents (mostly Latino), more than 200 private businesses, and six schools on 3.5 square miles bounded by Interstate 37 to the west, Fort Sam Houston to the north, AT&T ...
Latinos have seen some of the biggest gains of any ethnic group under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), yet their uninsured rate remains higher than that of other groups. Enroll America and its partners are teaming up to encourage Latinos to take part in the ACA and obtain quality, affordable health insurance. Open enrollment for the ACA is currently underway and ends on January 31. Enroll America is offering these five tips for Latino families about their health insurance options: People with many different immigration statuses may be eligible to sign up: Both citizens and lawfully present non-citizens may be eligible for coverage through the Health Insurance Marketplace, Medicaid, and CHIP.
Non-eligible family members can apply on behalf of eligible dependents. For example, ...
A recent report by the National Center for Education Statistics reported that the racial gap between high school graduation rates remains large. There are wide disparities in the racial gap in high school graduation rates in the 50 states, especially between Latinos and non-Hispanic whites. The overall graduation rate of Latino high school students in the U.S. is 76.3%; the state with the highest rate is West Virginia at 89% and the lowest is Minnesota at 63.2%. Conversely, the state with the highest rate of graduation for non-Hispanic whites was New Jersey at 93.5% with New Mexico having the lowest at 74.7%. In Minnesota, the gap between Latinos and whites was greatest at over 23% while the lowest gap was in 2% in Alabama: Latinos 85%, non-Hispanic whites 87.8%. The ...
The Ohio Commission on Hispanic-Latino Affairs (OCHLA) recently released their year-end report on the progress made by the state’s ever-growing Latino population. The report calls for more to be done to ensure that Latinos receive better quality healthcare outcomes. From the report: “As the Ohio population continues to grow and diversify, the importance of a culturally and linguistically competent workforce in healthcare, education, and government cannot be overstated.” The report, entitled “Ohio’s Changing Face: The Case for Culturally Responsive Institutions,” focused on the current state of cultural competence in healthcare, education, and governance in terms of the Latino population. It was found that Ohio lags behind the efforts of neighboring states in the areas of ...
In large part due to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the number of uninsured Latinos has drastically decreased in the last few years. However, according to the latest data, Latinos still remain the largest racial and ethnic group with the highest rate of uninsured individuals. The ACA is currently in its third open enrollment, which ends at the end of this month on Jan. 31. “The Latino community still suffers from health disparities like disproportionate rates of asthma, diabetes and certain cancers,” Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell said. “But with better access to better checkups, diet counseling and many cancer screenings, we can begin to close these gaps." Agencies and organizations, such as Enroll America, are working to spread ...
The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFKA) was passed in 2010 with the goal of improving child nutrition. The Act proved to be historic investment in the health of the nation’s children, especially Latinos who have been traditionally underserved by nutritional standards. One of the primary changes to come from the act was the introduction of updated school nutrition standards. Over 97% of the schools in the country report that they are meeting the updated standards. Previously the United States Drug Administration (USDA) determined that 17.4 million American households were at risk for hunger in (in a report from 2009); this included one in four Latino families. Among them, households with children were more likely than average to face very low food security among children. “The ...
The Roundtable on the Promotion of Health Equity and the Elimination of Health Disparities helps create dialogue on racial and ethnic disparities in health and healthcare. Created by the Institute of Medicine in 2007, the Roundtable examines the development of programs and strategies to reduce disparities. For the past several years, a major topic of discussion has been the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and its effects upon ethnic and racial minorities. The ACA has several provisions specifically designed to encourage minorities to participate in eliminating the gap in health disparities. A workshop was held recently to discuss the effects of the ACA at the Mark Twain House and Museum in Hartford, CT, entitled “Achieving Health Equity via the Affordable Care Act: Promises, Provisions, ...
Health giant Kaiser Permanente will open a new medical school in 2019 and one of its goals will be to add diversity to the country’s physicians, especially in the state of California. The Oakland-based healthcare system, which combines a nonprofit insurance plan with operating 38 hospitals across the country, specializes in integrated care encouraging doctors to work in teams and use technology to control costs and give patients more effective coordinated care. The company has made a commitment to recruit more minority students, especially Latinos, and teach doctors how to care for a diverse patient population such as is present in states like California. Currently, many ethnic groups are underrepresented in medical schools. This has led to concerns that doctors might struggle in the ...
The Strategic Growth Council recently released their final guidelines for the Affordable Housing Sustainable Communities (AHSC) program. The new guidelines reflect the feedback received during the program’s first year from its first round of applicants and its stakeholders. The changes were put into place to strengthen the AHSC and cover a range of topics including revising scoring criteria, projects in rural areas, and community benefits and engagement. The Safe Routes to School National Partnership worked with Sustainable Communities for All (SC4A), and the Coalition for Active Transportation Leadership (CATL), three of the program’s main stakeholders, to promote improvements for active transportation and to increase funding for walking and bicycling in communities in ...
