Health overhaul: Arizona language diversity
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Published: March 4, 2013 at 2:05 pm
Arizona faces cultural and linguistic challenges in trying to educate the public about the federal health care overhaul and in marketing the changes to limited-English speakers and hard-to-reach populations.
More than 1.6 million people in Arizona age 5 and older speak a language besides English, and about 700,000 of them say they speak English less than “very well.”
Here are the most commonly spoken languages besides English in the state:
| Number of speakers | Spoke English less than “Very Well” | |
| Arizona resident over the age of 5 who speak language besides English | 1,627,805 | 706,415 |
| Spanish | 1,267,440 | 597,776 |
| Navajo | 88,251 | 21,154 |
| Chinese | 20,940 | 11,070 |
| Vietnamese | 16,670 | 10,837 |
| Arabic | 12,708 | 5,143 |
| Tagalog | 16,252 | 4,590 |
| Korean | 8,726 | 4,491 |
| Russian | 8,495 | 3,819 |
| Serbo-Croatian | 6,557 | 3,044 |
| German | 22,406 | 2,898 |
‘ Source: U.S. Census.
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One Response to “Health overhaul: Arizona language diversity”
March 4th, 2013 at 5:36 pm
Why does the responsibility default to a government entity? My Grandparents and Mother spoke no English upon arrival and no one was there from the government to assist. And yes, they lived a happy, productive life full of opportunities provided by the USA. Where is the personal responsibility of the 500K to pick up the slack on their speaking English ability?