As parents and children are being separated from each other at the U.S.' southern border, public health experts are crying out about the risks associated with breaking up families, Vox Media reports.
Colleen Kraft, MD, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, spoke with Vox about why the nation's current immigration situation is fostering a health crisis.
Here are eight things to know:
1. In April, Dr. Kraft visited a shelter for unaccompanied minors ages 12 and younger. In a room dedicated to toddlers, she witnessed young children acting quiet — some crying uncontrollably — instead of running around and happily playing like the others.
2. Kids' stress hormones act in overdrive when they are separated from their parents, which puts them on high alert. Overtime, this "causes disruption in the way the neural synapses connect with each other, in their brain architecture," Dr. Kraft told Vox.
3. In addition to experiencing immediate trauma, kids can face developmental delays in speech and motor skills and can have trouble establishing proper relationships. These experiences can also affect a child's ability to learn and can leave them susceptible to drug and alcohol abuse as well as put them at a heightened risk for cancer or heart disease.
4. Social workers can't mitigate the potentially harmful effects, she added.
5. "The foundational piece of their health and development is the relationship with their parents," Dr. Kraft said. "When you take that away, you take away the basic tenets of pediatric health."
6. While children at the border may receive care from social workers, physicians and clinical psychologists, the information they provide could be used against them in immigration courts because their care is overseen by HHS' Office for Refugee Resettlement. The ORR can also share that information with the Department of Homeland Security and federal immigration authorities.
7. While the Obama administration engaged in such information sharing, families were typically reunited. However, the Trump administration is increasingly using the policy "to detain or deport undocumented minors."
8. Erica Monasterio, RN, a clinical professor of nursing at the UC San Francisco, told Vox the use of the policy presents a medical ethics issue. "There is privileged communication between a healthcare provider and a client," Ms. Monasterio told Vox. "When you breach confidentiality outside of those situations, you've clearly communicated to the patient, you've really breached trust. And healthcare relationships are really based on trust."
Click here to access the full Vox article.
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