Dangers To Migrant Health: Obesity, Malnutrition, Poor Mental Health Could Be Outcomes Of Administration’s Policies
News on migrant health focuses on harms done by cutting legal immigration and placing children in foster care. Also, a federal appeals court rules that detained children must be placed in safe and sanitary conditions.
Reuters:
Trump Rule Targeting Poor Immigrants Could Harm Children, Health: Advocates
A Trump administration plan to cut legal immigration by poor people will likely result in sicker children, more communicable diseases and greater homelessness in the United States, according to immigrant advocates and the federal government’s own analysis. (Trotta, 8/15)
The Associated Press & Frontline:
Claims: Migrant Kids Split At Border Harmed In Foster Care
The foster care programs are meant to provide migrant children with care while authorities work to connect them with parents, relatives or other sponsors. But instead the boy told a counselor he was repeatedly sexually molested by other boys in the foster home. A review of 38 legal claims obtained by The Associated Press — some of which have never been made public — shows taxpayers could be on the hook for more than $200 million in damages from parents who said their children were harmed while in government custody. The father and son are among dozens of families — separated at the border as part of the Trump administration’s zero tolerance policy — who are now preparing to sue the federal government, including several who say their young children were sexually, physically or emotionally abused in federally funded foster care. (Burke, Linderman and Mendoza, 8/16)
NPR:
Appeals Court Rules Detained Migrant Children Should Get Soap, Sleep, Clean Water
A federal appeals court in California ruled that migrant children detained by U.S. immigration authorities must be provided with edible food, clean water, and basic hygiene items such as soap and toothbrushes, in accordance with a decades-old court order. The ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a Trump administration challenge of a lower court decision finding that the government failed to offer detained minors safe and sanitary conditions as required by the 1997 Flores settlement. (Gonzales, 8/15)
The New York Times:
Migrant Children Are Entitled To Toothbrushes And Soap, Federal Court Rules
The exchange in June between the lawyer and a panel of openly aghast federal judges spread rapidly in the national media. The case grew in significance days later, when a group of lawyers told reporters they had observed distressed migrant children held in cramped, dirty conditions and without sufficient food or clean water at a Border Patrol station in Clint, Tex. The lawyers said they saw infants being cared for by other detainees, some as young as 7 years old. (Dickerson, 8/15)
Los Angeles Times:
Detained Children Must Have Adequate Food And Hygiene Items, Court Rules
“Assuring that children eat enough edible food, drink clean water, are housed in hygienic facilities with sanitary bathrooms, have soap and toothpaste, and are not sleep-deprived are without doubt essential to the children’s safety,” wrote Judge Marsha S. Berzon, a Clinton appointee. The case stirred nationwide outrage in June when a video of the 9th Circuit hearing on it went viral. (Dolan, 8/15)
The Associated Press:
Panel Rules Soap, Sleep Essential To Migrant Kids' Safety
Leecia Welch, senior director of legal advocacy and child welfare at the National Center for Youth Law, said the panel’s ruling wasn’t surprising. “It should shock the conscience of all Americans to know that our government argued children do not need these bare essentials,” she said. A message seeking comment was sent to the Department of Justice. (Taxin, 8/15)
