Health Care Services and Illegal Immigrants

Illegal immigrants can usually only obtain coverage for emergency care, but for many, by the time the emergency is over, there may be days left in the hospital or follow up care that is not covered. These services typically go unpaid and result in a monetary loss for the hospital and provider. An extraordinary amount of loss has caused facilities to close their doors because they simply cannot continue to operate in a state of loss.

     Illegal immigrants usually hold jobs that have bad conditions and worse pay.  Oftentimes, these jobs are found in sectors such as agriculture, construction, food-handling and manufacturing (Dwyer).  Unfortunately for the illegal individuals who acquire these jobs, they have no access to comprehensive health care, though their line of work tends to demand it.  Although illegal immigrants are consequently strapped for cash, many of them will not visit primary care physicians for fear of being deported.  This sets up a vicious cycle: individuals get sick yet ignore the signs.  When illnesses get remarkably worse and are too severe to treat at doctors' offices, the individuals then go to emergency rooms, where the cost is considerably greater.  More often than not, the immigrants cannot afford to pay their hospital bills.  The cost is then covered by the medical institutions and tax-payer dollars (Wolf).  While some argue that illegal migrants do not

Christopher Columbus landed on the shores of America back 500 years ago in the year 1492. Were he and his crew the first illegal immigrants in America? The land was occupied by another group of people that didn’t grant these explorers the right to have whatever they please without acquiring some kind of legal status. The topic of legal status might have been irrelevant back in those days but it surely is an issue that is widely talked about in today’s America. The issue of illegal immigrants has been a hot topic especially when it comes to discussing whether these people should be allowed to have health care provided by a government that doesn’t recognize their

With the economy of the United States in shambles, illegal immigration and the effects it has on health care can no longer be ignored. America has a whole needs to be concerned and well informed of the issues rather than collecting information piecemeal by way of media or other biased groups. If illegal immigration stays its present course the American tax-payer will continue to fund the well being of individuals who have broken federal rules and regulations and are being supported by law abiding citizens. This argument is not about individual rights to live and prosper. It is not about race or discrimination of any sort. It is only about the effects on health care that I am addressing.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) (2015) provided an overview of the Hispanic population, in which they reported the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) categorization of the population. Specifically, OMB defines Hispanics as a population which comprises of Cubans, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, South and Central Americans as well as people from other Spanish cultures (CDC, 2015). According to a report compiled by the CNN Library (2015), Hispanics are the largest minority group in the United States. In fact, the size of the Hispanic group in the United States is only second to the size of the Hispanic group in Mexico. The report further explained that there were approximately 54 million Hispanic people in the United States by 2013. The number showed a 2.1% increase in the Hispanic population between 2012 and 2013 (CNN Library, 2015). The total Hispanic population in 2013 constituted about 17% of the United States total population. Gonzalez-Barrera and Lopez (2013) inferred that people of Mexican origin constituted the largest number of Hispanics in the United States. They maintained that there were approximately 33.7 million Hispanics from Mexico in the United States by 2012 (Gonzalez-Barrera & Lopez, 2013). The Mexican-Hispanics population is represented by people who are born in the United States and immigrants from Mexico.

In an article that looked at the immigrant healthcare needs of the United States, Dudas (2012) found that

The film showed that some health care providers might mistreat patients because they do not have insurance. Also, they do not have the means to pay their expensive health care bill. The emergency room is the least effective in caring for undocumented immigrants and people in general. Much less, it does not provide an effective way in managing individual health care needs. The film also showed that undocumented immigrants may be afraid of reporting mistreatment from hospitals and employers because they are concerned about being deported.

