Farmworker study renews concerns about medical access, work conditions

Feb. 12—New survey data suggests the labor force behind California agriculture faces significant medical problems largely without access to health care, often endures unfair treatment at work and struggles with mental health while existing mostly outside the social safety net.

A study released this month by UC Merced's Community and Labor Center, the largest of its kind with 1,242 respondents between August 2021 and January 2022, concludes more should be done to widen farmworker access to health care, enforce existing workforce protections and prepare ag laborers for the industry's tech revolution.

Observers say the findings highlight stubborn disparities facing what the report terms the "nation's most disadvantaged workforce." They called for new urgency in addressing the plight of farmworkers on different levels, with policy changes, public investment and better wages.

"The farm workers who carry California agriculture on their backs need to be able to share in the bounty their hands harvest," CEO Diana Tellefson Torres of the United Farm Workers Foundation said in an emailed statement.

The study's focus on unmet health-care needs renewed a commitment by CEO Dr. Olga Meave at Clinica Sierra Vista to overcome barriers that keep farmworkers from getting treatment, such as language differences, lack of convenient transportation and limited hours of operation at clinics.

She said in an email statement the Bakersfield-based chain of health clinics will use its new mobile health units and staff of culturally competent, linguistically appropriate care providers to get farmworkers the medical attention they need.

"Through ongoing community outreach, and its commitment to providing quality health care to the most vulnerable patients, Clinica Sierra Vista will be able to help 'turn the curve' to (address) disparities related to health access and utilization referenced in the UC Merced study," Meave stated.

The survey results indicated a little less than half of all respondents had health insurance, and fewer still had visited a doctor (43 percent) or dentist (35 percent) in the prior 12 months. A small minority had ever been screened for skin cancer (16 percent) or colorectal cancer (21 percent).

About a third reported having a chronic medical condition, more than a third were obese, and incidence of mental health problems reached double digits (19 percent indicated having anxiety, 14 percent depression or hopelessness).

Among farmworker women surveyed, 14 percent reported having given birth pre-term, with 5 percent having had a pregnancy outcome with birth defects, according to the report. The report did not offer comparative data on other populations, and so it was unclear the degree to which the survey results were out of the ordinary.

Similarly worrisome conditions turned up in the UFW Foundation's Dec. 7, 2020, text-message survey of 11,921 respondents, most between the ages of 35 and 54, with a large majority working in ag fields.

Three-quarters of that study's respondents indicated they had no health insurance, and one-third reported having been diagnosed with medical conditions that put them at greater risk for a severe case of COVID-19. Only 44 percent had visited a doctor for a non-emergency, general health check in the previous 12 months. Seventeen percent said it had been more than three years since their last office visit; 13 percent said they'd never received that kind of attention.

Apart from health care, three in five respondents to the UC Merced survey indicated they did not qualify for unemployment, and more than half reported having experienced some degree of food insecurity. The vast majority were renters (92 percent), and among them, 29 percent endured living with cockroaches, 17 percent with rodents, 14 percent with mold and 12 percent with water leaks.

The study's findings in the area of working conditions were at least as troubling. Fully 43 percent indicated their employer never provided a legally required heat-illness prevention plan, and a little more than one in 10 reported having gone without consistent access to clean drinking water at work. A third reported they labored without respirators to protect against threats like pesticides and wildfire smoke, while 15 percent said they had worked through legally required, 10-minute work breaks.

More than a third (36 percent) responded they were unwilling to file a report against their employer for noncompliance with health and safety or wage and hour provisions. Among that minority, 61 percent said they hesitated to blow the whistle because they worried about being fired or deported.

The UC Merced study, informed at every stage by an advisory group of 26 worker rights, environmental justice and other organizations, recommended expanding farmworkers' access to health care and to public economic and social safety nets. It suggested devoting more public resources to protecting workers' rights and ag workforce development, "particularly as it relates to technological development" — a reference to the ongoing transformation toward greater farming automation.

"Agriculture is one of California's most vital and productive industries, yet many of its workers experience profound challenges in maintaining their health and well-being," Edward Flores at UC Merced's Community and Labor Center said in a news release. "This report provides valuable data that should inform policy development advancing the health and well-being of agricultural workers."

Co-founder and Executive Director Camila Chavez of the Bakersfield-based Dolores Huerta Foundation said Friday the idea for study originated in Kern County with a recognition that data on farmworker conditions was lacking. She added that the new findings "solidify what we've known and what we're dealing with."

Chavez, who voiced special concern about the survey data on women's reproductive health, echoed the study's recommendations for addressing workplace protections and widening access to unemployment benefits and Medi-Cal, which she said ag laborers often miss out on either because they earn too much money to qualify or can't afford benefits under Covered California.

Progress has been made, she noted, but more remains to be done to give workers a "health home" they feel comfortable in and make farmworkers' financial compensation more equitable.

"I hope that those that have decision-making power will look closely at this report and at the policy recommendations that are being made," Chavez said.

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