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Archive for the ‘Health’ Category

Wisconsin & Immigrant Communities

1:57 pm By Maegan La Mala · Health|Immigration|Wisconsin · 1 Comment

19 Feb 2011

Over the last few days there has been much focus on Wisconsin and the people’s movement(s) against Republican Governor Scott Walker’s attempt to take away collective bargaining rights from public employees. This anti-union move, anti-worker moved on behalf of the government of the state is gathering support across the countries with numerous solidarity actions in other parts of the country. But what isn’t being reported is how Walker’s actions and other bills are a direct attack on immigrant workers.

According to a release from the immigrants’ rights organization Voces de la Frontera part of the proposed budget cuts in Wisconsin includes eliminating access for pregnant undocumented women and to the children of undocumented to BadgerCare, the state program that provides health insurance for uninsured working families. This opens the door to administrative changes that could impact access to immigrants who are in the country with legal status but are not citizens.

Everyone is out protesting in Wisconsin at the moment (and I have to work) but this is something I will be following up on and I hope others will as well. We cannot and should not separate attacks on workers from attacks on immigrant communities and their families. Think about who are the hands that drive so much of the economy and think about how many laws across the country are scapegoating those very same hands in the name of “American jobs”. Think about all the “anchor baby” laws that are popping up and the bills to defund women’s health services. All of these things are connected.

Reproductive Health Care and Latinas

2:11 pm By Maegan La Mala · Health|New York City|Women · 2 Comments

5 Feb 2011

This Monday I am attending a media breakfast hosted by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America and Latina Magazine titled Nuestra Comunidad : Nuestra Salud , Our Comnmunity : Our Health.

The stated purpose of the event is to discuss inequities in reproductive health care affecting Latinas, to share the latest information on STD’s and unintended pregnancy, and teen pregnancy rates in Latinas, to review public opinion polling among Latinas regarding co-pays for prescription birth control, and to unveil the latest technology available to reach Latinos with reproductive health information and services.

As a Latina, I know I will be asking about the access for the uninsured (like myself), youth access and information, multilingual access, access and safety issues for undocumented women,, access and safety issues for lesbian, transgender women, and gender nonconforming people, and more.

But perhaps more important is what you, some of our VivirLatino readers would like to ask or know. I plan on live-tweeting the event (as connectivity allows) via our twitter account. You can submit questions and comments there. You can submit questions and comments via the comment form below, via our Facebook account, or you can send an email to info@vivirlatino.com.

World AIDS Day & Latinos

1:02 pm By Maegan La Mala · Health · 1 Comment

1 Dec 2010

Today is World AIDS Day, a day dedicated to drawing attention to AIDS, it’s prevention, treatment, and how it impacts all of our daily lives and how it impacts globally. For Latino communities inside the U.S., AIDS presents its owns challenges. Here are some stats from the Latino Commission on AIDS:

Latinos in the United States and HIV/AIDS
As the largest minority group in the U.S., Hispanics are disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS. In 2006, Hispanics comprised 15% of the U.S. population or 44.3 million people, yet represented 18% of the HIV/AIDS cases that same year, among 33 states with a name-based reporting, excluding Puerto Rico. Among Hispanics/Latinos, males had a higher AIDS rate (per 100,000) of 31.3, than females, 9.5.

Latina Women and HIV/AIDS
For Hispanic/Latina women living with HIV/AIDS, the most common methods of HIV transmission are: 1) high-risk heterosexual contact and 2) injection drug use (IDU).[4]In 2005, the majority of Latinas living with HIV/AIDS were infected through heterosexual contact-approximately 70% of Latinas.

Latino Men who have sex with men (MSM)
For Latino men living with HIV, the most common mode of transmission is sexual contact with another man. At the end of 2005, 57% of all Hispanics living with HIV/AIDS in the U.S reported male-to-male sexual contact as the transmission category, compared to 49% among Blacks and 77% among non-Hispanic Whites.

