E-grāmata: Borders of Care: Immigrants, Migrants, and the Fight for Health Care in the United States

"Borders of Care boldly tackles the relationship between immigration and access to health care in the United States, revealing how immigrants and migrants have been both included and excluded from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. Undocumented immigrants are excluded from Medicare and Medicaid and banned from participating in the Affordable Care Act. Some states offer limited coverage for undocumented children and those who are pregnant, but mostly undocumented immigrants must rely on emergency rooms or clinics that don't ask about citizenship status. Many receive no care at all. Yet immigrants haven't always been ostracized from health care in the US--providers and activists have for over a century worked to make medical services available to immigrants and migrants, including, at times, the undocumented. By featuring the role played by immigrants and migrants themselves, and especially their part in movements to define health care as a human right, Borders of Care tells the complete story of immigrants and US health care, and the consequences are tremendous. By analyzing both the health and immigration systems and how they work (or fail to work) together, Beatrix Hoffman adds to our understanding of why these systems, and the policies that support them, have been resistant to reform. As she shows, immigrant and migrant health care activism in the US has brought about an expansion of public health institutions and patient rights, ultimately leading to greater access for all. Aspects of the US health system that have hurt immigrants-limitations and exclusions based on race, income, employment, language, and residency, and other types of rationing-have also hurt everyone. This history helps to explain why so many Americans still struggle to obtain and pay for health care today, regardless of citizenship status"--

Probes the relationship between the immigration and health care systems in the United States.
 
For the roughly ten million undocumented immigrants living in the United States, federal health care coverage is out of reach. Barred from Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act, most rely on hospital emergency rooms when they get sick, or clinics that don’t inquire about immigration status. Further obstacles to health care, including discrimination and the fear of deportation, mean that immigrants, undocumented or not, seek and receive less medical attention than any other population in the country. Yet immigrants haven’t always been ostracized from health care in the United States—providers and activists have for over a century worked to make medical services available to newcomers and migrants, including, at times, the undocumented.
 
Drawing together stories from diverse communities from the mid-nineteenth century to the present, Borders of Care examines how health care in the United States has both included and excluded immigrants. Beatrix Hoffman analyzes both the health and immigration systems, adding to our understanding of why these structures, and the policies that support them, have resisted reform. Moreover, she shows that immigrants, often scapegoated as burdens on the health-care system, have strengthened it through their responses to systemic exclusion. By creating hospitals and clinics, serving as practitioners, fighting for safer workplaces, filing lawsuits, organizing and protesting, immigrants and migrants have improved medical access for everybody and advanced the idea of health care as a universal right. As accessible as it is authoritative, Hoffman’s survey could not be more timely.