Tag: refugee health

Federal government to take on more healthcare costs of refugees; relieve local health departments

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

One of the first things a “welcoming” community in America becomes aware of is the cost of refugee health care at a county health department.

We first became aware of how quickly “pockets of resistance” grow locally when a health department is overloaded with refugee vaccination needs and medical treatment costs for such diseases as TB and HIV/AIDS.   Here is one of our earliest posts on the problem in Ft. Wayne, Indiana (2007!).

Now we see that the US State Department and the CDC are going to try to get a greater number of refugees vaccinated abroad before they enter the US.  It sounds like a good move for medical reasons.  But, it also provides a fig leaf by shifting the cost from one group of taxpayers to the other.  While relieving the burden on local and state taxpayers, the costs will be borne by the federal taxpayers, so what is the difference!

Wyoming please note that if they are successful in vaccinating 56% abroad (we resettle on average 70,000 a year), that still leaves 30,800 or so refugees whose vaccination needs will be paid for by state and county taxpayers along with many other of their medical needs!  Wyoming Governor Matt Mead thinks the refugee program is free to Wyoming and that the federal government has a money tree!

From the CDC:

The refugees have agreed to participate in a vaccination project that will introduce multiple vaccines overseas, depending on age, before they arrive to the US. The project is a partnership between CDC’s Division of Global Migration and the US Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM). CDC and PRM are co-funding this project for approved refugee applicants in the US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP).The goal of the project is to provide cost-effective public health interventions, improve refugee health, and limit the number of vaccinations refugees will need after they arrive in the US. In addition to Kenya, the vaccination project is being implemented by IOM with USRAP in Ethiopia, Thailand, Malaysia, and Nepal.

[….]

This project has been implemented in five countries and will provide vaccinations overseas to 56 percent of US-bound refugees each year, saving state and local health departments from the cost and time to provide those vaccines after the refugees reach their new homes in the US.

And thereby eliminating an important driver of community resistance to refugee placement.

Buffalo, NY to hold special refugee health care summit

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

They must be having health problems with refugees in New York.  If you live in the area, it might be worth your while to try to get into this meeting.  LOL!  After all, you are a “stakeholder” too!

Jessica Scates: Health care providers must provide culturally engaged care. http://sphhp.buffalo.edu/global-health/about-us/our-staff.html

From University of Buffalo Reporter:

Every year, 1,500 to 2,000 refugees and asylum-seekers come to Buffalo — one of the top refugee resettlement areas in the United States — driven by social and political upheaval, war, economic and agricultural distress, and poverty.

Before they leave their homelands, they are provided health assessments, vaccine updates and any necessary medical treatment. But when they get here, it’s a different story. They often face substantial and complex problems when they try to gain access to the physical and mental health services required by them and their families.

To explore these challenges and develop models for exemplary refugee health care systems, the University at Buffalo will sponsor Buffalo’s first collaborative Refugee Health Summit on April 24 at the UB Educational Opportunity Center, 555 Ellicott St., Buffalo.

Participation in the Refugee Health Summit, which will take place from 12:30-7:30 p.m., is by invitation only. If interested in attending, contact Jessica Scates at jmscates@buffalo.edu.

[….]

It will feature major participation by Western New York’s four resettlement agencies: the International Institute of Buffalo, Catholic Charities of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service and Journey’s End Refugee Services, and by representatives of the refugee community itself.

[….]

Jessica Scates, coordinator of the OGHI, notes that as part of their orientation to Buffalo, refugees are educated about health care and health systems. “The challenge is to ready local health professionals to provide culturally engaged care to individuals from a variety of backgrounds,” she says. “Cultural education for local medical providers is especially important in addressing barriers to care, which can be complicated and difficult to resolve.”

Since there is an expanding Muslim population there, do you think they get into care for women and girls who undergo female genital mutilation?

See our archive on Buffalo, here.  See also our refugee health issues category with 209 previous posts.

Question for the Left: ‘Does an increase in the number of leprosy cases in US add to multi-culti diversity?’

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

That is what writer, Jeannie DeAngelis, at American Thinker asked yesterday in a piece entitled, ‘Do Liberals Care if Third World Illnesses Infect Americans?’   (Hat tip: Judy).

Leprosy! Multicultural disease diversity coming to a town near you?

Apparently inspired by something Obama’s old pal Bill Ayers said about how we white Europeans are responsible for knocking off Native Americans about 500 years ago, DeAngelis asked that question.

My only quibble with DeAngelis’s otherwise thorough accounting of the rise in diseases third worlders are bringing to America is that she attributes the spread solely to illegal immigrants.

With a health issues category of 197 posts on the subject, I can assure readers that the diseases are not all coming from the ILLEGAL aliens, but many are getting through via LEGAL refugees (and other legal entrants) not properly screened,  or with no medical treatment follow-up.  In many cases refugees are even allowed into the US with TB and HIV/AIDS.

