Official English

Fact Sheets: Preventable Tragedies

Language Barrier Dangerous, Often Deadly, for Immigrants

The high rate of immigration to the United States is rapidly changing the face of America, primarily due to the massive numbers of limited-English speakers arriving daily to our shores. There are 21.3 million people living here today who do not speak English "very well."

Instead of working to teach immigrants English, our government continues to turn itself inside out by increasing its multilingual services. While this divisive catering to non-English speakers comes at a heavy price economically to our nation, it takes an even greater toll on immigrants themselves.

Economically, the growing communications barrier has turned many newcomers into unwitting victims of a linguistic welfare system, and is rapidly marginalizing immigrants to the sidelines of American life. Without good English skills, immigrants fail economically, academically and socially.

More important, the inability to properly communicate puts the lives of immigrants in jeopardy and causes needless pain and suffering.

Following are but a few recent snapshots of appalling episodes that occur regularly in communities around the U.S. Tragic situations like these can be averted if immigrants are given every opportunity to learn English:

When a Patient Is Lost in the Translation
Communication problems between doctors and patients who speak different languages occur nationwide. Many hospitals and clinics hire interpreters, but because of their workloads, physicians often resort to having family members or hospital workers translate, instead of waiting the 30 or 40 minutes it may take for an official interpreter to arrive.
A recent study in the journal Pediatrics says that translation errors are common and can be dangerous. Dr. Glenn Flores and colleagues at the Medical College of Wisconsin and Boston University examined the transcripts of 13 audiotaped visits of Spanish speaking patients to a pediatrics clinic. Six encounters involved an official hospital interpreter; seven involved an "ad hoc" interpreter like a nurse, social worker, or, in one case, an 11-year-old sibling.
The official interpreters made 231 errors; 53 percent of them were judged to have the potential to cause clinical problems. The ad hoc interpreters made 165 errors, and 77 percent of them were potentially dangerous. Some errors included the interpreters' omitting questions about drug allergies, telling a parent to put a steroid cream on an infant's entire body (instead of just the face), telling a mother to give an antibiotic for two days instead of 10, telling a mother to put an oral antibiotic into her child's ears (instead of his mouth) for a middle-ear infection, and using a Puerto Rican slang word for mumps, which a Central American mother could not understand. Interpreters sometimes also added comments, like telling a mother not to answer the doctor's questions about sexually transmitted diseases or drug use.
Although the hospital interpreters' errors were significantly less likely to cause problems than those of the ad hoc interpreters, the authors wrote, "these findings support the conclusion that most hospital interpreters do not receive adequate training."
Interpreter errors can also put hospitals and physicians in legal jeopardy. In 1984, a 22-year-old man won a $71 million settlement after he asserted that a group of paramedics, doctors and emergency room workers at a South Florida hospital had misdiagnosed a brain clot. The patients' relatives used the Spanish word "intoxicado" to describe his ailment. They meant that he was nauseated, but the medical staff interpreted the word to mean intoxicated, a valid meaning in some cultures, and treated him for a drug overdose.
(New York Times, April 7, 2003, Erin Marcus)

Philadelphia Struggles Under Language Barriers
Language has become a big problem in Philadelphia, with about 65,810 Philadelphians, or 4.6 percent of the city's population, being isolated by language barriers. Two recent examples of linguistic troubles:

• Elderly Russian-speaking residents were "clueless" after being thrown out of their adult day care center because they didn't understand recent eligibility changes that had been sent to them in the mail and were written in English.
• Dominican Republic shopkeepers couldn't meet requirements of food inspectors because they didn't speak English.

