The UTMB Health Institute for the Medical Humanities is pleased to announce that a short video by Shannon Guillot-Wright, MA will be screened at the American Public Health Association's (APHA) Global Public Health Film Festival to be held in Atlanta in November 2017.
Ms. Guillot-Wright's video, Anonymous Health, focuses on the lack of access to health care for unauthorized immigrants in the United States.
Published Description
The American College of Physicians (ACP) considers unauthorized immigrants’ lack of access to health care a serious national public health problem. It argues that current legislation and policies increase the fear of immigration status exposure, resulting in limited utilization of health care services. According to Hacker, et al. (2015) individual-level barriers include language, lack of financial resources, and justifiable or non-justifiable fear of deportation. “Anonymous Health” opens with a recent (2017) story of an undocumented immigrant. The title references both the patient’s anonymity as well as his desire to keep his health condition a secret because of deportation fears. “I asked if he was okay,” said the student assisting him, “and he asked me, with a trembling voice, ‘Are you going to call the police on me?’” The film ends with information about how to access health care services if you are an undocumented immigrant.
For more information on the film festival, please visit
https://apha.confex.com/apha/2017/meetingapp.cgi/Home/0