Category: Healthcare incl. vaccinations

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‘My life is frozen’

From StatusNow signatory Jesuit Refugee Service: ‘My life is frozen’ – life in limbo for people seeking asylum

The impact of having their lives put on hold is devastating for refugee friends

This week the Independent published a special report looking at the lives of people seeking asylum, who are forced to live in limbo. As they spend years waiting on a decision to be made on their asylum claim, they live in great uncertainty, banned from working, and at risk of exploitation and abuse. These stories echo the harrowing experiences of the friends of JRS who are battling this hostile system, which is founded on suspicion. As they desperately seek to be recognised as refugees, they struggle to survive.

Data shows over 1,200 people seeking asylum currently in the system, have waited more than five years, with 399 more than a decade.

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Home Office breached article 3 of the European Convention of Human Rights

30 July 2021: Guardian: Home Office failed to put in place system to protect detainees with HIV

High court judge issues ruling after man was denied antiretroviral medication for four days

The Home Office failed to put in place systems to protect detainees with HIV, a high court judge has ruled, after a man was denied lifesaving medication for four days.

The landmark ruling found that in failing to adequately care for people with HIV the Home Office breached article 3 of the European convention of human rights, which protects against inhuman and degrading treatment.

Read more here: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jul/30/home-office-failed-put-in-place-system-protect-detainees-with-hiv

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Rising Calls for Health and Safety 4 ALL

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19th July 2021: PRESS RELEASE: Rising Calls for Health and Safety 4 ALL
Debate in Parliament today coincides with simultaneous demonstrations

“As a health worker, I must be enabled to do my job to the best of my ability, not be confronted with this abuse and distress and trauma and expected to keep on working, keep on raising my children safety, while my man is threatened with this great danger”. Front Line Nurse, Daisy Motlogwa

“It is incredible that we let unknown numbers of people languish without documentation, forced into the “unofficial” economy or worse. People who can work, want to work and pay taxes should be brought into the mainstream.” Tony Lloyd MP for Rochdale

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Releasing resilience and building networks of resilience report

JUNE 2021: This is a piece of collaborative work by three StatusNow4All signatories: Migrant Voice, Kanlungan, and RAPAR. The latest report ‘Releasing resilience and building networks of resilience: learning from the survey, interviews, and evaluation‘ is now available – see details below

Among the survey findings, 80% of respondents were worried about their financial situation during the pandemic, and about being able to afford food and other items that they might need. In addition, half of all respondents said they were unable to afford hand sanitiser, face masks, soap or cleaning products.

The Building Resilience project provided spaces for migrants with limited immigration status and no recourse to public funds to discuss shared experiences throughout the Covid-19 pandemic and form networks of solidarity.

‘Networks of resilience are important and meaningful. And for as long as the UK’s hostile
environment remains in place, individuals from the most marginalised and isolated
communities who make up networks of resilience will be compelled to continue to find ways to release and build resiliences through which they search out pathways to status and better access to basic rights.’

Read the full report here.

There is coverage here:

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2021/06/12/gay-asylum-seeker-home-office-application-gabon-conversion-therapy-priti-patel/

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/migrant-who-fled-kidnap-gay-20760497

https://inews.co.uk/news/uk/i-fled-conversion-therapy-as-a-gay-man-in-gabon-now-im-living-on-less-than-6-a-day-1043226

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Everyone should have access to the vaccine but this reported Vaccine ‘Amnesty’ Declaration is a Trap and Won’t Work

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8 February 2021:  STOP PRESS: Everyone should have access to the vaccine but this reported Vaccine ‘Amnesty’ Declaration is a Trap and Won’t Work 

#healthandsafety4all  

  • The virus cannot be effectively tackled and people cannot be kept safe until everyone currently in the UK has equal access to housing, healthcare, food, and any vaccine, and therefore equal status 
  • Addressing the question of people’s Status in the UK is the primary need 
  • Many people who are undocumented believe that they will be reported to the immigration authorities and/or subjected to the Hostile Environment if they come forward, and therefore this policy is doomed to failure  
  • Once Government commits to Status Now 4 All, everyone currently undocumented is going to be able to come forward  
  • This is the right time for a full regularisation – if not now – when?
Continue reading “Everyone should have access to the vaccine but this reported Vaccine ‘Amnesty’ Declaration is a Trap and Won’t Work”
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A secretive Home Office unit has hoarded data on millions of people

7 April 2021: Wired: The Data Services & Analytics unit holds information on 650 million people and has been accused of creating a “super database”

A data analytics team close to the heart of government has collected data on more than 650 million people, including children under the age of 13, according to newly unearthed documents.