Government agencies struggle to keep up and are undertaking many activities, including distributing lead poisoning and pre-natal health in more languages and adding more interpreters at health centers and adding English classes for students.
(Philadelphia Daily News, September 25, 2002, originally reported by Scott Flander)

OSHA Says Language Gap Kills
At the Workers' Compensation Educational Conference, a representative from the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) said language barriers have had a significant impact on the number of worker fatalities. OSHA is reportedly working to address the needs of Hispanic workers since this group has had the highest increase in the number of on-the-job fatalities. The agency plans to increase the number of workplace inspections in the coming year.
(National Underwriter, Property & Casualty/Risk & Benefits Management Edition, September 2, 2002, originally reported by Daniel Hays)

Vietnamese Immigrants Victimized
For the last six months, eight robberies or attempted robberies were reported in the Ashley subdivision of Baton Rouge, LA, home to many of the 2,600 or so Vietnamese. Many Vietnamese have been attacked brutally in front of their own homes, robbed of their money, cars and personal possessions. Gun-wielding robbers have kicked open front doors and awakened sleeping residents from their beds, demanding anything of value.
Even so, these frightened Vietnamese immigrants have suffered in silence. The language barrier between Baton Rouge police and Vietnamese victims compounds the problem, with many immigrants saying they don't know enough English to speak with a 911 operator.
(Advocate (Baton Rouge, LA), August 19, 2002, originally reported by Marlene Naanes)

Marriage Vows Not Understood
The nation's growing language gap is affecting all aspects of American life, including the age-old institution of matrimony; that is the ceremony of becoming husband and wife. At the most meaningful time in a person's life, many immigrants are participating in short, cold civil ceremonies and don't understand most of what is being said.
While Hispanics are the largest growing ethnic group in the country, county clerks (who often perform marriage ceremonies) are finding themselves facing wide-eyed immigrants wanting to marry who speak everything from Hindi to Swedish, but do not understand much of what they have just pledged.
(Washington Post, August 5, 2002, originally reported by Paul Glader)

Immigrants Struggle to be Understood by Doctors
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 has been interpreted by federal agencies and patient advocates to mean that medical facilities receiving federal money must provide services to everyone equally – even if they do not speak English. Former President Clinton added to this provision in August 2000 by signing Executive Order 13166, which encourages physicians to provide language assistance to every limited English proficient patient.
The growing language barrier is compromising the quality of care and privacy of immigrant patients across the country. While a patient's family member or friend often serves as interpreter, problems arise because medical jargon can be too complicated for the untrained interpreter and because patients are reluctant to share intimate details.
Heavy administrative burdens are created for clinics and doctors' offices with the increasing demand of finding trained interpreters and juggling appointments and securing funding for such services.
(Washington Post, July 23, 2002, originally reported by Sarah Park)

Crash Caused by Language Gap
An accident on a state highway in New Hampshire was caused when an English speaking passenger said, "You're going to take a left at exit 5," while trying to teach a Spanish speaking driver how to operate a motor vehicle. The driver proceeded to make a sharp left and collide with a tree. The car was totaled, but both occupants escaped unharmed.
(The {Manchester, NH} Union Leader, July 23, 2002, originally reported by Sherry Butt Dunham)

Safety Fines Caused by Language Barrier
An Illinois manufacturer was fined nearly $300,000 after a language barrier related incident caused a punch-press operator to lose three fingers from his left hand. The Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) cited the Sloan Valve Co., for seven citations, including failure to guard against injury and failure to supervise operation after the accident to the Spanish-speaking worker. While injuries for blacks and whites have declined in recent years, the Bureau of Labor Statistics claims fatalities for Hispanics have risen sharply, from 729 in 1999 to 815 in 2000.
(Chicago Tribune, July 21, 2002, originally reported by T. Shawn Taylor)

Medical Mishaps
Immigrants, both because of language problems and cultural differences, are at risk for communicating with their doctors.
There's the story of the Hispanic mother who gave her child 11 teaspoons of cough medication because she read the word "ounce" as "once," the Spanish word for eleven. The child lived, but the mistake could have been fatal.
There's also the case of an elderly Afghan man whose two grown-up daughters were the primary translators for their father, who had been diagnosed with stomach cancer. Each daughter had her own idea about what their father should hear, and often one or the other did not translate everything the doctor said about the man's condition.
(Passaic {NJ} Herald News, July 2, 2002, originally reported by Sarah Brown)

