Undocumented Immigrants and Healthcare Services
The debate over immigration reform continues to be a hot button in American policy and unlikely to be solved in the foreseeable future. Regardless of the current policy and where one stands on dealing with illegal immigration, the reality is that there will be undocumented immigrants that come into the country and as with all human beings, they will get sick or injured and need medical care. There are a host of legal, ethical, financial, and public health considerations for policies focused on care for this vulnerable population, and arguably no easy answers.
Review the background reading for this module and conduct your own research. After you have done so, write a position paper on whether the provision of health care for undocumented immigrants should be provided without consideration of immigration status, addressing each of the issues italicized above. Keep in mind that this paper is not meant to be a debate of immigration policy, but a statement regarding healthcare services.
Be sure cite reliable sources and utilize the reference below for setting up your paper. You must use the outline in the reference below.
SLP Assignment Expectations
- Limit your response to no more than 2 pages, single-spaced.
- Conduct additional research to gather sufficient information to justify/support your analysis.
- Support your paper with a minimum of 3 reliable sources. The course textbook counts as one, and at least one of the others should be a peer-reviewed article. Use How to Recognize Peer-Reviewed (Refereed) Journals
- Please use Evaluating Internet Resources for evaluating information found on the internet to ensure that you are using reliable sources
You may use Purdue OWL to assist in formatting your assignment:
Undocumented Immigrants and Healthcare Services
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Undocumented Immigrants and Healthcare Services
Introduction
Despite illegal immigration prohibited by the government, undocumented immigrants are humans and should not be deprived of medical services. However, ethical, legal, financial, and public health considerations make it challenging for this vulnerable population to receive quality patient care. Undocumented immigrants should be provided with proper healthcare services regardless of their immigration status.
Background Information
The issue of the provision of healthcare services to undocumented immigrants is controversial. Opponents might say that these individuals should not be provided with care services since they are illegally in the country and the majority might not afford them, hence increasing the public health expenditure. Nevertheless, all humans have the right to proper medical services regardless of their immigration status.
Legal Consideration
From the legal perspective, any person who enters the United States (US) illegally is considered to have committed a crime. Individuals are advised to follow the set immigration protocols, where they are required to present their documents for approval. In that light, undocumented immigrants’ health problems are neglected since they do not have relevant papers to seek proper medical services. According to the Henry Kaiser Family Foundation, this group of people comprises about 4% of the country’s population, which is around 12 million individuals (Beck et al., 2019). However, undocumented immigrants should be allowed to access healthcare services. If the government wants to deport them, it would be right if they are in proper health.
Financial Consideration
In particular, finances are another crucial factor that hinders healthcare accessibility for undocumented immigrants. This vulnerable population does not receive timely treatment, particularly for primary care since they lack resources, impeding the quality of medical services they get (Doshi et al., 2020). On that note, putting aside these individuals’ immigration statuses would ensure that they receive healthcare services under public health insurance. That way, undocumented...