Blogger Jeannie DeAngelis at American Thinker (emphasis mine):

One of the favorite pastimes of liberalism is to try to inflict guilt on people of European descent for being part of a lineage that they believe, in the words of Bill Ayers at the Dartmouth Debate with Dinesh D’Souza, “murdered” the American Indians by way of contagious disease.

Calling it the “European Invasion,” liberals believe that prior to Christopher Columbus’ arrival American Indians were virtually disease-free.  Never mind that syphilis, which originated in the New World, was brought back to Europe, where spirochete bacterium was not present until after Columbus and his fellow discoverers returned in 1493.

The Columbian theory concludes that invaders from across the sea brought to the Americas the scourge of bubonic and pneumonic plague, chicken pox, cholera, diphtheria, influenza, measles, scarlet fever, smallpox, typhus, tuberculosis, and whooping cough.

Even though Indian tribes were slaughtering each other, lefties argue that their lack of immunity was solely responsible for American Indians dying en masse after exposure to infectious diseases, and are persuaded that 80-90 percent of the Native American population perished after Europeans landed in the New World.

Whether that scenario is truth or fiction, there remains a problem with the argument.  Liberals incessantly harp on the fate of unsuspecting American Indians being infected with European maladies, yet that outrage doesn’t jibe with their insistence that amnesty be granted to illegal aliens, some of whom carry diseases eradicated long ago from North America.

At the turn of the century, immigrants coming to America through Ellis Island were screened for disease, just as law-abiding persons immigrating via legal channels today require a medical exam as part of the process. Meanwhile, irresponsible politicians on the left, who portray Christopher Columbus as a marauding murderer, choose to ignore the influx of modern-day intruders carrying with them highly-contagious Third World diseases into the US.  [As I said, Legal immigrants/refugees are bringing in diseases too—ed]

[….]

The hypocrisy is stunning.

Leprosy increased from 900 cases in the US to 9,000 in 3 years!  Did you know that?

The Biblical scourge of leprosy, a “slow-growing bacillus…parasite with a tropism for peripheral nerves, skin, and mucous membranes…upper respiratory tract, anterior chamber of the eye, and the testes,” is also within our borders.  In 2002, there were only 900 total cases of leprosy in the US. In the next three years there were 9,000 , mostly in states with the largest immigrant populations.

[….]

Do those hostile to 15th century European exploration feel that although it was once rare in America, an increase of reported leprosy cases adds to the multicultural diversity liberals embrace with such affection?

[….]

So, once again the self-righteous left proves they are the champions of idiotic double standards.  They condemn European-descended whites for murdering Native Americans centuries ago, while arguing on behalf of illegals currently spreading a plethora of deadly Third World afflictions with the potential to infect and kill millions of Americans.

Yes, but you see in Leftists’ mean-spirited eyes we white people deserve it—it’s payback time!

There is more, DeAngelis tells readers about other diseases increasing in America and reminds you to think about those shopping cart handles the next time you grab one in ethnically diverse neighborhoods.

I have a question for Wyoming!  How are your health departments in Campbell County (Gillette) and Natrona County (Casper)?  Are they ready for the diversity of health issues coming their way?

Pittsburgh: Bhutanese have more health problems

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Last week we reported on the mental health issues plaguing America’s 70,000-strong Bhutanese refugee population and now according to reporter Erika Beras, here at New America Media, it seems they are also being plagued by diabetes they got after arriving in America.  Type II diabetes is associated with too much weight gain.   Sure is a good thing Obamacare has come along to take care of them!

And get this!  Pittsburgh now has 4,000-5,000 Bhutanese (mostly Hindu) refugees.   That population growth is only since 2008!

Bhutanese family in Pittsburgh sees first snow! Reporters love these refugee snow stories! http://www.alleghenyfront.org/story/new-natural-world-bhutanese-refugees-brave-pa-weather

From New America Media:

On a typical weekday morning, 47-year-old Tek Nepal is moving about the Mount Oliver duplex he shares with his wife, sons, daughter-in-law and grandchild.

He works nights, so he gets his family time in the mornings. And often, that time centers around eating. Those meals used to consist of lots of starches. But since a Type 2 diabetes diagnosis last year, they have changed.

“I don’t eat rice at all. I don’t eat potatoes. I try to eat a lot of green vegetables like lettuce, spinach … carrots, and I don’t eat totally fried things,” he said, showing off a chart of appropriate foods on his kitchen wall.

Nepal is ethnically Nepalese. He was resettled in California as a refugee, moved to Tennessee, then Pittsburgh, which has a lower cost of living and boasts a growing Bhutanese-Nepalese population. Before coming to the U.S., he spent 17 years in refugee camps in Bhutan.

About 4,000 to 5,000 ethnically Bhutanese-Nepalese refugees call Pittsburgh home. Having migrated in the last six years, it’s a new population that is falling into an old immigrant paradox.