Minnesota Construction Fatalities Rise
In trying to determine why Minnesota construction fatalities increased from six to eight to 13 over a three-year span, authorities consider the language barrier a prime suspect. Though contracting officials said the number was well within the average range for casualties given the up tick in construction projects, they stressed that 13 deaths were way too many.
Investigations found that the majority of accidents could be traced to new employees with limited experience and training. Also noted for contributing to the higher accident rate was the increased number of workers who were limited English proficient.
(Associated Press, May 28, 2002, )

Language Barrier Almost Gets Mom Put in Jail
A Mexican immigrant, who also is a mother, is but one of many people caught up in the plight of being a non-English speaker in a New York Hospital. She tells the story of the time her son Carlos fell out of his bed and bumped his head, and so, as she put it, "like any concerned mother," she took him to the hospital.
After waiting 12 hours for someone to treat her son or speak to her in Spanish, the mother decided to go home. She was apprehended by security guards as she attempted to leave and was escorted back into the hospital. Confused about why she was not allowed to leave, she finally found a janitor to help translate. The janitor spoke to the doctors, and then explained to her that the hospital was taking her son away because of suspected child abuse.
"Imagine," she said, "being a worried mother trying to do the best for your child, and another person who doesn't even know you, doesn't even talk to you, accuses you of abusing your child – all because you don't speak their language!"
(The Village Voice (New York City), May 7, 2002, originally reported by Katie Worth)

Man Accused of Killing Brother-in-Law, Uses Language Barrier to Show Innocence
Language skills played a central role in a Rhode Island courtroom when the defense claimed the accused had not been read his rights in his native language of Gujarati. The 25-year old, who had been in the United States for 12 years, is accused of murdering his brother-in-law in a Portsmouth hotel.
Though the accused gave a statement admitting to the crime, the defense claims that the charges of murder, conspiracy to commit murder, committing assault with the intent to rob, conspiring to commit robbery and discharging a firearm while committing a crime of violence resulting in a death should be dismissed because the Miranda warning was meaningless to a man whose 1991 report card gave him an "LB" [language barrier] grade in reading and writing.
(The Providence {RI} Journal-Bulletin, April 5, 2002, originally reported by Alisha A. Pina)

Mentally Ill Man Who Spoke No English Killed by Police
A Minnesota man wielding a machete was shot and killed by police after he failed to respond to multiple requests to drop the weapon. The victim, who spoke no English, had been trailed by police for several blocks while chanting, "God is great" in Somali, and waving both a machete and a crowbar. Police used their weapons after the man hit a police car and threatened officers with the knife.
(Associated Press, March 11, 2002, )

Inability to Communicate with Police Leads to Tragedy
A Texas man died while being taken into police custody following a call regarding an intoxicated person. Police found the man wandering the streets, but were unable to communicate with him because he did not speak English. When officers noted a shiny object in his hand, pepper spray was used to subdue the suspect. By the time an ambulance arrived, the man was no longer breathing. It was later determined the suspect was unarmed.
(Associated Press, January 21, 2002, )

Language Barrier Blamed for Construction Worker's Death
A limited English proficient construction worker in Georgia fell more than four stories to his death after failing to secure his safety harness on the job. An official from the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) found that the language barrier played a significant role in the man's death, finding that the many Spanish-speaking employees on the job understood neither the training nor safety rules provided. An investigation into the matter was further hampered by the language barrier.
(The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, January 17, 2002, originally reported by Beth Warren)

Linguistic Ghetto Hits Professionals
Even though many immigrants to the U.S. bring impressive resumes and skills, the language barrier sidelines thousands. The stories are endless and familiar:

