Newsletter - Juin 2010 - numéro 16 (en anglais)

NATIONAL DEVELOPMENTS

 

FRANCE

 

Call for action on unaccompanied minors

A report from French Senator Isabelle Debré (UMP) to the Prime Minister highlights the urgency and necessity of more action towards foreign unaccompanied minors in France. The report calls for a more coherent response in the areas of protection, social services and regularisation of unaccompanied minors. Welcoming the report and recalling the EU Commission’s action plan on unaccompanied minors recently published, NGO FTDA calls for more action from the French government, but also for a European response to the issue.

Sources:

- France Terre d’Asile, ‘Call for a European protection of unaccompanied children’

- ECRE Weekly Bulletin, 4 June 2010.

 

 

 

GREECE

 

Detention of migrants

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) published a report about the impact of the current detention system on the mental health and wellbeing of migrants and asylum seekers arriving in Greece. The report presents data from psychological counselling sessions as well as individual testimonies. It shows that detention can exacerbate existing problems and contribute to new traumas and psychological distress.

Source: MSF, ‘Greece, Migrants in detention, lives on hold’

 

 

 

ITALY

 

Amnesty Italia has published its annual report on the situation of the human rights in Italy and a chapter focuses on migration and asylum. Amnesty particularly condemns the harshening of the Italian legislation on irregular migration which criminalizes undocumented migrants. While it is still possible for irregular migrants to receive health care and enrol their children at school without the need of showing a residence permit, Amnesty believes that after the approval of the Italian security package in July 2009, migrants have been dissuaded to report to the police on suffered maltreatments and abuses fearing of being arrested and deported.

Source: PICUM Newsletter June 2010

More information (in Italian) at: http://www.amnesty.it/Rapporto-Annuale-2010/aggiornamento-diritti-umani-Italia#00ce25.

 

 

 

SPAIN

Spain considers charging for health care to help plug its financial deficit

The Spanish government is considering introducing a fee per visit for publicly funded healthcare services in a bid to help plug the hole in its finances. Health authorities in various autonomous regions like Catalonia, Valencia, Madrid, or Asturias, have backed this approach in the past few weeks, despite widespread opposition.

The campaign group, the Madrid Network Against Privatisation of Public Health Care (CAS Madrid), states that the treasury is studying the feasibility of implementing a fee per visit system. The various options under consideration, it says, include charging 2 to 3 euros to see the family doctor or the pediatrician, and a financial penalty for anyone requesting emergency services for non-urgent care, in the view of the attending doctor. Other options include requiring pensioners to pay a proportion of the overall cost of drugs around 10% for those with long term conditions, or on a sliding scale, depending on income—and simply not providing certain expensive services for free, forcing patients to either pay for them privately or to take out insurance cover. "There is evidence that a fee per visit reduces both necessary as well as unnecessary visits, and it is indiscriminate: the repercussions are worse for those who have lower incomes and for marginalised groups," commented the spokesperson for Dempeus per la Salut Pública (Standing Up for Public Health Care).

Source:BMJ 2010;340:c3063

PUBLICATIONS

 

• Health of migrants, the way forward

This is the report of a global consultation organized by the WHO in March 2010 in Spain. For three days, some 100 participants from various government sectors across the world, representatives of non governmental agencies, United Nations agencies, inter governmental agencies, migration networks, academics and experts, worked together to review the obstacles to generating comparable global data on the health of migrants; to identify policies and legislation that advances the health of migrants; to identify key actions to create migrant-sensitive health systems; and to develop or strengthen national, regional and global platforms to foster dialogue between the various sectors involved in migration and health.

EVENTS

 

• Migrant Workers Convention Petition Campaign

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary year of the UN Migrant Workers Convention, December18, the International Resource Centre on the Human Rights of Migrants, together with the European Platform for Migrant Workers Rights, launches the campaign: “Europe it’s Time to Ratify the Migrant Workers Convention,” demanding the European Union to live up to its core values. All 27 Member States of the EU are asked to ratify this core international human rights instrument.

The petition can be found here:www.migrantsconvention.eu

 

 

• "Medical Ethics and Practice to the test of security policies"

This symposium was a joint event of MDM France in partnership with the University of Political Sciences (Sciences Po), financed by HUMA network funds. The conference provided a general legal, economical, sociologic, historic and medical perspective for health professionals. It specifically enlightened the contradictions in public policies between public statements promoting access to health care and the security and migration political agenda.

Many academics, specialists or field workers testified of the situation in France, also largely commenting the global evolution of health care access policies in Europe. Professionals showed how migrants and asylum seekers (but also Romas and sex workers) were the most targeted population by security policies, suffering difficulties to access health care and economic welfare.

 

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