Latinos, Drug Use, and HIV/AIDS
Communities of Color in the U.S. are most heavily affected by AIDS associated with substance use. At the end of 2006 in 33 states with confidential name-based reporting, 14,427 male adult or adolescent Hispanics living with HIV/AIDS became infected through injecting drugs with HIV contaminated needles, representing 23% of Hispanic males living with HIV/AIDS.

Latino Youth and HIV/AIDS
Hispanic/Latino adolescents in the U.S. face unique obstacles that help account for their disproportionately high rate of HIV infection. Hispanic/Latino teens aged 13-19 accounted for 19% of AIDS cases among U.S. teens in 2006 although they represented 17% of the U.S. teen population that same year.

Do you know your HIV status? How do you stay healthy?

I know my status and get tested regularly, not just for my sexual partners (or potential partners), not just for my family, but for myself. I discuss sexual health with my kids (yes even the younger one) so they don’t grow up thinking that talking about and acting on behalf of a healthy whole self is taboo.

Y Tu?

The Center for Disease Control has a handy widget on it’s front page where you plug in your zip code and can find a testing site near you.

Please share resources, information, and knowledge.

National Latino AIDS Awareness Day (NLAAD)

3:15 pm By Maegan La Mala · Health · 2 Comments

15 Oct 2010

Today marks the last official day of Hispanic/Latino Heritage Month. It also is National Latino AIDS Awareness Day (NLAAD), a day that seeks to draw attention of the impact of AIDS within the Latino community, information sharing, and prevention. This year’s theme, “Save A Life; It May Be Your Own,” urges Hispanics/Latinos to get tested for HIV.

According to the Center for Disease Control, the issue of why AIDS impacts the Latino community in very specific ways has nothing to do with being Latino but rather has to do with the barriers linked to our identities, including poverty and migration status. In other words, yes institutional racism. I would also add that the specific ways that structural racism works in our communities impacts our access to health services.

According to the CDC :

While Hispanics/Latinos represented approximately 15% of the United States population in 2008, they accounted for 19% of people diagnosed with HIV infection in the 37 states and 5 dependent areas with long-term confidential name-based infection reporting*. From 2005-2008, the number of diagnoses of HIV infection increased in Hispanics/Latinos. The increase in the number of diagnoses may be due to increased HIV testing and other outreach efforts.

* 2008 is the latest year for which surveillance information is available.

U.S Researchers Experimented on CIA Prisoners, Mental Hospital Patients, Soldiers, Sex Workers and Children in Guatemala in the 1940′s.

8:05 am By Maegan La Mala · Guatemala|Health|history · Comments Off

6 Oct 2010

Latina Americans being used as medical guinea pigs for U.S. medical advancement isn’t the stuff of nightmares or science fiction. Look up for example how the birth control pill that many women claim as part of their liberation came to be.
Last week, the U.S. apologized for knowingly, purposely, and without consent infecting anywhere between 700 to over 1,00 Guatemalan prisoners of the CIA, mental patients, soldiers, sex workers and children in the 1940′s with sexually transmitted illnesses like syphilis and gonorrhea in order to test the effectiveness of antibiotics The experiments came to light five years ago, stumbled upon by a professor researching the Tuskegee syphilis study, where African -Americans were withheld treatment so that scientists could observe the progression of the illness, but were only just made public.

National Sexual Freedom Day Blog Carnival

4:09 pm By BiancaLaureano · Blogs|GLBT|Health · Comments Off

22 Sep 2010

Many of us participated on the Latina Week of Action for Reproductive Justice and this week I received this email from my friend and activist Perez:

The blog carnival is almost here! On September 23rd, the Woodhull Freedom Foundation will be hosting the first annual National Sexual Freedom Day. Along with in-person events, we’re also hosting a blog carnival.

The theme for the blog carnival is sexual freedom and joining is easy. Just write a post on or before Sept 23 and send me a link to this email address. We’d also love it if you would consider using the attached logo and linking back to WFF’s website.

Here are two questions to consider for your post, but feel free to write about sexual freedom in any way you’d like.

What does sexual freedom as a human right mean to you?

