Migration and health: moving towards a diversity-oriented public health monitoring at the Robert Koch Institute

Abstract

Key messages Summarizing categories, such as migration background or history of migration, do not reflect the diversity and heterogeneity of the population living in Germany and their health. A differentiated description of the health situation of people with a history of migration should consider migration-related, social, and structural determinants of health as well as their interactions. The findings obtained in the ‘Improving Health Monitoring in Migrant Populations (IMIRA)’ projects will help to improve the inclusion of people with a history of migration in future studies as well as in the RKI panel. This will enable an adequate description of the health situation of people with a history of migration and therefore of the general population in Germany. In future studies, the health status of people who have not been well included in health surveys so far, such as people who are not listed at the registration office, should be monitored. For this purpose, continuous development of sampling and survey methods is necessary.