One study that focused exclusively on the HIV-related risk behaviors of Latino day laborers was conducted by Organista & Kubo. also found rampant violations of day laborers' rights, including not being paid for their work, working under hazardous conditions and being subject to insults from employers. Most are at or below the federal poverty level. 7 found that most day laborers (83%) rely on their day labor work as their only source of income. Often their primary attention and focus is on earning enough money to send home to their families and for this reason many hardships are endured. Many are homeless or share housing with other men in order to save on housing costs. 8 - 9 Many borrowed money from friends or relatives to cover transit costs and as a result may spend their first few months after arrival repaying their debts. to support their families in their countries of origin. 7Įthnographic studies conducted with Latino day laborers reveal that most day laborers report coming to the U.S. 7 Day workers seek jobs primarily through informal locations, such as standing in front of businesses, home improvement stores, gas stations and on busy streets only one in five seeks work at an official day laborers work center. It is estimated that there are approximately 117,600 day laborers on any given day in the United States either looking for day labor jobs or employed as day laborers. The limited literature that exists on HIV and Latino migrant men has focused primarily on migrants living in rural areas or small cities who are usually or primarily farm workers 2 - 4 or on those described solely as “migrant laborers.” 5 - 6 Limited information is available on the HIV-related risk behaviors of day laborers, the overwhelming majority of whom are Latino immigrants. 1 Compounding such risk factors are a number of other issues, such as disruptions in family lives, poverty, low levels of formal education and literacy rates, limited English proficiency and undocumented residency status. These include engaging in sexual activities with commercial sex workers, having many sex partners, sharing needles after the injection of illegal drugs or substances taken for “therapeutic” reasons and abusing alcohol and drugs.
A number of factors are associated with the risk of HIV infection among Latino migrant workers in the United States.