• The 'big boss,' a business executive who ran an international corporation and negotiated million-dollar deals. Today, he's a warehouse worker, a diabetic 60-year old man who loads boxes and fills out shipping forms.
• The Iraqi political refugee who was a college professor in Iraq, with a doctorate in international development from Oklahoma State University. A specialist in agriculture, he now directs terminal traffic at Atlanta's Hartsfield International Airport.
• The West African surgeon who once trained other doctors as a member of the World Health Organization, and once served as the only doctor in a refugee camp in Ghana that housed thousands of people. He worked nonstop, rarely getting a full night's sleep. Today, he works in a warehouse in Lithonia, Ga. He can't be certified as a doctor in America until he masters English well enough to pass the medical exams.

(Cox News Service, January 15, 2002, originally reported by John Blake)

Japanese Woman Dies in Freezing Temperatures, Language Barrier Contributing Factor
A woman holding a crude map of a tree next to a highway and wandering around a landfill aroused the suspicions of Minnesota police, who later determined she was looking for the treasure featured in the fictional movie "Fargo." Though officials attempted to explain to the woman, who spoke only Japanese, that neither the movie nor the treasure was real, attempts to overcome the language barrier were nearly insurmountable. Six days after being placed on her way home, her body was found by a bow hunter 60 miles east of Fargo.
(The Bismark Tribune, January 8, 2002, originally reported by Deena Winter)

Teenage Moms Get Unexpected 'Surprise'
Each year the California Department of Social Services prints calendars to help teenage mothers cope with a daunting world. They include nutritional tips for babies and mothers, immunization charts, job and domestic violence hotlines, tips for living a responsible life.
This year an unexpected surprise: A toll-free number for a phone sex line. The number was printed by mistake on 32,000 Spanish-language calendars sent to 169 county CalWORKS offices, community organizations and job centers across the state.
Normally, someone at the department, who would call the phone numbers to make sure they were correct, would proofread the English- and Spanish-language calendars. But this year, after the English-language version was translated into Spanish at Chico State, no one at the department proofread it.
(Sacramento Bee, January 1, 2002, originally reported by John Hill)

Hispanic Construction Workers Have Highest Fatalities
Hispanics accounted for nearly a third of Georgia's workplace deaths in the last fiscal year, despite making up only 5.3 percent of the state's population.
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, a branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, blamed "misunderstandings arising from language barriers" for the deaths and said they "could be prevented and don't have to happen."
The trends in Georgia echo those nationwide. While the number of workplace fatalities among non-Hispanic workers dropped in 200, fatal injuries among Hispanic workers increased from 730 in 1999 to 815. The rise in Hispanic deaths was led by a 24 percent jump in construction fatalities.
(Chattanooga Times/Chattanooga Free Press {TN}, December 29, 2001, originally reported by Pat Mahony)

Immigrants Face Deadly Mix Due to Language Gap
Orange County, Calif., is dealing with a startling increase in the number of Hispanics and immigrants killed on the job, part of a 33 percent rise nationwide, even as the overall number of fatalities has declined. An investigation into the records found that nearly half of the persons killed while working over the last three years were immigrants.
Experts say that language barriers and lack of training play a major role in the trend. OSHA investigations have found a lack of understanding of instructions and a lack of use of safety gear in many inquiries following workplace incidents. Worse, OSHA found that many immigrant worker casualties go unreported.
One Orange County worker died from a fall into a 175-degree vat of chemicals at an Anaheim metal-plating shop. Though the company's instruction manual clearly forbid walking on the 5-inch rail between tanks, it was printed in English, not a language that the worker understood. A subsequent inquiry into the accident found that many of the recent hires were neither trained to handle hazardous materials nor proficient in English.
(The Orange County {CA} Register, October 21, 2001, originally reported by Natalya Shulyakovskaya and Alejandro Maciel)

