Racism, Other Discriminations and Effects on Health

We study the probability of perceived racism/other forms of discrimination on immigrant and Spanish populations within different public spheres and show their effect on the health of immigrants using a cross-sectional design (ENS-06). Variables: perceived racism/other forms of discrimination (exposure), socio-demographic (explicative), health indicators (dependent). Frequencies, prevalences, and bivariate/multivariate analysis were conducted separately for men (M) and women (W). We estimated the health problems attributable to racism through the population attributable proportion (PAP). Immigrants perceived more racism than Spaniards in workplace (ORM = 48.1; 95 % CI 28.2–82.2), and receiving health care (ORW = 48.3; 95 % CI 24.7–94.4). Racism and other forms of discrimination were associated with poor mental health (ORM = 5.6; 95 % CI 3.9–8.2; ORW = 7.3; 95 % CI 4.1–13.0) and injury (ORW = 30.6; 95 % CI 13.6–68.7). It is attributed to perceived racism the 80.1 % of consumption of psychotropics (M), and to racism with other forms of discrimination the 52.3 % of cases of injury (W). Racism plays a role as a health determinant.

This study is partially funded by “CIBER Epidemiología and Salud Pública, CIBERESP. Spain”, by the (2) “Ministerio de Sanidad y Consumo––Observatorio de Salud de la Mujer, Dirección General de la Agencia de Calidad––y Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación––Instituto de Salud Carlos III” (Spain) and by the “Analysis of the effects of discrimination in self-perceived health in adult and child populations in Spain” Project from the Health Research Fund belonging to the latter institutions (2) (reference PI080782).