- 27 Dec 2018 16:21
#14975843
From the NY Times:
Another child is dead and I'm sure conservatives everywhere are celebrating. America is great again. Thank you Jesus, for President Trump.
A Guatemalan boy who died on Christmas Eve while in United States custody was moved among at least four crowded facilities at the border over the six days from his apprehension until his death.
That chronology, provided by government officials, underscores how stretched the facilities and their staff are in handling the surge of Central American families reaching the southwest border, particularly minors.
Kirstjen M. Nielsen, the secretary of homeland security, acknowledged on Wednesday that the “dramatic increase” had pushed the system to “a breaking point.”
She said she had ordered her agency to bolster medical screenings of children at the southwest border and had enlisted the medical corps of the United States Coast Guard to assist. The secretary also said that she would travel to the border this week to personally observe the screenings.
“Moving forward, all children will receive a more thorough hands-on assessment at the earliest possible time post-apprehension — whether or not the accompanying adult has asked for one,” Ms. Nielsen said in a statement.
Most of the circumstances surrounding the boy’s death remain unknown. It is not clear whether his health deteriorated because of neglect by personnel in the facilities, the perilous journey, or a combination of these factors.
“This crisis is exacerbated by the increase in persons who are entering our custody suffering from severe respiratory illnesses or exhibit some other illness upon apprehension,” Ms. Nielsen said. “Given the remote locations of their illegal crossing and the lack of resources, it is even more difficult for our personnel to be first responders.”
The secretary placed the blame on an immigration system that she said rewarded parents for sending their children to cross the border alone and brought few consequences for parents who bring their children with them into the country. “Our system has been pushed to a breaking point by those who seek open borders,” she said. “Smugglers, traffickers, and their own parents put these minors at risk by embarking on the dangerous and arduous journey north.”
She said that until the two deaths, of the 8-year-old Guatemalan boy late on Dec. 24 and a 7-year-old Guatemalan girl earlier this month, it had been more than a decade since a child had died in custody at the border.
Democratic lawmakers pushed back on Wednesday. Representative Nancy Pelosi, the speaker-designate of the House, deemed the death of two children in United States custody “unconscionable” and called on Congress to investigate.
Representative Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the incoming chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said, “There is no question that the system is not working.” Mr. Thompson said he would immediately call department officials to testify after he takes up the committee gavel in January.
The boy, who had entered the United States with his father, was identified by Guatemalan authorities as Felipe Gomez Alonso. Nearly three weeks earlier, Jakelin Caal Maquin, also traveling with her father, died in Border Patrol custody.
Some 2,100 migrants have been arriving daily at the southwest border. All told, nearly 60 percent of them are families and minors traveling alone. Last month, federal agents arrested a record 25,172 families, most of whom were fleeing violence and poverty.
After the two deaths and amid an apparent spread of illnesses, American officials have requested the help of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to investigate a spike in the number of migrants arriving sick at the border.
“We’re doing dozens of hospital trips every day with children that have fevers or manifest other medical conditions,” said Kevin K. McAleenan, the commissioner for Customs and Border Protection, the Homeland Security agency responsible for detaining and processing the arriving migrants.
“We need to budget for medical care and mental-health care for children in our facilities,” Mr. McAleenan said on CBS This Morning on Wednesday.
Border facilities, where migrants are held after being intercepted by federal agents or after being processed at a port of entry, were “not built for that group that’s crossing today,” he said. “They were built 30, 40 years ago for single adult males and we had a different approach.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which receives migrants discharged from border facilities, has itself been struggling to find enough space in family detention centers and other shelters in the interior of the country because they are at nearly full capacity. ICE has dropped off hundreds of migrants in El Paso in recent days, and advocates said that they had been notified that another 500 or more would be released there and in Las Cruces, N.M., late on Wednesday.
The American Association of Pediatrics recommended in a report last year that children not be detained in the border facilities commonly known as “hieleras,” Spanish for “iceboxes,” because of the typically low temperature inside. Lights are always on, everyone sleeps on mats on the ground and the only covers available are Mylar sheets, according to migrants who have been held there.
“The conditions might make children ill or make their conditions worse, if they are already ill,” said Colleen Kraft, president of the association.
