2.3 Immigrants in a municipality near madrid: the teaching of  (Page 8/9)

Attitudes of health professionals

One of my students from my 3 ^rd year of nursing wrote in class:

It is certainly logical and fundamental to reject groups or individuals that cross our borders with unrespectable aims, such as drug trafficking, delinquency, and rape violation. They are immigrants who cannot integrate into a healthy society. Instead they try to force their way of life onto others without respect. It is impossible to accept and tolerate those people who do not contribute nor enrich the country, but who rather foment the citizen’s logical reaction to reject. No tolerant person would ever accept for their daughter to be violated, their house or business be robbed, or to be stabbed in the streets or in the subway. Nor that hospital beds are occupied by non-taxpayers, those who do not live up to societal obligations. Above all, citizens object to being called racists for rejecting immigrants as such.

However, it is necessary to remember that all human beings have legal rights. The right of health protection is a fundamental and legitimate right to all. Since The Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizen after the French Revolution of 1789, the right to medical aid is seen as an inseparable right of human dignity. Intertwined with this is the right to life, to physical integrity, and personal dignity.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states in Article 25 that every human being has the right to a lifestyle which guarantees a good state of health. Article 11 of the Social European Letter of 1961 declares the right to the protection of health, as does Article 35 of the Letter of the Fundamental Rights of the European Union, approved in Niza in 2000. In Spain, Article 43 of the Constitution states the importance of health, and Article 1.2 of the General Law of Health states the right to the protection of health for all those who live in Spain.

Among health professionals in our present society exists the full range of attitudes regarding immigrants, from solidarity to rejection, and every position in between. There are professionals who desire greater professional formation and want to solve the new challenges of working with a population whose cultural characteristics are not known. There are other health professionals who view immigrants as threatening to our health, thinking of them as carriers and propagators of diseases.

Immigrants are healthy

In view of the previous assertion, there have been several scientific studies that demonstrate that immigrants are healthy. This is due to natural selection in the country of origin. Normally, those who emigrate are the youngest, the physical and emotionally strongest, because the adventure of emigration requires these qualities.

However, some become ill for two reasons: (a) the precarious conditions of life due to overcrowded neighborhoods, or labor accidents that happen frequently to immigrants working under dubious contracts or subcontracts; (b) another reason is what Atxótegui (2002) has defined as the "duel of immigration."