EU healthcare workers say they ‘refuse to be instruments’ in deportation plans | European Union
More than 1,100 health professionals from across Europe have urged MEPs to reject proposed measures to increase deportations of undocumented people, warning they could threaten public health by turning essential public services, including hospitals, into immigration control sites.
The draft plans, due to be voted on on Thursday, have been in the works since last March, when the European Commission presented its proposal to target people with no legal right to stay in the EU, including potentially sending them to offshore centers in third countries.
The measures, launched after the far-right’s victory in the 2024 European elections, are part of a broader EU effort to rethink how it manages migration.
Ahead of the vote, which is one of the final steps before negotiations between EU institutions begin on the final text, doctors and nurses from Portugal to Ireland and Greece were among those who signed an open letter expressing their concerns about the plans.
“We refuse to become instruments of immigration control,” the letter states.
Published in six languages and sent to MEPs before the vote, the letter claims the measures would have a considerable impact: “Behind the technical language lies a profound transformation of our societies and the destruction of the social fabric. »
At the heart of their concerns is a proposal requiring all member states to implement broad and vaguely defined detection measures to identify undocumented people. “In practice, this risks legitimizing racial profiling and transforming schools, hospitals, shelters, workplaces, public transportation and even private homes into sites of immigration control,” the letter said.
The proposals could also involve healthcare workers being required to report undocumented people, which has been described as a threat to ethical duties to protect patient privacy and ensure safe access to care.
The result would be a “climate of fear” that could dissuade people from accessing care, the letter said. “When people are afraid to access care, everyone’s health is at risk,” he adds. “It also erodes trust in social services and threatens public health, as is already happening in countries like the United States, where ICE-style raids take place daily. »
In the UK, where rules were introduced in 2017 to force English hospitals to charge most undocumented migrants upfront for many forms of hospital medical care, the impact has been notable, said Anna Miller, head of UK policy and advocacy at Médecins du Monde UK.
“In our UK clinics we see patients who are too scared to go to the NHS in case it results in an ICE-style raid on their home,” she said. “This EU regulation risks creating the same climate of fear across the EU, driving people away from health services, with serious consequences for individuals and for public health systems as a whole. »
Announcing the proposals last year, the European Commission described them as “efficient and modern procedures” that would increase expulsions of people who have been rejected from asylum or have overstayed their visas. Currently, around one in five people without residency rights are returned to their country of origin, and this rate has changed little in recent years.
Activists have long expressed concerns about the proposed measures, warning that they risk transforming everyday spaces, public services and community interactions into ICE-style immigration enforcement tools.
In February, 75 rights organizations said the plans would “consolidate a punitive system, fueled by far-right rhetoric and based on racialized suspicion, denunciation, detention and deportation.” The joint statement came weeks after 16 U.N. human rights experts wrote to the EU listing more than a dozen concerns about how the projects could contravene international human rights obligations.
In this week’s letter, medical professionals also expressed concerns that the regulation could lead to more people in detention, including children, in and outside Europe. “Detention has well-documented health consequences: respiratory and infectious diseases, severe anxiety, depression, sleep disturbances, retraumatization, acute psychiatric needs and higher suicide rates,” he notes. “In the case of children, the impact of detention is devastating and long-lasting; it will never be in their best interests and is prohibited by international law. »
The open letter was organized by Médecins du Monde, which said it was calling on European institutions to remove any provisions that could dissuade people from seeking healthcare. “Cracking down on immigration cannot come at the expense of the right to health,” said the organization’s Andrea Soler. “The EU must ensure that its migration policies protect public health, respect medical ethics and ensure safe access to healthcare for all, regardless of migration status. »