What legislative or social changes would you like to see to promote sexual freedom?

We’ll promote the carnival and all the posts, including a round-up at the end of the day on Thursday.

In solidarity,

Miriam Zoila Perez
Consultant, Woodhull Freedom Foundation

–
Miriam Zoila Perez
Editor, Feministing.com
Founder, Radicaldoula.com
www.miriamzperez.com

It would be AMAZING if more Latin@s, people of Color, LGBTQI, immigrants, and everyone else who is often not included in such opportunities to take part in the blog carnival! If you think you may write something for this event please share a link in the comments below and send Perez your link as well! I’m writing something I hope you will too or send this to someone who will!

VivirLatino Proudly Participating in first annual Latina Week of Action for Reproductive Justice

9 Aug 2010

We are proud and honored to participate in the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health‘s first annual Latina Week of Action for Reproductive Justice. Everyday this week, we will feature a post relating to Latinas and reproductive justice and invite you to discuss with us and with each other what reproductive justice looks like for nuestra comunidad.

All of our posts and the posts of others will be linked to the Latina Institute’s blog, Nuestra Vida, Nuestra Voice> (Our Life, Our Voice). We invite our readers to visit that site as well to further the conversation.

It’s raining oil…

8:46 am By la Macha · Environment|Health|Weather · 3 Comments

2 Jul 2010

This is just about the most enraging thing I’ve seen in a while.

National Weather Service Science and Operations Officer Charlie Paxton says while it’s always possible a water spout could pick up some oil and carry it a short distance, the notion of black rain is just not possible. Paxton says that’s because oil does not evaporate. As a result, talk of black rain is just a myth.
Jalapnik.com mentions, however that “under normal environmental temperatures, oil does not evaporate, however with the Deepwater Horizon disaster, the effects of seawater emulsification and the introduction of BP’s dispersant of choice, Corexit 9500, may be allowing some degree of evaporation into the water cycle.”

Now, yes yes, of course, black rain isn’t possible, or it might be, who the hell knows. And this video may be video of the oil from somebody’s car mixing with rain. But maybe it’s not. Who knows.

The infuriating enraging part is that nobody knows. That we have to all sit and think now, what the hell are the implications of this massive oil spill that nobody anywhere seems to have any damn clue on how to stop. Is it possible to rain oil? Do you know? Do scientists to know? Does Jesus know?

Calling All U.S. Citizens : Let’s Work on the Farm

2:04 pm By Maegan La Mala · Food|Health|Immigration|Labor · 11 Comments

24 Jun 2010

Today the United Farm Workers launched their Take Our Jobs campaign which calls on documented workers in the United States to apply for agricultural jobs across the country.

In a telephonic press conference today, UFW President Arturo Rodriguez, said that the campaign was a response to the misinformation and fear of undocumented taking jobs in the U.S.. “The current economic crisis has people blaming the undocumented as much as farmworkers, ” Rodriguez said.

Clearly this is more than just about labor, it is about the growing anti-immigrant rhetoric that by default places many farmworkers in the position of targets since the majority of them are undocumented.

This campaign, which seeks to place wannabe workers in farm work, is also a push for AgJobs, one of the so-called “piecemeal” bills that have more bi-partisan support than Comprehensive Immigration Reform (the other one being the DREAM Act). AgJobs would create a path to legalization for undocumented farm workers currently working in the U.S.

But on a wider level, the campaign seeks to connect the security of farmworkers to the security of the nation’s food supply. Rodriguez said that the U.S. is in denial about where our food comes from and who is responsible for getting it to the tables of U.S. families.
Read more…

F*$% You SIDA

9:56 pm By BiancaLaureano · GLBT|Health|Spain · 3 Comments

21 May 2010

I’m loving this award-winning HIV prevention ad created by a LGB non-profit in Spain. There are several components of what I had listed on my wish list for Latin@s during Teen Pregnancy Prevention Month. Read more about this video from Blabbeando.

Video is NSFW as it uses profanity.

Do you think something like this could/would work in the US?

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