There are several arguments spotlighting the effect of illegal immigration on current rising health care cost. To this point, illegal immigrants and elected representatives across the country are unable to deny the increased costs placed upon the backs of American taxpayers due to the rise in health care and health care insurance cost. A bill initiated in Indiana will demand local hospitals create a report regarding the costs associated with treating illegal immigrants. Additionally, on a countrywide level, there is an ongoing endeavor to push illegal immigrant children toward federally funded Children’s Health Insurance by the governing body which in turn will effectively raise the current tax rates for all Americans. As an alternative, some policymakers are trying to use creative language in order to guarantee that illegal immigrants were blocked from obtaining health care services (Maxwell & Adolfo 324). For undocumented immigrants within the United States, acquiring health related services or care systematically increases the cost for American taxpayers across the board. Health care providers, Health care insurance companies and both the state and federally supplemented health care funds ( i.e. Medicaid) are forced to close the gap on the negative revenue return by increasing cost of services due to the excessive use and write off of public health care funds and services by illegal immigrants.

Everyday people are sent to the hospital. Not only are they in fear of losing their life but also in fear of being in debt due to the prices of health care treatment they need. But what if this patient happens to be an illegal alien? What if the patient has a foreign illness that needs to be cured so it does not spread? Should healthcare providers continue to provide (s) he with treatment even if they cannot pay? Or should illegal aliens be treated just like any other patients by having a right to health care?

The Department of Public Welfare properly denied MA benefits to cover medical provider’s care to an illegal alien because the care was considered ongoing; not treatment for an emergency medical condition. The medical provider stated that the patient suffered from an aggregate of very severe chronic conditions and acknowledged that treatment and care would be for an indefinite period of time. There was no evidence to support the conclusion that the patient was manifesting acute symptoms thereby rendering her condition an emergency medical condition for which she would be eligible for MA benefits. Spring Creek Mgmt., L.P. v. Dep't of Pub. Welfare, 45 A.3d 474 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2012).

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was the first step that the United States takes in order to provide greater access to health care coverage, reduce health care spending rate, and improve the quality of service. Ever since the implantation of the ACA, millions of Americans were able to have access to health care coverage. However, the ACA fails to include the undocumented immigrants. Compared with other immigrant group in the United States, undocumented immigrants have lower rates of health insurance coverage. The studies shows that undocumented Latinos were less likely to check their health and they report that “blood pressure being check in the past 2 years and cholesterol checked in the past 5 years. There was 40% reported that reported receiving

But for the rest of the population substantial disparities still exist. This problem not only affects the uninsured population and the communities they live in, but the entire nation's economy. Dozens of hospitals in Texas, New Mexico Arizona, and California, have been forced to close or face bankruptcy because of federally mandated programs requiring hospitals to provide free emergency room services to illegal aliens. Safety net hospitals continue to operate under a heavy burden of providing care to this largely uninsured population (Torres, Steven, & Wallace, 2013). Having access to healthcare is a necessity in maintaining the good health of these undocumented immigrants. Several solutions have been proposed to overcome the barriers affecting undocumented immigrants. One solution would be to expand the coverage of the Affordable Health Care Act for this population. Another solution would be to approve an amnesty bill to alleviate the undocumented immigrants' situation in the United Sates, which would allow them to access public health

County Hospitals that are already underfunded to provide indigent and uninsured care for citizens are also providing health services for the immigrants. Local Law Enforcement and City and County jails deal with those immigrants that break the law and are having to absorb those costs until they can be handed off to Federal Immigration services for deportation.

The ethical right for individuals to have access to health care already has a form of legal binding within the United States as seen in the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. “In 1986, Congress passed the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA), which forbids Medicare-participating hospitals from “dumping” patients out of emergency departments” (Pozgar, 2010, p. 221). The act provides that:

Answering this question is provide a complex views in different aspect such as ethical, judicial and financial tensions. I believe that health care should be a right, not a privilege or a commodity for all American citizen and legal resident. The United States as one of the wealthy country, everyone should has the human right to access health care. Although the Americans are greater users of higher health care prices, diagnostic by using expensive and sophisticated technologies machines (like magnetic resonance imaging MRI) and they are top consumers of prescription drugs, but the U.S. is the only country without a publicly financed universal health system. As Schneider (2011) correctly argues