\n<\/p>\n
More than 1,100 healthcare professionals from across Europe have urged MEPs to reject proposed measures aimed at increasing the deportation of undocumented people, warning they could threaten public health by transforming essential public services, including hospitals, into sites of immigration enforcement.<\/p>\n
The draft plans, which are due to go to a vote on Thursday, have been in the works since last March, when the European Commission laid out its proposal to target people with no legal right to stay in the EU, including potentially sending them to offshore centres in non-EU countries.<\/p>\n
The measures, launched after the far right made gains in the 2024 European parliament elections, are part of a broader effort by the EU to overhaul how it manages migration.<\/p>\n
Before the vote, which is one of the last steps before negotiations begin between EU institutions over the final text, doctors and nurses from Portugal to Ireland and Greece were among those who signed an open letter expressing concerns over the plans.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe refuse to become instruments of immigration enforcement,\u201d the letter noted.<\/p>\n
Published in six languages and sent to MEPs before the vote, the letter argued measures would have a wide-reaching impact: \u201cBehind technical language lies a profound transformation of our societies and the destruction of the social fabric.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the heart of their concerns is a proposed requirement for all member states to implement broad, vaguely defined detection measures to identify undocumented people. \u201cIn practice, this risks legitimising racial profiling, and turning schools, hospitals, shelters, workplaces, public transport and even private homes into sites of immigration enforcement,\u201d the letter said.<\/p>\n
The proposals could also mean healthcare workers are required to report undocumented people, in what was described as a threat to the ethical duties of protecting patient privacy and guaranteeing safe access to care.<\/p>\n
The result would be a \u201cclimate of fear\u201d that could deter people from accessing care, the letter said. \u201cWhen people are afraid to access care, everyone\u2019s health is at risk,\u201d it added. \u201cIt also erodes trust in social services and threatens public health, as it is already happening in countries like the US, where ICE-style raids occur daily.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the UK, where rules were introduced in 2017 to compel hospitals in England to charge most undocumented migrants upfront for many forms of hospital-based medical care, the impact had been noticeable, said Anna Miller, head of UK policy and advocacy at Doctors of the World UK.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn our clinics in the UK we see patients too afraid to go forward to the NHS in case it leads to an ICE-style raid at their home address,\u201d she said. \u201cThis EU regulation risks creating the same climate of fear across the EU, driving people away from healthcare services, with serious consequences for individuals and for public health systems as a whole.\u201d<\/p>\n
In announcing the proposals last year, the European Commission described them as \u201ceffective and modern procedures\u201d that would increase the deportations of people denied asylum or who had overstayed their visa. Currently about one in five people without the right to stay are returned to their country of origin, and the rate has changed little in recent years.<\/p>\n
Campaigners have long expressed concerns over the proposed measures, warning that they risk turning everyday spaces, public services and community interactions into tools of ICE-style immigration enforcement.<\/p>\n
In February, 75 rights organisations said the plans \u201cwould consolidate a punitive system, fuelled by far-right rhetoric and based on racialised suspicion, denunciation, detention and deportation.\u201d The joint statement came weeks after 16 rights experts from the UN wrote to the EU listing more than a dozen concerns over how the plans could contravene international human rights obligations.<\/p>\n
In this week\u2019s letter, healthcare professionals also expressed concerns that the regulation would lead to more people in detention, including children, within and outside Europe. \u201cDetention has well-documented health consequences: respiratory and infectious diseases, severe anxiety, depression, sleep disorders, retraumatisation, acute psychiatric needs and higher incidences of suicide,\u201d it noted. \u201cIn the case of children, the impact of detention is devastating and long-lasting; it will never be in their best interests and is prohibited under international law.\u201d<\/p>\n
The open letter was organised by M\u00e9decins du Monde, which said it was calling on EU institutions to remove any provisions that could deter people from seeking healthcare. \u201cMigration enforcement cannot come at the expense of the right to health,\u201d said Andrea Soler of the organisation. \u201cThe EU must ensure that its migration policies protect public health, uphold medical ethics and guarantee safe access to healthcare for all, regardless of migration status.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
More than 1,100 healthcare professionals from across Europe have urged MEPs to reject proposed measures aimed at increasing the deportation of undocumented people, warning they could threaten public health by transforming essential public services, including hospitals, into sites of immigration enforcement. The draft plans, which are due to go to a vote on Thursday, have<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47452,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[4280,715,3194,23377,480,13843,2719,1438],"class_list":{"0":"post-47451","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-deportation","9":"tag-european","10":"tag-healthcare","11":"tag-instruments","12":"tag-plans","13":"tag-refuse","14":"tag-union","15":"tag-workers"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47451\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/47452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}