The Data Services & Analytics unit is described as “one of the most advanced data analytics centres in government” and forms part of the Home Office’s Digital, Data and Technology (DDaT) department. It builds decision-making tools and provides data-driven insights to the rest of the Home Office – although details of exactly what it does remain tightly guarded.

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Covid-19 Vaccines: Deportation Fears May Be Limiting Uptake Among Undocumented Migrants In The U.K.

Forbes: British lawmakers have warned their government that fear of deportation may be stopping hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants from getting vaccinated against Covid-19.

Most vaccines are being distributed through family doctors (GPs). But many undocumented migrants are afraid to register with their local GP over fears their details will be shared with the Home Office.

Health Minister Ed Argar previously told radio station LBC that the government was not going to “chase up” the immigration status of anyone getting a shot.

But on Friday, Labour party MP Sarah Owen and Conservative peer Lord Sheikh asked what “proactive” action was being taken to ensure the country’s 1.2 million undocumented migrants are not missed in the vaccine rollout, in a letter to vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi.

Continue reading “Covid-19 Vaccines: Deportation Fears May Be Limiting Uptake Among Undocumented Migrants In The U.K.”
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Hostile Environment: Fear is stopping migrants getting the Covid-19 vaccine jab, research suggests

8 February 2021: Morning Star: MORE than 80 per cent of undocumented migrants are too fearful to access the Covid-19 vaccine due to NHS charges and data sharing with the Home Office, new research suggests.

The government stressed today that everyone, regardless of their immigration status, will be offered the vaccine without any checks on their right to be in the country.

But campaigners have warned that reassuring people is not enough to ensure that they feel confident to access healthcare without facing repercussions from immigration enforcement.

Continue reading “Hostile Environment: Fear is stopping migrants getting the Covid-19 vaccine jab, research suggests”
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“No one should fear accessing medical advice from our superb NHS due to an immigration reason.”

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Open Letter to Public Health England and other agencies:

“As PICUM (Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants) have most recently expressed:

“Any vaccination campaign, to be effective, has to cover virtually everyone. Including #undocumented people is not only humane, it’s also public health common sense. We’re all in this together, and only together can we win this battle.”

Here is our letter:

Continue reading ““No one should fear accessing medical advice from our superb NHS due to an immigration reason.””
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Please ask your MP to support EDM #658.

We have an urgent request: the call for Status Now for All is being carried into Parliament in an Early Day Motion – EDM #658 as follows:

EDM #658 – LEAVE TO REMAIN STATUS

​That this House notes that there are currently an unknown number of persons in the UK who are not citizens of the UK and who do not at present have leave to remain in this country, who lack any entitlement to support from the state and are therefore entirely without funds to feed, clothe and house themselves and their families and who are unable to comply with government guidance on self-isolation and social distancing; and considers it essential that the government takes immediate action to ensure that leave to remain in the United Kingdom is granted to all such persons who are within the UK but are not citizens, irrespective of their nationality or immigration status, so that they can access healthcare, food and housing to enable them to adhere to government advice on social distancing, and to ensure the health of themselves and their families as well as helping protect the health of all of us.

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Status Now 4 All – this is our call

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27 March 2020 An Open Letter to the Prime Minister of the UK and the Taoiseach of Ireland

We call upon the British and Irish States to act immediately so that all undocumented, destitute and migrant people in the legal process in both the UK and Ireland are granted Status Now, as in *Indefinite Leave to Remain. In this way every human, irrespective of their nationality or citizenship can access healthcare, housing, food and the same sources of income from the State as everyone else.

[*The word ‘Indefinite’ was added to the call in our second letter, dated 27 March 2021: https://statusnow4all.org/open-letter2-to-the-prime-minister-of-the-uk-and-the-taoiseach-of-ireland/]

This is the letter in full below – we have not yet received an answer:

Continue reading “Status Now 4 All – this is our call”