Civil Rights

‘Not Safe’: Medical Advocate Urges Release of All People Held by ICE, Especially Amid COVID-19

BY SPLC

In this Q&A conducted by SPLC Staff Writer Liz Vinson, Dr. Amy Zeidan, an assistant professor at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta and co-director of the Georgia Human Rights Clinic and the Society of Asylum Medicine, discusses the urgent need to free detained immigrants from custody, especially in light of the COVID19 pandemic. Zeidan recently signed on with 86 other physicians and health care professionals to call for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to release people from the Irwin County Detention Center (ICDC) in Ocilla, Georgia, and to close the facility.

SPLC: What does ICE often overlook in terms of providing medical care to people who are detained? Zeidan: What I most commonly see is unaddressed opinion, constitutes torture. I have also reviewed cases in which ICE withholds medications from individuals residing in ICE facilities long-term, including life-sustaining medications like those for cancer and HIV. Frequently, people do not get routine medication that they desperately need.

medical problems, including mental health problems. Detained individuals with complicated psychiatric or psychological disorders very rarely receive standard of care. Most ICE detention centers simply cannot provide proper health care. There are not enough nurses, doctors or behavioral health providers who work at ICE facilities and have the appropriate resources to provide treatment. Further, detention facilities are not appropriate facilities for individuals with complicated medical and psychiatric diseases to reside. Detained individuals with serious mental health problems are often placed in solitary confinement, which, in my

SPLC: Why did you decide to sign the letter urging the Department of Homeland Security to release people in ICE detention from the Irwin County Detention Center in Georgia?

Zeidan: Primarily, I don’t see a rationale to detain people who are fleeing persecution and, secondly, even if that wasn’t my position, the risk of detaining people during a pandemic is so high – the risk of becoming sick is so great – that I simply cannot justify keeping individuals at ICDC locked up. Furthermore, ICE lacks the capacity to provide proper medical care to the individuals it detains, and the agency simply cannot follow through with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended guidelines to effectively control the virus in detention facilities. Facilities are perpetually understaffed and in many states, facilities are located much too far away from proper medical facilities, like hospitals, where they could receive proper medical treatment should they become infected. People in detention have died from the virus, and these people – including detention center staff – can become ill from the virus really quickly. You can be fine one day, and the next day you’re critically ill. These facilities are not built to be health care settings, especially for those subject to COVID-19 or other medical problems that are aggravated while in detention.

SPLC: How is the pandemic affecting individuals in ICE facilities not only at ICDC but across the nation?

Zeidan: What we’ve seen is [that] those who have COVID19 in detention settings are at a much higher risk than those of the general population. In terms of public health, the situation is terrible. The only way you can truly prevent the spread of COVID-19 is to test everyone residing in the facility and anyone who leaves and comes back, including staff. But this doesn’t often happen. From a community perspective, it appears that ICE is sadly not providing appropricontinued on page 5

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