A mother almost loses a son. A daughter is too scared to visit the doctor
Immigrants were less likely to seek medical care during Trump’s first term, multiple studies concluded. A 2023 study of well-child visits in Boston, Minneapolis and Little Rock, Arkansas, noted a 5% drop for children who were born to immigrant mothers after Trump was elected in 2016. The study also noted declines in visits when news about Trump’s plans to tighten immigration rules broke throughout his first term.
“It’s a really high-anxiety environment where they’re afraid to talk to the pediatrician, go to school or bring their kids to child care,” says Stephanie Ettinger de Cuba, a Boston University researcher who oversaw the study.
A delayed trip to the doctor almost cost 82-year-old Maria Isabel de Perez her son this spring. He refused to seek help for his intense and constant stomach pains for weeks, instead popping Tylenol daily so he could still labor in the farm fields of Arkansas, she says. He put off going to the hospital as rumors swirled that immigration enforcement officials were outside of the hospital.
“He waited and waited because he felt the pain but was too scared to go to the hospital,” she explains in Spanish through an interpreter. “He couldn’t go until the appendix exploded.”
Her son is still recovering after surgery and has not been able to return to work, she says.
Perez is a permanent resident who has lived in the United States for 40 years. But all of her children were born in Mexico, and, because she is a green card holder, she cannot sponsor them for citizenship.