Health at risk for Hispanic men in U.S.

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Stacey Vanek-Smith: Health care is becoming a huge issue for latino immigrants. Immigrants often arrive to the U.S. in good health and become less healthy the more time they spend in this country. A report out today examines the phenomenon. From WLRN, Marketplace’s Dan Grech reports.

Dan Grech: One quarter of Hispanics in the U.S. do not have a doctor or health provider that they routinely see for care. That’s according to a national survey of 4,000 Hispanic adults by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Pew Hispanic Center. Susan Minushkin co-authored the report:

Susan Minushkin: One would think that people that don’t have a medical home don’t have one because of financial reasons or insurance reasons.

In fact, many of those people are young, single men who rarely get sick. Minushkin says that will change. As they age, Hispanics are more likely than the population as a whole to become obese and suffer from diabetes.

Minushkin: On the part of medical researchers, there is concern that without preventative care and monitoring, there may be a problem in the future.

A problem that could require expensive medical care.

I’m Dan Grech for Marketplace.