Nearly 26 million Americans have diabetes, and another 79 million are pre-diabetic, up sharply over the last few decades. Included among those statistics are newer Americans, people such as Nepal who came here as refugees. According to a study published in the journal Human Biology, an immigrant’s risk of obesity and hypertension — indicators of diabetes — grow with every year they are here.

At the Squirrel Hill Health Center, a federally qualified facility that provides the bulk of initial and follow-up care to refugees, Chief Medical Officer Andrea Fox is perpetually busy. She spots trends in her patient population. Rarely do the Bhutanese come to the U.S. with a diabetes diagnosis, but they’ve found a high prevalence of the disease in those they treat.

[…..]

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention monitors refugee populations. Among their priority health conditions for the Bhutanese are anemia, B12 vitamin deficiency and mental health. They haven’t been tracking diabetes numbers.

There is a lot more.  Check out the nice kitchen!

See our ‘health issues’ category for 191 previous posts on refugee health problems.  We have them all—HIV/AIDS, TB, intestinal parasites, mental health issues, and now diabetes.

Pittsburgh: Language barriers complicate refugee mental health treatment

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

A radio station reporter has discovered that Pittsburgh, PA has taken a lot of refugees in need of health treatment (including mental health treatment) that they may not be getting.  I’ll bet it’s happening where you live too, and partly because no one is available to translate for the mental health provider.

Esar Met was not normal in the camp. If a reporter figured that out, surely the US State Dept. knew.

The issue of cities and counties being responsible for appropriate interpreters came up the other day when we wrote about the Utah murder case where the Salt Lake City police must have figured any Burmese person would do to communicate with the newly arrested Esar Met.  Met is a Muslim, probably a Rohingya.  If he is Rohingya he speaks a Bengali dialect.

So, think about it, according to federal law, local governments are required to provide interpreters, not just in law enforcement cases, but when helping refugees get the appropriate medical treatment and in the hundreds of languages and dialects spoken by refugees.

Increasingly, we are hearing of mental health problems in the refugee community going unattended.  Add the cost of all this (treatment and translators) when determining if yours is to be a “welcoming” community for refugees.

The US State Department resettles refugees with mental problems as they surely knew Esar Met was not normal.

In the Utah rape/murder case an article in the Salt Lake Tribune in 2008 tells us this about the accused murderer (below).  Interestingly his mother did not want to come to America, but the US State Department figured Met would make a good addition to a multicultural America—help diversify Utah!

A challenged son » About a mile away, people at Mae La knew Esar Met was not normal. He often sat alone, talking and laughing to himself in the Muslim section of the camp where his family lived. Or he played with children years younger, shooting rubber bands in the camp’s narrow lanes, flicking marbles across the rocky, dirt patches that were his neighbors’ yards.

He was the eldest of eight children, but when he argued with his younger brothers, he was the one to cry.

As a boy, he could not remember what he learned in class. His mother, Ra He Mar, knew her son was not very smart and worried he might become even slower as he grew older. After he had to repeat second grade, she let him drop out of school.

Friends told her the family should find someone to “check his brain,” but Esar’s parents thought they couldn’t afford to have him tested.

I’m surprised there is no insanity plea in the case yet, maybe it is still coming.

Reporter Erika Beras: no system in place when refugees are new to the town.

Back to Pittsburgh where there is NO SYSTEM IN PLACE for dealing with mental health issues and language barriers.

From 90.5 WESA (NPR in Pittsburgh), thanks to reader Joanne:

Refugees to the region face a number of challenges, unfamiliarity with a different language is even more complicated when trying to obtain health care.

90.5 WESA Behavioral Health Reporter Erika Beras is embarking on a month-long series on the challenges refugees face in the Pittsburgh area to obtain health care. She says her interest in the topic was sparked by the high population of refugees in Pittsburgh.

“The refugee community here has grown and grown. And in that time I’d been talking to providers and I’d been in different situations at specialty courts and I keep hearing stories about different refugees who have come in with different issues and how people are struggling to meet their needs. They don’t quite have a system in place after the first few months a refugee is in town.”

Mental health challenges throughout the US:

As Project Editor for the Reporting on Health Collaborative, William Heisel also finds the system to be often unprepared or overwhelmed by immigrant mental health cases.

“When you’re talking about refugees, they’re coming with acute needs…Refugees are coming from conflicts that most of us will never experience and so they, in addition to having the trauma they need to get over, they have language barriers that make it difficult for them to access health care, many of them have low income status, they’re disconnected from their communities and so we are seeing this throughout the U.S. as a pretty big challenge.”

So who is responsible for refugees when they first arrive in Pittsburgh?   Catholic Charities, Jewish Family & Children Services and AJAPO (Acculturation for Justice, Access & Peace Outreach) (here).   Ms. Beras needs to start her investigation right here—with these three federal contractors.

For ambitious readers, this is our 190th post on health problems and refugees.  See Health issues category here.