Abstract
The WHO urges countries to consider the link between racial discrimination and health and, in particular, the need for further research to study the links between health outcomes and racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance. This article is carried out within the framework of approximation work towards health-related ethnic inequalities among the population of African descent of the Americas. A qualitative methodology was used to conduct 20 in-depth interviews with a group of key informants composed of leaders of African descent, officials from the ministries of health, international health agencies, and international technicians specialised in African descent health and interculturality from six different countries. The extracted data were categorised and encoded, generating quotations and concept maps with Atlas.ti v.8.2. The concurrency coefficients made it possible to link the codes of each subcategory with the central analytical category. The racial discrimination experienced by people of African descent and the quality of health services received poses a problem. Discrimination is faced in all countries, affecting access to services and the quality of health care, and greater discrimination against women is also detected. This shows the need for an activistpolicy and for the inclusion of specific variables in surveys, censuses, and records in order that they may be researched. Claims are made about the complementary role that traditional medicine may play and the fact that the intercultural approach may be a useful strategy for addressing inequalities. The interviewees agree with the reference theory on the existence of racial discrimination and segregation regarding the African descent population of the Americas and how this translates into ethnic inequities in the field of health. Proposals have been put forward both on how to deepen research and how to contribute to the reduction of ethnic inequalities in health issues.
Highlights
Efforts to eliminate health inequalities are a matter of global importance [1]
Once the concurrency coefficients linked to the theoretical construct “socio-racial segregation + discrimination” is calculated, the highest values are observed in the following codes: “racism” (0.29), “care” (0.18), “racial” (0.12), “access” (0.11), and “black” (0.10)
The data in this study are consistent with the benchmarks for clarifying the meaning of racial discrimination and segregation proposed by World Health Organization (WHO) [6] and the joint position adopted by PAHO [7]
Summary
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, established at the request of the United Nations, proposes global and regional commitments to reduce these inequalities [2,3]. The World Health Organization (WHO), in the document for the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, held in 2001, urges the link between racial discrimination and health, noting the need for further research to study the connections between health outcomes and racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and forms of intolerance [6]. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) has raised racial discrimination as a social factor in the establishment of health differentials among individuals. Discrimination at the health level operates in different forms: difficulties in accessing services, low quality of available services, lack of adequate information in decision-making, or through indirect mechanisms such as lifestyles, place of residence, type of occupation, income level, or individual status [7]
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