FairPlanet.Support
| tags: | #migrant children, #USA, #humanitarian crisis |
|---|---|
| located: | USA |
| by: | Yair Oded |
Despite a law that says underage asylum seekers must be transferred to the hands of the Office of Refugee Resettlement within 72 hours of their arrival, thousands of migrant children (many of whom are unaccompanied), are detained for weeks at Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) facilities for weeks on end.
In those facilities, children as young as several months old are being held under inhumane conditions.
A Human Rights Watch report indicates that children at CBP detention centers sleep on the floor under thin Mylar blankets or foil wrappers. The report further states that nearly all women and children at the facilities were not permitted to shower, often for days, and did not receive hand soap, toothpaste, or toothbrushes. Others were denied access to menstrual hygiene products and diapers.
A combination of the ice-cold temperatures, severe crowdedness, non-nutritious and often under-cooked food, and an acute lack of hygiene, have caused the outbreak of diseases among children at CBP holding facilities, and at least seven of them have died since the beginning of the year (the youngest victim was one).
A Change.org petition launched by Maya Uppaluru calls on government officials and state leaders to immediately funnel funds and medical care services to children seeking asylum in the United States.
The petition, addressed to U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Alex Azar, Acting U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan, and Texas Governor Greg Abbott, lists a series of demands from the aforementioned officials, urging them to collaborate in order to grant appropriate medical care to children seeking asylum in the U.S.
“No child, and especially no child on American soil, should ever be put in a position in which they are scared, hungry, sick, cold, feel unsafe, or experience life-altering trauma,” states the petition’s author.
Please sign the petition and support the movement calling for an end to the tragic neglect of children seeking asylum at the southern border.
Image: Change.org
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