Immigrants' use of healthcare system lower than expected

[SHRED]

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This is really gonna piss off the "blame the brown people" crowd.

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Study finds immigrants' use of healthcare system lower than expected
UCLA researchers find that Latinos in the U.S. illegally are 50% less likely to visit emergency rooms.
By Mary Engel, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 27, 2007

Illegal immigrants from Mexico and other Latin American countries are 50% less likely than U.S.-born Latinos to use hospital emergency rooms in California, according to a study published Monday in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine.

The cost of providing healthcare and other government services to illegal immigrants looms large in the national debate over immigration.

In Los Angeles County, much of the focus of that debate has been on hospital emergency rooms. Ten have closed in the last five years, citing losses from treating the uninsured, and those that remain open are notorious for backlogs.

By federal law, hospitals must treat every emergency, regardless of a person's insurance -- or immigration -- status. Illegal immigrants, who often work at jobs that don't offer health insurance, are commonly seen as driving both the closures and the crowding.

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-...

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/11/27/healthcare-immigran...

[Deja Q]

1. I pose a question, naive widdle honky gringo with white skin as I am:

If you were in a country illegally, would YOU go to any place that would be more inclined to find out you are not there legally?

As such, I would avoid the obvious places - which would include hospitals.

I'm more interested, and agreeing with Bill O on this, why the other countries' governments don't do more to build their economies -- the resulting poverty of which encourages people to do illegal things, such as illegal immigration? (Bill mentioned Mexico in his one-on-one interview with Mexican ex-President Fox, but illegal immigration isn't tied to one conveniently scapegoated country...)

[City Lights]

2. Thanks SHRED. I just sent this to my aunt, who is a proud member of the

"blame the brown people" crowd.

[SoCalDem]

3. LA times.. commie pinko liberal rag..pole's meaningless

sincerely,

Freeptoe & son



* spelling of "poll"= intentional (SCD)

[blogslut]

4. The 'illegals' crap = the Welfare queens of the 1980's

It's a bogus issue IMHO.

Immigrants aren't draining our system. The system is draining the system. It's not just that employers won't pay a decent wage to US citizens. It's that they don't want US citizens as employees. US workers are protected by US law. These employers want to evade US law. They want to work people as long and hard as possible. They want to avoid safety regulations and frankly, basic human rights. The system looks the other way and favors the corporations and the employers. Immigrants come here illegally because those law-evading employers bring them here - illegally.

[blondeatlast]

6. That's the entire issue in a nutshell--and it is, indeed, a non-issue. .

This election cycle, it isn't even on my list of concerns.

It's a wedge--and I think people are starting to see that. I hope, anyway.

[Deja Q]

7. Very true, I have to agree.

(Funny how Bill O asked Fox why Mexico's government was ignoring its citizens and seemed quiet on ours... of course, I'm probably missing something too...)

[VP505]

5. An interesting

sentence from the LA Times article. So basically the study concluded that illegal immigrants don't use emergency room health care as much as others.

"The other factor, he said, is the cost to taxpayers, which Ortega's study did not examine."

[underpants]

8. They pay way more into the system than they take out

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/underpants/27