Chicago Reporter (https://www.chicagoreporter.com/category/key-issue/health/page/2/)
When residents of some of the city’s most violent neighborhoods need mental health treatment, they often seek help from social service and community organizations in their neighborhoods — help that can be hard to find.
Unaccompanied minors face temporary displacement, language barriers and other challenges that can lead to anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and other serious mental health problems, according to research. Advocates say more services, such as talk therapy and support groups, are needed to help them deal with the stress and trauma they have experienced.
About 1million Chicagoans live in a ‘pharmacy desert,’ and underserved residents in many South and West Side neighborhoods could stay sick longer without better access.
On the eve of the second enrollment period for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, there is good news, bad news and still many unknowns about the federal law’s impact. In 2010, President Obama signed legislation, widely known as “Obamacare,” into law with the goal of improving access to health care for millions of Americans. State and federal officials began working toward that goal in earnest in October 2013, when Americans could begin signing up for health insurance, for the first time, on the marketplaces created by the law. But one year later, we don’t know exactly how many uninsured Americans signed up for health insurance and, more importantly, who is still without coverage. The good news: Rates of uninsured people have dropped in every state.
The hysteria about Ebola takes the focus away from public-health problems such as influenza, which poses a real threat to Americans.
While the NFL scrambles to investigate incidents of domestic violence within the league, it should rethink its own visual portrayals of women in ads that objectify and dehumanize them.
With the Supreme Court set to rule on Harris v. Quinn, a case that could limit the collective bargaining rights of 20,000 home care workers in Illinois, we wondered what difference union representation has made in their lives. It comes down to much better wages, health insurance, and professional training, longtime homecare workers told us. And across the board, they say, these improvements mean a higher quality of care for their clients, thousands of seniors and people with disabilities. In many cases it means people are able to stay in their own homes and live independently, rather than being forced in to nursing homes. That translates into huge savings for the state.
Charlene Davis is teaching young girls to respect themselves and learn to walk away from bad situations.
The petcoke controversy on Chicago’s Southeast Side is another example of the heightened environmental costs of every stage of tar sands oil production — and yet another case of low-income communities of color bearing the brunt of those hardships.
Chicago officials say a new study of Latinos by the National Institutes of Health can help inform health policy in the city.