THE
SITUATION OF THE ROMA COMMUNITY
One
of the basic features of the Roma European population is its notably
transnational nature. We face a community who constitutes an ethnical
and cultural minority, settled in every European country as early
as the 15th century. As a distinct ethnic group, the Roma minority
has its own historical, social and cultural peculiarities, raises
very specific problems and requires differentiated and specialised
treatment if it is to be integrated into society.
It
is estimated that the Roma population living in Europe totals
8 million people, more than 6 million of whom reside in Eastern
Europe. It is a well-known fact that the Roma suffer high levels
of poverty and marginalisation and are undoubtedly the European
minority facing the greatest obstacles to social integration.
Within the European Union, Spain is the country with the highest
number of Roma, approximately 650,000. The Czech Republic, Slovakia,
Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary taken together have a Roma population
of around 4, 1 million citizens. These five are European Union
candidate countries and, therefore, future Community partners.
As for health, this is for the Roma population, as for any other,
a relevant pointer of inequalities, of quality of life and of
active participation in society. However, in this case, among
other pointers, we can verify a life expectancy inferior to that
of the non-Roma population in the same countries. The access to
health and care resources in general, culturally rather out of
reach, have created an added difficulty for their utilization
as citizens in their own right. The irruption of drugs in the
life of the Roma community is another factor that contributed
to reinforce an image already deteriorated.
Among
the health-related problems, drug abuse and HIV/AIDS are singularly
affecting the Roma community. This is due to several reasons:
firstly, because it is a demographically young population, vulnerable
to drugs abusing; secondly, because it is altering its traditional
social structures; and thirdly, because it is severely damaging
the image of the Roma population as a whole, plus it is another
factor that adds new difficulties to their social promotion and
involvement.
Since
the first steps, all over Europe, towards the creation of the
care networks for drug users, until the current situation, we
can say that Roma have been the last ones to arrive and the latest
to get involved in the abusing use of these substances. Also,
if adequate measures are not taken, they may be the last ones
to get out and to profit the prevention and care efforts that
are been executed in European countries.
