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Immigration and customs officials said more than 2,000 illegal immigrants currently held by the ICE were quarantined for showing signs of infectious diseases, including mumps.
CNN reports that the number of asylum seekers and other immigrant detainees held along the border in cities like El Paso, Texas, has risen sharply since last year, and that ICE and the US Customs and Border Protection deal with immigrants more seriously ill than all the others. before.
"As of March 7, 2019, a total of 2,287 inmates were grouped together to be exposed to an inmate suffering from a contagious disease," said a spokesman for the CIE in a statement released earlier this week in the press .
"In the past 12 months, 51 ICE detention centers have been undergoing a health survey for the treatment of mumps, chicken pox and influenza, according to the newspaper. [ICE officials], "CNN reports." There were 236 cases of mumps reported, with 16 other suspected cases during this period. "
At least three children have died in CBP detention since November after contracting life-threatening illnesses and infections during their journey from the US to Mexico, from their home in Honduras or in Guatemala. In at least two cases, border patrols attempted to provide emergency medical care, but they were simply too late. the children's illness was too advanced.
US immigration authorities are accustomed to illegal immigrants and asylum seekers arriving at border patrol premises, but in recent years, most of them have finally been in dire straits in the face of flu or chickenpox – diseases that are still quite common in the United States. States.
Last year, however, ICE and CBP officials saw a marked increase in the number of migrants with more serious life-threatening illnesses and dangerous communicable diseases such as mumps, which spread by contact with bodily fluids and which could trigger an epidemic among Americans. if infected people are allowed to enter the general population.
The most serious outbreak occurred in Texas, where about 200 people aged 13 to 66 living in a border patrol facility are currently quarantined for mumps.
The situation poses problems not only for the Americans, but also for the migrants and for the border patrol, whose facilities can not withstand the influx of illegal immigrants with serious medical problems.
According to the New York Times, border facilities are already severely understaffed to cope with the sharp increase in the number of asylum seekers – a border patrol can now see up to 2,000 people cross the border . per day – and the facilities are even further behind compared to hundreds of patients with life-threatening diseases.
Border patrols know the situation is critical and are expected to announce major expansions of their medical facilities "in the coming days," the NYT said. The Trump administration is looking for a leading health care provider who can contract with CBP to provide medical services – a contract they may be willing to pay more than $ 47 million dollars to complete.
But the problem is that border protection is not a "humanitarian agency" and is not supposed to handle major epidemics, leaving it uncomfortable with the thousands of seriously ill migrants. who come to the border every month.
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