Professional paper
Impacts of racial discrimination on people's health and public health systems in multicultural societies
Dino Galinović
orcid.org/0000-0001-5329-0097
; Faculty of Political Science, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
Systemic racism represents a major threat in multicultural societies in which racial biases and framing still play a significant role in the creation of public policies and organizing public systems such as health care. This paper argues that racism and racial framing directly influence negative effects on people's health, especially among minority groups such as African Americans in the United States and Aboriginal people in Canada. These groups of people are more likely to get unsatisfactory or inadequate medical service and suffer from chronic illnesses, such as cardiovascular problems, diabetes, mental health issues, drug abuse and overdose, or HIV infection more/in a higher degree than the white population. Furthermore, racism has a direct impact on inequalities in health care systems due to a lack of diverse health care providers in more urban areas and inaccessible treatment because of geographical reasons or cultural differences. In this paper, we have taken into consideration the concept of race and ethnicity, decades of racial framing in the United States and Canada, and shown the negative impacts on health within different ethnical groups. The paper concludes by emphasizing the need for structural change within health care systems.
Keywords
racism; racial framing; health care systems; United States; Canada
Hrčak ID:
246689
URI
Publication date:
25.11.2020.
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