The population of older immigrants in Europe has grown in recent decades. This population consists of two main groups: individuals who migrated as labour migrants and aged in the host country and those who migrated in older age. Because of the double jeopardy of their migration status and older age, both groups are potentially at risk for experiencing ageism in the form of marginalization and social exclusion. As with other groups of older adults, ageism towards older immigrants takes place at different institutional, cultural, social, and individual levels, and in many different contexts. Most immigration studies have failed to recognize older immigrants’ jeopardies as practices of ageism. This chapter discusses policies regarding older immigrants in the context of ageism. The following question is investigated and discussed: Does migrant status constitute a situation of increased vulnerability to ageism? The chapter concludes with recommendations and implications in light of current immigration waves.

In public health policy debates, the 2015-2016 refugee crisis made visible that even in European welfare states with (close to) universal health coverage there are specific vulnerable groups with highly limited access to health care. Among them is a population of so-called 'undocumented' or 'irregular' migrants who have no regular status of residence and falls off the radar of publicly funded health care services and thus from the public health surveillance systems. The aim of our study is to provide the first-of-its-kind evidence on the characteristics, health problems and health care needs of one such vulnerable group in Austria - Chinese migrants residing in Vienna without a regular status. Medical records of 74 uninsured assumingly undocumented Chinese patients were analysed. The data was provided by a Non-governmental organisation (NGO) which delivers primary care to uninsured people in Vienna. The most frequently diagnosed health problems clustered around cardiovascular and metabolic-related diseases (hypertension and diabetics) and there was a high burden of multiple chorionic non-communicable diseases. Further efforts and resources are needed for collecting more data in a systematic way. A trusting relationship between science and practice and a cooperative relationship between and among the government agencies and NGOs are essential for evidence-based public health policy making.

There is robust evidence that homelessness and the associated life conditions of a homeless person may cause and exacerbate a wide range of health problems, while healthcare for the homeless is simultaneously limited in accessibility, availability, and appropriateness. This article investigates legal frameworks of health care provision, existing knowledge on numbers of homeless to be considered, and current means of health care provision for four EU countries with different economic and public health background: Austria, Greece, Poland, and Romania. National experts investigated the respective regulations and practices in place with desk research. The results show differences in national frameworks of inclusion into health care provision and knowledge on the number of people experiencing homelessness, but high similarity when it comes to main actors of actual health care provision for homeless populations. In all included countries, despite their differences in economic investments and universality of access to public health systems, it is mainly NGOs providing health care to those experiencing homelessness. This phenomenon fits into conceptual frameworks developed around service provision for vulnerable population groups, wherein it has been described as “structural compensation,” meaning that NGOs compensate a structural inappropriateness that can be observed within public health systems.

Care for the elderly in Europe increasingly depends on migrant carers, both in institutionalised and informal care settings. For the latter, the vulnerability of migrant carers working in private households has been described in several studies. Austria is a EU member state that made attempts to legalise the grey labour market of home care by several legislative changes, providing a framework of regulations to foster inclusion of migrant care workers into schemes of social protection. It can serve as an example how attempts of inclusion also make room for in-built mechanisms of exclusion, and how public health issues are related to economic considerations of a “care market”, with migrant workers as important, yet rather voiceless, stakeholders.

Ensuring a basic social infrastructure, encompassing welfare, healthcare, education, housing, and employment, is crucial for upholding human rights. In the context of migration, access to social infrastructures is tied to national migration and residence regulations. Undocumented migrants (UDM) often are excluded even from such basic provisions. Lacking a legal residence status, they live in a NowHereland and are subject to various forms of exploitation. The Center for Health and Migration initiated a stock-taking of legal frameworks concerning entitlements to basic social infrastructures for UDM as its Social Responsibility Project 2020. National experts provided evidence on entitlements for UDM to social welfare, healthcare, compulsory education, housing, and work, using a validated template for data collection. The chapter will present the country cases of Austria and Israel, which represent the prevailing neglect of human rights within national policies.