Does health insurance participation matter in shaping African immigrants' physical health in Guangzhou, China? The role of mental health

Abstract

China is a burgeoning immigrant-receiving country, and policies on immigration are just beginning to be developed. While African immigration to China was uncommon 30 years ago, China has gradually become a major destination for African immigrants due to its robust economy, welcoming universities, and low cost of living. Currently, there are increasing numbers of African students and professionals who are migrating to China to study or work. The health status of African migrants in China shapes their wellbeing, which plays a key role in strengthening long-term cooperative relations between China and African countries. Although previous literature has examined the socioeconomic status of these African immigrants, the role of health insurance participation in shaping the health status of African immigrants remains obscure in China. Using data from the 2019 questionnaire-survey in Guangzhou, China, this paper investigates the underlying mechanism driving African immigrants' health insurance participation as critical to their physical and mental health. Our results demonstrate that health insurance participation is a pivotal factor in the overall health of African immigrants; specifically, purchasing health insurance and one's mental and physical health can be characterised as a feedback loop. Purchasing health insurance can positively impact mental health, and consequently, better mental health can improve physical health. Good physical health also tends to bolster mental health. Therefore, policies aimed at improving African immigrants' mental and physical health are expected to encourage them to purchase health insurance above their present low level of insurance participation. The proposal here is that health policymaking for immigrants should include the interaction mechanism between physical and mental health rather than focus only on physical health conditions.