A security guard watches over unaccompanied minors at an immigration detention facility run by the U.S. Border Patrol on Sept. 8, 2014, in McAllen, Texas. (Credit: John Moore/Getty Images)
Inadequate medical care probably contributed to the majority of deaths of detainees at U.S. immigration facilities between December 2015 and April 2017, according to a new report issued by a coalition of advocacy organizations.
Substandard medical care contributed or led to eight of the 15 deaths reviewed, according to doctors asked to analyze each case for the report released Wednesday as a collaboration between Human Rights Watch, the National Immigrant Justice Center, the Detention Watch Network and the American Civil Liberties Union.
“The picture that it paints is one of a system that fails to ensure the safety of the people it detains,” said Clara Long of Human Rights Watch and lead author of the report.
That’s significant, she said, because the Trump administration wants to expand its capacity to hold immigrants — both adults and children — in detention facilities. Under Trump, immigration officials have also started holding pregnant women for longer periods of time and denying release to people who have complex medical needs, she said.
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