Language Barrier Impede Police Investigations
After failing to solve only two of 11 homicides in the prior 12 months, Lexington, Ky., police had failed to make arrests in six of 13 homicides in an eight month span in 2001. Officials attribute the lack of closure to the difficulty with the language barrier, encountering more witnesses and relatives who spoke English poorly or not at all. "Any time you have a language barrier, it's going to slow you down," said Lt. P. Richardson of the Lexington Police.
(Lexington {KY} Herald-Leader, August 28, 2001, originally reported by Jefferson George)

Language Barrier Often Turns Robbery Into Murder
Police in New Jersey stepped up patrols after a series of attacks on gas station attendants in the early morning hours. Gas station employees in New Jersey are especially vulnerable, as the Garden State is one of only two states to prohibit self-serve gasoline.
Police surveillance and drive-bys were increased to allay fears among workers, though officials cautioned late-night gas attendants, 95 percent of whom are estimated not to speak English, to not resist when confronted with a robbery situation. "The language barrier could play a big part," said Sgt. Steve Choromansky, "Sometimes a robber might think someone is stalling, when they're just unsure of the situation."
(The Bergen County {NJ} Record, August 28, 2001, originally reported by Leslie Koren and Peter Pochna)

Language Barrier Prevents Public Health Messages From Reaching Latinos
Research at the University of Buffalo found that Mexican-Americans who live in the United States and speak primarily Spanish are much less physically active than those whose main language is English. While the adjustment to a new environment correlated with increased smoking and consumption of unhealthy foods, researchers found that Mexican-Americans who were more acclimated to U.S. culture participated in the same amount of exercise as non-Hispanic white Americans.
According to lead author Carlos Crespo, the lack of exercise is due to the language barrier and understanding of public health messages among Latinos.
(Copley News Service, August 13, 2001, Alison Ashton)

Colorado Police Made Front-Line Language Instructors
Colorado police are looking to bridge to language gap after four people were killed in a drunken boating accident on the John Martin Reservoir. Efforts to save the men and comfort the families were made impossible by the fact that neither the victims nor victims' families spoke English. The incident occurred just weeks after police were forced to invoke a language line to translate for Spanish speaking witnesses to a quadruple murder in the town of Rifle. According to police, costs for translation calls have increased 200 percent over the last three years.
(The Denver Post, July 23, 2001, originally reported by Erin Emery)

Spanish-Labeling Mistake in Baby Formula
Hundreds of batches of infant formula were recalled when it was found that the preparation instructions in Spanish were incorrect. As written, the Spanish instructions created a product that could lead to seizures, irregular heartbeat, renal failure or death in infants.
(The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, July 11, 2001, )

Language Barrier Blamed in Shooting Death of Hispanic Man After His Spate of Violence
A Mexican man living in Portland, Ore., was shot and killed after a string of incidents that included threatening hospital staff with pencils, striking an officer and approaching police while yielding a metal pole. The trouble began when the man refused to pay his fare when boarding a bus. After trying and failing to communicate with the victim in English, the operator of the bus flagged down a police officer. The policeman attempted to speak to the man in Spanish, but was punched in the chest. After his arrest, the man was taken to the hospital, where he threatened staff and the officers who responded, resisting pleas to surrender. According to the victim's father, no one at the hospital understood Mayan, the family's native language.
(Associated Press, April 4, 2001, originally reported by Amalie Young)

Billions Spent on Medical Mishaps
An immigrant woman gave her 85-year-old mother a dangerously high dose of blood pressure medicine because she couldn't understand the label's English-language instructions. The Food and Drug Administration estimates that $20 billion a year is spent hospitalizing people who, because of the language barrier, take the wrong dose of medication, take the wrong medication entirely or mix drugs in dangerous combinations. Health experts say millions of immigrants risk injury or death because warnings on medicine bottles only come in English.
(Associated Press, October 12, 1997, originally reported by Lauran Neergaard)