In an interview, Dr. Kraft said that the detention facilities conduct no systematic screening beyond recognizing when a child is obviously sick. An academy report published last year said that children were checked for lice, scabies and chickenpox during cursory screenings.
Federal authorities said that both emergency medical technicians and paramedics have started conducting interviews of minors and adults to assess current medical complaints and get their medical histories.
Dr. Kraft said that she was encouraged that Mr. McAleenan, the commissioner, had contacted her to discuss possible collaboration, and that her association had offered to recruit a team of pediatricians to train border agents to identify when children are unwell.
“What we are asking for is to have pediatric expertise available to train medical personnel, monitor conditions in the facilities and be part of the accountability for caring for these children,” said Dr. Kraft. “A child in early stages of severe illness has subtle findings. It takes someone with trained pediatric experience to recognize these signs.”
Democratic lawmakers and immigrant advocates blamed the recent deaths and the increase in migrants who fall ill on a Trump administration policy known as “metering,” which limits the number of asylum-seekers allowed into the country each day through an official entry point.
For instance, immigration authorities at the San Ysidro border crossing, near San Diego, have said they can process about 100 migrants each day, though rates have dipped as low as 40 a day. To avoid the long wait times, which can extend months, some migrants take circuitous routes to reach the border and cross between ports of entry, sometimes in remote areas.
“The administration’s policy of turning people away from legal ports of entry, otherwise known as metering, is putting families and children in greater danger,” said Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat who is chairman-elect of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
Michelle Brané, director of migrant rights and justice at the Women’s Refugee Commission, said, “As long as C.B.P. continues to refuse people access to ports of entry and drive people into dangerous situations, children’s health is at risk.”
Customs and Border Protection officials on Wednesday outlined a series of steps they plan to take in the aftermath of the deaths of the two children, including securing help from ICE to alleviate capacity issues that have kept migrants in its facilities for extended time.
But the swelling number of families and unaccompanied minors has also stressed that agency’s capacity to transport and house migrants inside the country.
Authorities aim to keep children in border facilities only temporarily, ideally three days, and not more than 20 days in residential centers run by ICE in the interior of the country.
At the border, they are not bound by a firm 72-hour deadline to transfer children but must still do so “as expeditiously as possible,” said Carlos Holguin, the lawyer who represents minor children in a legal accord that limits their time in detention.
On Wednesday, federal authorities provided new details about Felipe’s final days, during which he was shuttled with his father from facility to facility before his death.
Felipe was arrested with his father around 1 p.m. on Dec. 18, just three miles from the Paso Del Norte Port of Entry in El Paso. They were returned to the entry point late that afternoon.
Two days later, on Dec. 20, they were transported to the El Paso Border Patrol Station, where they showered and received food, juice and water. Because of crowding there, they were transported yet again, to a Border Patrol station in Alamogordo, N.M., around midnight on Saturday.
On Monday morning, an agent noticed that Felipe was coughing and that his eyes seemed “glossy.” About 30 minutes later, he was taken, with his father, to the Gerald Champion Regional Medical Center.
Hospital workers diagnosed Felipe with a cold and gave him Tylenol, but held him for observation after determining that he had a 103-degree fever. They released him with prescriptions for antibiotics and Ibuprofen that afternoon.
Felipe and his father were taken to a “temporary holding” facility, according to authorities, at a highway checkpoint, and border agents gave the child medication at about 5 p.m. Two hours later, he vomited, but his father declined medical assistance when Felipe appeared to be better. That account could not be corroborated by Felipe’s father.
Around 10 p.m. on Dec. 24, Felipe was lethargic and nauseated again, so agents took him again to the hospital. En route, he vomited and fainted. On arrival, hospital staff were unable to revive him, and declared him dead just before midnight. The authorities previously said that Felipe died early Tuesday.
The father and son, according to a spokeswoman for the Guatemalan foreign ministry, are from Nentón, a rural municipality near the Mexican border in Huehuetenango. The impoverished province sends more migrants than any other to the United States.
The family has asked for the boy’s body to be returned to Guatemala after an autopsy is performed, and the foreign ministry will ask for a formal investigation by the immigration authorities and the hospital. The foreign ministry has been in contact with the boy’s mother and a sister.
Another child is dead and I'm sure conservatives everywhere are celebrating. America is great again. Thank you Jesus, for President Trump.
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