Running head: HISPANIC POPULATION IN SUSSEX COUNTY 1

Hispanic Population in Sussex County

Kayla Adkins

Population and Community Health NUR 330

Mrs. Golden

July 30, 2020

 HISPANIC POPULATION IN SUSSEX COUNTY 2

The population that I have chosen to write about is the Hispanic/Latino population mainly in

Sussex County, Delaware. I chose this population because I see them every day in the hospital and I

know how much of a struggle it is for them to get the proper care that they need due to the barriers that

are associated with this population. There are 16,954 Hispanics in all of Sussex county and out of them

9,154 are male and 7,800 are female with most of this population being twenty-five to twenty-nine

years old (Surbanstats.org, 2020). Sussex county is widely known for the farmland and poultry industry

such as chicken plants, so even though there are quite a few open fields and land, they are not used for

things such as parks, but more for crops and agriculture. It is hard for this population to find securing

steady work or housing since most of these families do not speak English well, are considered

immigrants, or lack education or income. The jobs that they find usually are associated with food

manufacturing, agriculture, or construction. Even though poultry processing is replacing farm work as

Latinos’ chief occupation on the Peninsula, there has been a decrease in the number of Hispanics

receiving jobs in the poultry industry (eighty-three percent of food processing is poultry) and an

increase in the number of workers doing construction (Fuqua & Veness, 2019).

The main issue of this population is the lack of funding to support their family. This can lead to

an issue such as lack of housing. This population must seek affordable rentals which lead to situations

where they share five-hundred-dollar housing with multiple other people in order to cut back on costs.

The population of Hispanics that live with three or more generations are 276 out of 3,602 in Sussex

county and 40 out of 488 in Georgetown, Delaware (Surbanstats.org, 2020). The lack of money may

also lead this group to not be able to afford insurance due to their low wage jobs, the small businesses

that they work for do not offer any healthcare, or they just don’t know how to enroll. Legal immigrants

can enroll in the healthcare system after five years of being an American citizen but undocumented are

barred from enrolling. The government can be beneficial to this population by helping this population

get coverage through the Affordable Care Act (ACA) (Fuqua & Veness, 2019). They are also working

to build the capacity in communities to use community health workers to improve the health of the
 HISPANIC POPULATION IN SUSSEX COUNTY 3

population. They are leveraging existing programs to improve community health services and access to

preventative care. The doctors and healthcare workers of the community can help by working with

interpreters to better understand the population and to assess their needs and can also counsel on weight

loss, and risks associated for cancer, high blood pressure, and diabetes (Center for Disease Control and

Prevention [CDC], n.d.).Hispanics are approximately fifty percent more likely to die from diabetes or

liver disease than non-Hispanic whites. Heart disease and cancer are the two leading causes of death in

this population as well. They are at greater risk for developing other illnesses since they use public

transportation to get to and from work or they share their vehicles with the household.

Most of this population that lives in Sussex County are immigrants from Mexico, Central

America, and the Caribbean, which are considered Mesoamerica. These immigrants are less likely to be

high school graduates than people born in the United States. Between twenty-five and fifty-seven

percent of these foreign-born immigrants from Mesoamerica have less than a high school education and

only twenty percent from the Caribbean have a four-year degree, nine percent from Central America,

and only seven percent have a four-year degree from Mexico (Fuqua & Veness, 2019). Georgetown has

the highest concentration of population with no high school diploma and has a high risk of poverty,

with 848 families being in this class. There are more than three-hundred and ten Spanish speaking

people over the age of six who have limited English abilities and a contributing factor of this is the lack

of income. Of the entire Hispanic population in Sussex county ninety-eight percent of the immigrants

are from the Mesoamerica region (Fuqua & Veness, 2019).

As nurses it is our job to constantly educate and heal all of those around us. We can help with

this community be setting up community events at least once a month that has wellness check-ups and

just being there to answer questions that they may have. At these events, the nurses would be able to

educate the population on the management of diabetes, hypertension, cancer, and liver issues since

these complications are the most predominate in this population. This type of community is very tight

knit, and they do a lot together such as soccer leagues. This is a great way to get the community
 HISPANIC POPULATION IN SUSSEX COUNTY 4

engaged and a strategy to help with decreasing the risk for obesity. There is something called a festival

Hispano which brings the community together and celebrates with music, education, and cuisine. The

churches also play a huge part in gathering the community together by opening churches for the

Hispanic population (Fuqua & Veness, 2019). Even though every population and community face their

own areas of needs, I believe that Hispanics need the most help. They need help with navigating health

and social services systems, family literacy and language skills, and it would be very helpful if they

could receive low cost pro-bono legal services.

As stated, before the goals for this community population are to decrease the risks of diabetes,

liver disease, cancer, and hypertension, gain access to healthcare, and being able to afford a healthy

lifestyle; such as housing and transportation issues. To decrease these health risks the community can

begin by joining a soccer league, walking, exercising, or just being outside for the day. These small

things will add up quickly and in the long run will be very helpful with preventing other health

complications. In order to afford healthcare this population can gain access by applying for the

Affordable Care Act, but the issue is knowing how to apply. The community workers should come

together in a time like this and help this population. Finally, many of this population are working on a

farm, in a poultry plant, or doing construction, all of which do not supply good healthcare or benefits

when first starting. This population also works for less and therefore must share their housing with

multiple people in order to save money.

In order to evaluate the interventions to these goals the community nurses and members need to

have the monthly meetings in order to gather their data on outcomes. Nurses play a big role in

communities such as these because they need to be advocates for their community and especially the

ones in need.
 HISPANIC POPULATION IN SUSSEX COUNTY 5

References

Center for Disease Control and Prevention. (n.d.). Vital signs. Hispanic health (May 2015). Retrieved

from https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/hispanic-health/

Fuqua, J. & Veness, A. (2019). Perspectives on the Latino population in Sussex County. Delaware.

Delaware Community Foundation. https://www.delcf.org/wp-

content/uploads/2019/10/Perspectives-on-the-Latino-Population_10-7-2019_FOR_WEB.pdf

Surbanstats.org. (2020). Current Hispanic Or Latino Population demographics in Delaware 2020, 2019

by gender and age. https://suburbanstats.org/race/delaware/how-many-hispanic-or-latino-

people-live-in-delaware