Southern Border: Public Health Violations in Migrant Detention Centers

There are countless human rights violations that occur at detention centers at the southern border of the United States, but one I’d like to focus on that is particularly important is the complete disregard for the health of these recent migrants. Health and safety conditions at migrant detention centers at the southern border of the United States are not close to the standards they should be at. Failure to provide adequate medical care and a hygienic environment continues to result in unnecessary deaths and illness both while in custody and shortly after release. This has been illustrated formally in multiple reports written by various human rights groups like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Detention Watch Network (DWN), and the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC), as well as reports written in lawsuits and even by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General. Details of the horrid conditions and treatment are also told less formally through personal narratives by migrants and their families, or by those who work or who have visited these facilities.

According to the report done by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General in 2019 that investigated five facilities in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, children were found to have few spare clothes and no access to laundry facilities, many migrants were given only wet wipes to clean themselves and bologna sandwiches to eat, and children at two of the five facilities in the area were not given hot meals until inspectors arrived. Conditions and overcrowding were so severe that when the agency’s internal inspectors visited some of the facilities, migrants banged on cells and pressed notes to windows begging for help.

Central American children who under immigration law cannot be immediately deported back to their origin country, are supposed to be moved to facilities managed by the Department of Health and Human Services within 72 hours, yet 826 of the 2,669 children detained at the facilities were held longer than 72 hours—a clear violation of a federal court settlement and Customs and Border Protection policy. Those who have successful asylum cases are brought by ICE to temporary shelters that run privately and often on donations. Here, they are able to rest, rehydrate, and are given basic care before going off to their final destinations. At a recent news conference, doctors in Texas who volunteer at one of these shelters described children having life-saving medication taken away or released with serious ailments but without any medical records from the time they were detained.

According to Eve Shapiro, a pediatrician volunteering at a shelter named Casa Alitas, “When people have been experiencing adverse circumstances, such as inadequate food and water, dehydration, and particularly stress, all those factors would increase risk in terms of getting the flu and other illnesses as well.” This adds another layer of vulnerability to the already extremely vulnerable groups of people making this journey to the United States. Today, nearly 90% of migrants caught crossing the Southern border illegally are families and unaccompanied children from Central America. They are not citizens nor are they legal residents of the United States until they receive their legal documents, if they do. Therefore, they have very little legal rights in the United States, so it is very easy for them to be neglected or taken advantage of, and there is not much incentive for Customs and Borders Protection to improve conditions and treatment. This neglect coupled with the physical and emotional trauma of their journey leads to their compromised immune system that puts them at a much higher risk for very preventable illnesses.

More recently, little to no efforts were made to implement safety measures to reduce COVID-19 spread. In fact, Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice and Freedom for Immigrants reported this month that employees at the Adelanto Detention Centre in California are spraying HDQ Neutral – which manufacturer Spartan Chemical warns can be harmful as it can cause skin burns and serious eye damage when inhaled – in poorly ventilated areas filled with detainees. Included in the report are first-hand accounts by inmates, including the following: “The guards have started spraying this chemical everywhere, all over everything, all the time. It causes a terrible reaction on our skin,” one inmate said. “When I blow my nose, blood comes out. They are treating us like animals. One person fainted and was taken out, I don’t know what happened to them. There is no fresh air.” The poor ventilation that causes prolonged contact with dangerous chemicals also allows airborne viruses such as COVID-19 to spread unchecked.

The U.S. government is failing to give these people their basic human rights. Our country’s most vulnerable should not rely on shelters that are funded by donations and county governments to compensate for this. The U.S. must improve the conditions and treatment of detention centers, make sure no one is being detained in these facilities meant for short-term stay for more than 72 hours, and provide funding to these temporary shelters for asylum seekers post-release. These shelters desperately need more resources that they simply don’t have the budget for, even when it comes to obtaining enough of the flu vaccine, which is crucial for this at-risk population. Before funding, however, needs to come a change in attitude and priorities by the U.S. government. Customs and Border Protection refused to grant a group of doctors access to provide vaccines in San Diego in December 2019 despite at least three recent flu deaths of children in U.S. immigration custody, stating that it was not feasible. This is not only ridiculous but cruel, as the effort to allow a group of doctors access to the facility is minimal compared to the human cost of a flu outbreak. This dehumanizing behavior and these policies can be reversed and changed, but for now, the U.S. government is deliberately choosing not to.

Sources

“Southern Border: Conditions at Immigrant Detention Centers.” American Medical Association, www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/population-care/southern-border-conditions-immigrant-detention-centers.

Kanno-youngs, Zolan. “Squalid Conditions at Border Detention Centers, Government Report Finds.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 2 July 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/07/02/us/politics/border-center-migrant-detention.html.

“Pandemic.” Castro, Isabel, director. Season 1, episode 2, Netflix, 2020.

“US Immigration Officials Bar Doctors from Giving Flu Shots to Detained Kids.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 10 Dec. 2019,  www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/10/us-immigration-detained-children-flu-shots.

Soboroff, Jacob, and Julia Ainsley. “Detained Migrants Say They Were Forced to Clean  COVID-Infected ICE Facility.” NBCNews.com, NBCUniversal News Group, 11 June 2020, www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/detained-migrants-say-they-were-forced-clean-covid-infected-ice-n1228831.