Sunday 14 April 2019

The health of immigrant and refugee children after their arrival in Canada

As Vincentians, we not only want to help the poor, but we need to work with others to find and address the root causes of poverty and its effects in all its forms.

The first comprehensive research project in Canada examining the health of immigrant and refugee children after their arrival in the country was published on the web in May 2018.

The study found a number of things. For starters, it emerges that research studies over the past 15 years have found that immigrants arrive in better health than Canadians — with a lower incidence of chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer and diabetes — but suffer a decline in their health as their time in Canada increases.

A  highly readable digest of this study was published recently (April 9, 2019) by Vatanparast and Lane under the title: Immigrant children’s health declines rapidly after arrival in Canada.
https://theconversation.com/immigrant-childrens-health-declines-rapidly-after-arrival-in-canada-114421

Study authors:
Hassan Vatanparast
Professor of Public Health, University of Saskatchewan

Ginny Lane
Postdoctoral Fellow in Public Health, University of Saskatchewan