Latinos and health: Guys, eat a salad and stay home
Photo by elotroxxx/Flickr (Creative Commons)
Un "indeciso chico en Burger King," as the photographer refers to him on Flickr, June 2007. Chico, that Double Whopper has 900 calories - don't do it.
This is not a great news day for Latino men, health-wise. First, a new Yale School of Medicine-led study has found that while young Latinos in the U.S. have generally better health than non-Latino white men, they are more likely to be murdered or die in a car accident. Not good to hear.
If that’s not enough, new report in the Journal of Health and Social Behavior says that among immigrants from Mexico, men are the most likely to suffer declining health after adapting to U.S. culture (which includes a less-healthy U.S. diet) than their female counterparts.
From a story in Futurity.org, which curates research news from universities:
“Men who have recently migrated from Mexico tend to report better health than women,” says Bridget Gorman, associate professor of sociology at Rice University and lead author of the study. “This could be in part because men are more likely than women to migrate to the U.S. in search of employment—often in physically demanding jobs—and at younger ages.”
…While men tend to start out healthier than women, their health declines at a faster pace as they adapt to the U.S. culture.
“In particular, the risk of diabetes increases at a strong rate for Mexican-American men, even after we account for a variety of factors that might explain this relationship, such as smoking or income,” Gorman says. “Yet, among women, diabetes status appears mostly unrelated to their acculturation level.”
One bright spot: Another researcher points out in the story that the findings run counter to the popular notion that new immigrants drain the U.S. health system, since they tend to be healthiest.
Still, the news takes some of the joy out of being part of the so-called Latino health paradox, a term used to describe how Latinos in the United States are typically healthier than the general population in spite of lower incomes and education levels and less access to health care.
Señores, eat your wife’s home cooking, it’s good for you. And kids, drive safely and keep those eyes in the back of your head wide open.
