Immigration, Aging, and Health in the United States

Given the rising numbers of immigrants to the United States, in recent decades there has been increasing interest in better understanding the health status and the health care needs of immigrants and how they impact the host societies’ health and social service systems. Recent evidence has suggested the existence of a health advantage among immigrants, especially those from non-western origins, which has challenged our previous and often stereotypical notions regarding immigrants from poor countries. Early research in North America was almost exclusively focused on the negative impact of immigration on mental health (Malzberg 1967). The negative aspects of immigration were also the dominant theme of early studies in Europe (Friis et al. 1998). It is now commonly assumed that early research was often culturally biased, methodologically weak, and based on small numbers of immigrants (Friis et al. 1998; Markides 2001).