Migration is a growing phenomenon around the world, including within the African continent. Many migrants, especially African children, face challenges related to health and social inclusion and can face increased health risks. A systematic scoping review of available literature on the health of African migrant children across the globe was conducted to offer insight into these health risks. The review was conducted over a 15-month period from January 2019 to April 2020, yielding 6602 articles once duplicates were removed. This search included electronic databases, reference lists of articles reviewed, and searches of libraries of relevant organisations. A total of 187 studies met the inclusion criteria, of which 159 were quantitative, 22 were qualitative, and 6 used mixed methods. The findings reveal decreased health in this population in areas of nutrition, infectious diseases, mental health, birth outcomes, sexual and reproductive health, physical and developmental health, parasitic infections, oral health, respiratory health, preventative health, endocrine disorders, health care services, and haematological conditions. The findings offer insights into factors influencing the health of African immigrant and refugee children. Further studies, especially qualitative studies, are needed to determine barriers to service access after migration and to investigate other underexplored and overlooked health concerns of African migrant children, including pneumonia and child maltreatment.

Background: African refugee women in the United States are at risk of poor reproductive health outcomes; however, examination of reproductive health outcomes in this population remains inadequate. We compared: (1) prepregnancy health and prenatal behavior; (2) prenatal history and prenatal care utilization; and (3) labor and birth outcomes between African refugee women and U.S.-born Black and White women. Methods: A secondary data analysis of enhanced electronic birth certificate data was used. Univariate comparisons using chi-squared tests for dichotomous variables and analysis of variance and/or Kruskal–Wallis tests for continuous variables were conducted for Refugee versus Black versus White women. A p-value <0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: From 2007 to 2016, 789 African refugee, 17,487 Black, and 59,615 White women in our population gave birth. African refugees experienced more favorable health outcomes than U.S.-born groups on variables examined. Compared to U.S.-born women, African refugee women had fewer prepregnancy health risks (p < 0.001), fewer preterm births (p < 0.001), fewer low birth weight infants (p < 0.001), and higher rates of vaginal deliveries (p < 0.001). These favorable outcomes occurred despite later initiation of prenatal care (p < 0.001) and lower scores of prenatal care adequacy among refugee women compared to U.S.-born groups (p < 0.001). Conclusions: The healthy immigrant effect appears to extend to reproductive health outcomes in our studied population of African refugee women. However, based on our data, targeted, culturally-congruent education surrounding family planning and prenatal care is recommended. Insight from reproductive health care experiences of African refugee women can provide understanding of the protective factors contributing to the healthy immigrant effect in reproductive health outcomes, and knowledge gained can be utilized to improve outcomes in other at-risk groups.