The Bronx Apartment Fire Highlights More Challenges for Immigrants in the US
The apartment fire that devastated the Bronx, killing 17 people, was the deadliest fire New York has seen in three decades. The building was home to many immigrants from Gambia, and many of the 17 victims, including 8 children, were immigrants. The fire sparked from a malfunctioning electrical space heater. Twin Parks North West, the building where the fire occurred, was built in 1972. It lacked basic safety protocols that would have made the tragedy less severe; the self-closing doors didn’t shut, allowing smoke to travel through the building and expose more smoke to people. The building did not have fire escapes or a sprinkler system throughout the building which also would have helped actively fight the fire’s growth. Housing records show that the building was also subject to more than a dozen complaints in the last 12 months ranging from broken appliances and heating problems to infestations. Two tenants who survived filed a lawsuit against the building’s owners, one complaint being that they failed to provide adequate heat to the building. Even if there was sufficient heat at the time of the fire, it is a serious problem when renters have to rely on space heaters because of heating problems. The culprit to this problem is poor conditions and the normalized racism that takes place in infrastructure decisions.
The number one reason people immigrate to the United States is for better living conditions. Many come without speaking any English or come illegally. Due to these restrictions and setbacks, it is easy for landlords to take advantage of them and the case many times is they won’t repair it in a timely manner. If landlords do wrong towards tenants who have trouble with English or who are not technically supposed to be here, they are less likely to push back against misdemeanors committed against them. The significant immigrant population in the building, along with the poor living conditions, painted this picture vividly, but it is only a single piece in the larger problem of marginalization in the United States.
Generally, boundaries like language and education lead immigrants to work more hazardous jobs than Americans born in the U.S. Three of the most hazardous industries are agriculture, construction and transportation, industries that also happen to employ high percentages of immigrant workers. Immigrant workers doing these jobs tend to have lower salaries and fewer rights in terms of what they can do, which some can’t fight because if they are undocumented, they face deportation or unemployment. Because of this vulnerability, they often take risks at work that a privileged individual may not subject themselves to. If they get a bad supervisor, and they don’t get the good equipment and end up getting injured, they are out of a job and can’t even take legal action. With the recent immigration crackdowns, immigrants underutilize health services that they are entitled to like going to the emergency room.
Immigrants and people of color are getting sick and dying at younger ages than white people due to inferior health care they receive because of doctors racial biases. A study showed physicians whose IAT tests (a test that measures the test takers “implicit biases” by asking them to connect images of Black and white faces with words with different connotations) showed doctors were more likely to prescribe pain medication to white patients than to Black patients along with other important medical decisions. Pushing back against this is hard, especially when it's an unconscious act by the physician, but regardless, it is something that impacts people’s health which is too important to just ignore. Even with this insufficient healthcare, immigrants are less likely to have insurance and face even more barriers to care. Unresolved health problems withholds immigrants from being able to maintain productive employment, especially given that many work hard and strenuous jobs.
Immigrants put themselves at risk doing dangerous jobs to provide themselves and family with a better life. They shouldn’t go home to an outdated building with outstanding complaints, that can’t provide tenants with sufficient heating. They should be getting the same level of medical treatment that any one else does, especially when they are more likely to get hurt working. Withholding basic rights that immigrants need and will help them achieve their wish for a better life leaves them stuck with nowhere to go.
By Caroline Cranman