Ethnic Disparities in Self-Reported Health among Older Adults in Chile: The Influence of Stressful Economic Conditions

Moisés Sandoval, Universidad de Chile
Marcela E Alvear Portaccio, Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadística - DANE

The aim of our study is to determine the influence of stressful economic conditions on ethnic disparities in self-reported health among older adults in Chile. For this purpose, we use data from the EDES 2022 survey, which is the first survey representing indigenous and non-indigenous elderly people in the country. A series of five logistic regressions were estimated considering self-reported health (good and bad health) as the dependent variable. Socio-demographic variables, health status and stressful economic conditions are added as covariates. The results corroborate that indigenous people, in this case, Mapuche, are 49% more likely to report poor health (OR=1.49; 95% CI=1.47-1.51) compared to non-indigenous people. These differential decreases when sociodemographic and health status variables are included but remains significant (OR=1.28; 95% CI=1.26-1.29). However, when introducing the variables referring to stressful economic conditions (economic hardship, financial loss and housing damage) and the respective interaction with the ethnicity variable for each of them, the probabilities of reporting worse health increase considerably for the indigenous (OR = 1.92; 95% CI = 1.87-1.96). Our findings are consistent in demonstrating that socioeconomic conditions (stressors) are a fundamental part of the racial-ethnic disparities in the health of older adults in Chile.

Keywords: The Demography of Indigenous Populations, Health and Morbidity, Population Ageing, Inequality, Disadvantage and Discrimination

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