Along the Wall and Beyond: The Crisis of Immigrant Health During the COVID-19 Pandemic

          Despite our country’s growing innovations both in and outside of the government, there is still one discussion that seems to constantly be brought up within legislation, mainstream media, and political debates. That topic is immigration and in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic it seems that its prevalence is made even more significant. One of the biggest industries in the United States is healthcare and sanitation. But, as you seem to connect these two topics together, it is made clear that for immigrants there is a lack of proper care and sanitation. The U.S. border is a temporary home for over 416,000 people with roughly 58 percent being refugees and asylum seekers (UNHCR). Of this population 42 percent are attempting to come to the United States for health services and only 10 percent of that 42 percent population will receive them with proper healthcare coverage (Jesus 297). These numbers have only gone up as COVID-19 has slowed and closed courts that help to process immigrants and has stunted the functionality of detention centers. Healthcare is an important aspect right of everyone’s lives and should be necessity for those who live or want to live in the United States. And although healthcare is made available to many socioeconomic groups for citizens, it is not seen as a right for immigrants. The spread of COVID-19 has opened many people’s eyes to the need for healthcare, but it still isn’t organized for those in detention centers and people along the border.

          Detention centers for immigration are buildings that hold potential immigration violators while their case is being processed. However, these detention centers are not in the best kept conditions for holding immigrants. Between 2010 and 2016 there were over 33,000 complaints reported to the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General. These complaints ranged from mental, physical, and social health issues to blatant abuse to immigrants held in the centers (Ballard Brief). Each year there is an estimated 400,000 immigrants that are place into one of the 200 immigration detention centers across the country. Currently there is roughly 55,000 immigrants held in these detention centers at one time. This is a 13,000 person increase since 2018. Over a third of complaints this year were about health conditions with a majority being food and water issues mixed amongst complaints towards lack of heating, lighting, sleep deprivation, and overcrowding (Saadi 187). These and a lack of proper hygiene create a breeding ground for diseases like COVID-19, influenza, measles, mumps, pneumonia, among other respiratory diseases. Health officials in these centers are also told to focus only onto acute health problems and to leave the major ones for the medical care workers in their home country after deportation. These negative conditions are not preserving human rights and health interests into the frontal perspective, and this causes these conditions to continue to be circulated. Many immigrants can then be sent back to their home countries without proper care and thus remain without it due to improper coverage. Uncured diseases also continue to spread, especially during COVID-19 as vaccinations aren’t given to immigrants and refugees which continues to spread in some of the more unsanitary and overcrowded conditions.

          Unfortunately, a majority of these prisons are privately run and make it difficult for change to be enacted onto the detention centers. The length of processing and sentencing are also increasing as detention population sizes are steadily increasing as well as from court slowdowns from the COVID-19 closures of government systems. The lengths of immigrants reached a peak under the Trump administration that began to form under Obama. Between the two administrations, the holding average changed from 22 days to 34 days (FFI). This average is expected to fluctuate based on each coming administration, but the certainty of the increase has been seen in the pandemic. ICE and the Trump administration have utilized immigrant detention as a racial project that slowly disables human rights for the people. Families that are separated within detention centers from ICE’s organizational failures have caused many individuals to be neglected from physical and mental health issues as they are sometimes left unseen and untreated. These poor conditions are further outlined amongst the inadequate amount workers that are present in some of these detention facilities. Because of this family separation and unsanitary predictions that effect physical and mental health aren’t being fixed quick enough as DHS policies aren’t able to be enforced with the lack of proper care workers. This disorganization isn’t just present in detention centers, but also along the border of the United States and Mexico where refugees and immigrants are attempting to make their way into the country as their wait times in improper conditions have been lengthened by the pandemic at hand.

          The border population is at its largest point ever and has seen growth more and more, especially over the past eight years. One of the problems that comes with an increased population in a set amount of space is sanitation. This is a focus in the United States as clean water, regulated food, and disease prevention are a central focus to the citizens. However, neglect of this same tenacity can be seen in detention centers as immigrants are left in less-than-ideal spaces. Regulation is a huge reason why this is occurring, and it is happening in an even worse state along the border. The COVID-19 outbreak has spread worldwide which means that it has also reached people along the border, and since those seeking amnesty usually don’t have healthcare, they can seek medical attention when needed. In addition, countless of COVID-19 cases have been documented, but due to a central focus onto the quarantine effort it is expected to be significantly more than previously calculated. Other diseases like E. coli have also been spreading throughout the camps as they don’t have access to bath water. It is reported that most clean themselves in the Rio Grande River which is known for carrying harmful bacteria like E. coli and waste (TBP). These issues continue to rise and have been a product of previous legislation that has been passed by current and previous administrations. The border crisis has been at the center of the political lens since the Bush administration and earlier, but during the pandemic the light that is shown onto immigrants has now shifted and for the most part it hasn’t been a positive one.

          The Trump administration posed the immigrant issue as a threat instead of a more passive problem that needed to be solved. Seeing the immigrants as a national security threat and a public health risk in the wake of a pandemic changed the narrative and seemed to paralyze policies that were previously in place. In July of 2017 the Family Case Management Program was terminated and created prolonged and indefinite detention and required all migrants regardless of background to be detained and processed to ultimately be deported. This led to an increase in population within detention centers over the next year. Prior to July 2017, asylum seekers with a sponsor and a record that was deemed not a threat to the community were allowed to be released on humanitarian parole, but when the Trump administration terminated the program, this changed. The Migrant Protection Protocol was the next step into the downturn of the border management process. Asylum seekers along the border were forced to return to their home country, with a majority returning to Mexico. This cause the border to be used as a makeshift detention center that left many to be without a lawyer and present without the rights and laws of the United States. Only 6 percent of legal cases had representation and only 2 cases out of all 16,000 were granted amnesty (Syracuse University). In 2020 when the pandemic broke out, Title 42 of the public health code closed the border and restricted travel to essentials only (CDC). The border was not deemed as such and thus migrants were expelled across the border and over 200,000 of these were without due process (USCBP). The CDC attempted to counter the claims made by the government and presidential administration by explaining that students and families along the border are no more likely to spread COVID-19 than a citizen of the United States, however they are more exposed to it along the border (PHR). The pandemic has made it incredibly difficult for legislation to resume to full efficiency and this has resulted in an increased policies towards migrants and has increased the return to home countries. 

Overall, there needs to be some form of reform in both legislation and the system itself. However, the first place of reform lies amongst the legislation and the presidential administration. The coronavirus pandemic has guided attention away from immigration in the public eye but has thrusted the political lens over it as there is now a garnering of legislative attention over these two overlapping issues. Policies like the MPP and Title 42 have caused many migrants to be sent back to their home countries unwillingly and without support for their health and well-being (Blue 47). This is now being done without right and due process, although the issues within immigration should be viewed as a human right and not a lawful one. The CDC’s Title 42 has also stunted the process of amnesty as immigration isn’t deemed as a necessity. This is moved forward as there is no consistent reporting of conditions and unsanitary circulation throughout the border and detention centers. This could attempt to be solved if the immigration issue was taken from a stricter regulatory standpoint and detention centers had stricter policies enforced upon the workers and the funding. Immigration focus during the pandemic has been a major aspect of legislation that is growing during the COVID-19 pandemic, and these could ultimately be fixed by stricter regulations that were focused on human rights and the well-being of the people in mind.