Author ORCID Identifier
Dina Refki: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1292-1750
Rukhsana Ahmed: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0381-4491
Document Type
White Paper
Publication Date
2021
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to have significant impacts on social determinants of health. Immigrant communities often bear a disproportionate burden of the crisis because of the immigration experience, which serves as an additional social determinant of health. Evidence suggests that these communities are hard hit by economic instability, food insecurities, isolation, lack of safe housing and safe neighborhoods, environmental dynamics that cut them off from systems of support, lack of sufficient access to educational tools that have become critical in remote and digital learning, limited access to health and healthcare resources, low health literacy, and restricted access to culturally and linguistically competent services. In this review we (a) synthesize literature on structural and community level causes of health disparities in immigrant communities; (b) summarize evidence-based interventions that increase collective efficacy in managing social determinants of health in immigrant communities; and (c) recommend strengths and resiliency-based approaches that focus on increasing community capacity to eliminate COVID-19 health disparities.
Recommended Citation
Refki, Dina; Ahmed, Rukhsana; and Altarriba, Jeanette. 2021. "Closing the Health Disparity Gap in U.S. Immigrant Communities in the Era of COVID-19: A Narrative Review" Understanding and eliminating minority health disparities in a 21st-century pandemic: A White Paper Collection. University at Albany, SUNY: Scholars Archive.
https://scholarsarchive.library.albany.edu/covid_mhd_nys_white_papers/12
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