Health of Roma People living in marginalized Communities in Slovakia

Abstract

Introduction. The biggest Roma communities reside in the eastern part of Slovakia in the regions of Presov and Kosice, whose share is 35-40%. While the atlas of Roma communities from 2019 indicates that about 440,000 Roma live in Slovakia, only 156,000 Roma registered in 2021. Moreover, more than half of them stated Roma nationality only as a second nationality. Due to the fear of discrimination, racism and hate speech 10-15% of Roma did not state their identity because they consider it more advantageous in their efforts to integrate into society. It is also assumed that a significant part of the Roma (12- 15%) living in the south of Slovakia have adopted the Hungarian nationality. Objectives. The main goal was to map and analyse the development of civilizational and infectious diseases in the Roma population, taking into account the social, economic and cultural status of the Roma in Slovakia. Methods: The data were analysed on the basis of available statistics and forecasts of the development of diseases in the allSlovak databases maintained by the NCZI SR and the Statistical Office of Slovak Republic. We compared the development of tuberculosis, hepatitis, diabetes, and the overuse of psychotropic substances, which often occur in marginalized Roma communities. Results: The results showed that although some diseases such as tuberculosis and hepatitis are decreasing along with the general average of registered diseases in the population, their highest occurrence in terms of the number of registered cases still occurs in Roma communities. Among Roma, the proportion of people addicted to psychotropic substances is increasing, the risk of infectious and civilizational diseases such as e.g. diabetes, asthma, obesity and cardiovascular diseases. Conclusion. With the decreasing quality of life of the Roma, the number of infectious and civilizational diseases also increases, therefore we recommend that comprehensive prevention, education in the field of vaccination and support for early diagnosis of diseases be implemented.