Update on April 25, 2018: A federal judge orders the U.S. government to continue Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and accept new applicants, according to the Washington Post. Immigration is a politically divisive issue. It can be hard to keep in mind that real people are affected, no matter what your political views. People's livelihoods began to hang in the balance in September 2017 when U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that the Trump administration would be rescinding the DACA. DACA is an Obama administration program begun in 2012 that allows undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children to apply to defer deportation and legally reside in the country for two years. They can apply for reinstatement after. How many ...
The White House has proposed changing immigration policy to allow citizenship for up to 1.8 million young people brought into the U.S. as children—in addition to a $25 billion border wall and other security measures, USA Today reports. The proposed bill would blaze a path to citizenship for DREAMers, undocument immigrants who came to the U.S. as children. DREAMers have been in limbo since the Trump Administration rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which was created by the Obama Administration to allow undocumented children brought to the U.S. to remain here. The bill, which will be introduced to the House and Senate in the coming weeks, would for the first time provide a clear path to citizenship for 1.8 million undocumented immigrants that ...
Some areas of San Antonio (68% Latino) are much harder to live in than others. Latinos in these areas face more hardship, health problems, and die sooner. In fact, everyone living in these areas faces more hardship, health problems, and dies sooner. Lily Casura and other grad students in Social Work at the College of Public Policy at UT San Antonio (UTSA) mapped ZIP-code level data and launched a project to explore life lived in four difficult-to-live ZIP Codes in San Antonio. Their goal is to deepen conversations about equity and investment to improve quality of life. January 2019 UPDATE: Casura continues to gift San Antonio with interactive maps, to include results of the 2018 Community Needs Assessment.
Why ZIP Codes?
Everyone can visualize the physical environment of ...
Imagine a world where every person has the opportunity to attain full health potential—with no disadvantages due to race, money, etc. That is health equity. Unfortunately, Latinos and other people of color often struggle with health inequity as a result of poverty, structural racism, and discrimination. This causes gaps in how long Latinos live and how they struggle with disease and health, compared to their peers, according to the new Communities in Action: Pathways to Health report from thew National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. The new report does have some good news: Communities have agency to promote health equity. However, community-based solutions are necessary but not sufficient.
Supportive public and private policies at all levels and ...
Three in four U.S. Latinos (78%) believe Latinos face discrimination in America today, compared to 92% of blacks and 55% of whites who say they face discrimination, according to a new poll. Who is doing the discriminating? Nearly half of Latinos (47%) believe personal prejudice is the bigger problem. A smaller amount (37%) say say discrimination based in laws and government policies is the bigger problem. About 14% say they're equally problematic. The data is from a new poll by National Public Radio (NPR), the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. "Basically what we have found is that discrimination is a type of stressful life experience that has negative effects on health similar to other kinds of stressful experiences," ...
Nearly 94% of the 18 million Latino kids living in the United States today were born here. Their moms and dads are a different story. About half of Latino kids have at least one parent who was born outside of the U.S., and about four million of these also have at least one parent who is not authorized to be in the country, according to new data from the National Research Center on Hispanic Children & Families. The new data have big implications for the wellness of these children.
Immigration, Kids, and Mental Health
Living with the threat of deportation and the separation from a parent can harm a child. It may cause “fear or anxiety that can affect children's physical and mental health, as well as their development,” the new data shows. One in four Latino kids are ...
Sacramento has mild weather, light rail, and many bike paths. But people still heavily depend on cars in this 23% Latino city, according to its relatively low walk score. Sacramento also is like many other California cities, where urban planners face a big challenge to create more ways for a rising population to walk and bike. Fortunately, a group of diverse youth are making a difference for more walking, bicycling, and skating.
Youth Step Up for Safer Streets
The Walk & Bike Youth Leaders Program started in Sacramento in 2017, thanks to the California Bicycle Coalition, California Walks, and the California Center for Civic Participation. Program organizers chose 11 youth ages 16-23. The youth will partake in four online training sessions. They will learn how to ...
President Donald Trump's administration recently rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), an American immigration policy signed by President Barack Obama five years ago. DACA allows unauthorized immigrants who arrived in the United States as children to work, go to school, and get a driver’s license without fear of deportation. The clock is now ticking for a Congressional fix for people who qualify for DACA. If not, recipients could lose their status starting March 5, 2018.
Who are DACA recipients?
Since the program started in June 2012, most DACA recipients are in Latino-centric states: California (222,795) followed by Texas (124,000) and Illinois (42,376). Unauthorized immigrants from Mexico make up more than three-quarters of all DACA ...
For many immigrant families, the current political climate adds a great deal of stress to their lives. Many Latinos already face inequities in health care; they are still the largest uninsured population in the U.S. In South Carolina (5.2% Latino population), this stress is now manifesting in even harsher ways. According to a report in The Post and Courier, many immigrant families in the state are not only foregoing health care services for the adult family members, but also their children. “We’ve gotten calls from the health department of mothers not coming to ... appointments, not showing up for immunizations,” said Julie Smithwick, executive director of the Latino assistance group PASOs. The statewide group connects Latino patients to health care resources across South ...
