Hmong

Many of North Carolina's Hmong residents live in western North Carolina, which was badly impacted by Helene. Community leaders say that families, especially older folks, need access to Asian food staples and language interpretation assistance to apply for federal disaster relief funds.

WFAE's Layna Hong and WUNC's Eli Chen talk with co-host Jeff Tiberii about their story on health care interpreters for members of NC's Hmong community — who are often patients' adult children. They are also joined by Sendra Yang, who interprets for her father at his medical appointments.

Many Hmong refugees settled in western North Carolina in the decades following the Vietnam War. Now that they’re getting older and are dealing with more health issues, they’ve become more reliant on their adult children to serve as interpreters in healthcare settings, which can be challenging given major differences between the English and Hmong languages.