Filipinos and the U.S. Nursing Market

I found the topic of the role of Filipinos to U.S. nursing from the book and class discussion to be interesting. I found an article discussing the U.S. nurse labor market, which addresses the role of immigration, more specifically Filipino immigration. The article, written by Linda Aiken in 2007, shared that approximately 8 percent of roughly 3 million (in 2004) U.S. nurses were foreign educated. I thought this percentage was relatively low at first; I expected the number to be around 15 to 20 percent. With that said, I know there are plenty of universities full of nursing majors in the U.S.; I went to one in Iowa. Students of these programs earn thousands of degrees each year, which add up to U.S. maintaining half of the world’s stock of English-speaking nurses. These figures make it reasonable to see the relatively low number of U.S.-foreign educated nurses. The Philippines, which accounts for 30 percent of U.S. foreign-educated nurses, is denoted as the major source country for RNs. Furthermore, nurse immigration to the U.S. tripled from 1994 to 2007. Aiken lists two factors to explain this growth: changes in the demand for nurses in the hospital sector and changes in immigration policy. The first change was the inclusion of foreign nurses in the H-1A visa for temporary employment (1995). The second change was the addition of an INS screening program for foreign-educated nurses to offer permanent residence through employment.

           
http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=ad8c80ee-5034-4f73-8ee8-5afeb26b2b4a%40sessionmgr14&vid=7&hid=127

Migrant Boat Capsizes in the Mediterranean

            http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2013/10/lampedusas-migrant-tragedy-and-ours.html

            I wasn’t aware of the migrant boat disaster in the Mediterranean until Dr. Fitzgerald mentioned it last class, but it certainly stuck with me. The boat took off from Eritrea and capsized off of Lampedusa, a Sicilian island about 500 meters from the coast. It is suspected that more than 300 people deceased out of the approximate 500 on the boat. It is believed that the captain lit a blanket on fire to signal that the boat needed help for a stalled engine. Rather than create this signal, he caused an explosion, which, along with the ensuing chaos, brought down the boat. The boat capsized at 4 A.M., leaving many inexperienced swimmers with no chance. A horrifying quote from survivor, Germani Nagassi, reads, “For five hours we were floating, using the dead bodies of our companions. There is nothing worse than this. There were many children. There was a mother with her four children, a mother with an infant, all lost at sea. My mind is scarred and in a terrible condition.”

            Unfortunately, this is by no means the first migrant boat tragedy in the Mediterranean. In the past year, around 1500 migrants have deceased in the Mediterraean, and some 20,000 in total over the past 20 years, according to the International Organization for Migration.

Health Care and Immigration

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1306636 - The New England Journal of Medicine

As immigration reform is tossed around the legislature, there are valid points made on both sides. One of the biggest issues that face either argument is the clash of our current health care system with a potential immigration reform. Right now, health care is very restricted for undocumented immigrants. It’s highly unlikely that a bill would pass that would provide undocumented immigrants with the right to standard Medicaid. If the 11 million undocumented immigrants are legalized, providing further health care for these immigrants with health care suddenly becomes a major issue. Oh by the way, ironic as many Americans may think, most immigrants are healthier than nonimmigrants upon arrival – according to this article. Within one or two generations, after adopting unhealthy American lifestyles, combined with a lack of health care opportunities, these immigrants begin to face health issues.