The Implications of Health Disparities: A COVID-19 Risk Assessment of the Hispanic Community in El Paso

Impact of traffic congestion on asthma-related hospital visits in major Texas cities

Asthma is one of the most prevalent chronic conditions in the United States and is particularly sensitive to environmental changes in urban areas. While it is known that traffic congestion contributes to increased vehicle emissions and poorer air quality, its direct association with asthma incidence has not been thoroughly explored. This study aimed to address this void by analyzing 148 city-level observations from 2016 to 2020 in Texas, using data from the Texas A&M Transportation Institute and Definitive Healthcare. We investigated the association between traffic congestion, measured by the travel time index, and annual city-level asthma hospital discharges, while adjusting for refinery productivity, minority groups, and education levels through multivariate regression. Our findings revealed a significant positive correlation between the travel time index and asthma visits, indicating that higher traffic congestion is associated with increased hospital visits for asthma. This finding remains consistent across different models, regardless of whether control variables are included. For the control variables, we found that higher refinery productivity was linked to elevated risks of asthma-related hospitalizations, aligning with previous research findings. Although correlations with Black or African American and Hispanic or Latino populations, as well as those with less than a high school education, were not statistically significant, a positive trend was observed. These results emphasize the impact of traffic congestion on asthma prevalence and the necessity for targeted public health interventions and urban planning strategies.

Recommendations for Working with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Families: A Report from the Field

Given the persistent shift in racial and ethnic demographics in the United States, board certified behavior analysts (BCBAs) will increasingly serve culturally and linguistically diverse families. There has been a recent increase in published resources to help behavior analysis practitioners navigate working with diverse populations. The purpose of this article is to add to these resources and demonstrate how these recommendations can be put into action. We outline five recommendations for working with culturally and linguistically diverse families in the context of a small company that has incorporated these practices in their own work focused on serving a large percentage of immigrant families.

The Most Vulnerable Hispanic Immigrants in New York City: Structural Racism and Gendered Differences in COVID-19 Deaths

This paper explores the structural and group-specific factors explaining the excess death rates experienced by the Hispanic population in New York City during the peak years of the coronavirus pandemic. Neighborhood-level analysis of Census data allows an exploration of the relation between Hispanic COVID-19 deaths and spatial concentration, conceived in this study as a proxy for structural racism. This analysis also provides a more detailed exploration of the role of gender in understanding the effects of spatial segregation among different Hispanic subgroups, as gender has emerged as a significant variable in explaining the structural and social effects of COVID-19. Our results show a positive correlation between COVID-19 death rates and the share of Hispanic neighborhood residents. However, for men, this correlation cannot be explained by the characteristics of the neighborhood, as it is for women. In sum, we find: (a) differences in mortality risks between Hispanic men and women; (b) that weathering effects increase mortality risks the longer Hispanic immigrant groups reside in the U.S.; (c) that Hispanic males experience greater contagion and mortality risks associated with the workplace; and (d) we find evidence corroborating the importance of access to health insurance and citizenship status in reducing mortality risks. The findings propose revisiting the Hispanic health paradox with the use of structural racism and gendered frameworks.