Feeding Hunger-Striking Prisoners

2018 ◽  
pp. 155-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nayan Shah
Keyword(s):  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Immigrant Detention ◽  
Detention Facilities

This essay explores the tension between state practices of biocitizenship that champion human vitality and health and the state’s exercise of bodily violence. This tension erupts sharply in grappling with the imperatives and crisis of forcible feeding of hunger strikers that are incarcerated or detained indefinitely. Forcible feeding transforms the bodies of hunger strikers into dependents and makes such techniques more acceptable to concerned audiences. Yet this is also an exercise of state sovereign power through the exercise of biopolitics on subjects produced not as liberal subjects of consent or economic subjects of rationality, but as a population of dependents who must be managed. This essay examines the imperatives and contradictions of biocitizenship and biosecurity through the debates over forcible feeding of hunger strikers in Guantanamo, Israel, U.S and Australian immigrant detention facilities.

Undocumented Migrants and Detention Facilities

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jelka Zorn
Keyword(s):  
Due Process ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Community Life ◽  
Undocumented Migrants ◽  
Ethical Considerations ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
Immigrant Detention ◽  
The Right ◽  
Detention Facilities ◽  
Formal Status

Being undocumented does not mean being without ties to one’s host society: undocumented immigrants might work and have family and friends; they might be active in community life, etc. However, due to a lack of formal status, they are vulnerable to detention and deportation. Instead of vilifying migrants for their irregular situation, the article sees immigration controls as a source of unjust policies and practices. Immigrant detention means administrative imprisonment without the normal due process safeguards commonly demanded in liberal democracies. Its consequences are separated families and broken individuals. Social work is seen as a profession developing ethical considerations and arguments to advocate for the right to belong to an organized political community, the right to social security, and the right to personal liberties being applicable to all people, regardless of their immigration status.

Pulmonary Tuberculosis Disease Among Immigrant Detainees: Rapid Disease Detection, High Prevalence of Asymptomatic Disease, and Implications for Tuberculosis Prevention

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole J Boardman ◽  
Tiffany Moore ◽  
Jennifer Freiman ◽  
Geri Tagliaferri ◽  
Dakota McMurray ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Chest Radiography ◽  
Disease Incidence ◽  
Diagnostic Testing ◽  
Acid Fast Bacillus ◽  
Rapid Screening ◽  
Symptom Screening ◽  
States Immigration ◽  
Immigration And Customs Enforcement ◽  
Immigrant Detention ◽  
Detention Facilities

Abstract Background Rapid screening for tuberculosis (TB) disease at intake into immigrant detention facilities allows for early detection and treatment. Detention facilities with United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Health Service Corps (IHSC) medical staffing utilize chest radiography and symptom screening as the primary screening for pulmonary TB (PTB) disease. This analysis describes the demographic, clinical, and microbiological characteristics of individuals identified with TB disease at these facilities. Methods We conducted a retrospective analysis to describe the population of immigrant detainees identified via chest radiography with PTB disease between 1 January 2014 and 31 December 2016 at facilities with IHSC medical staffing. We collected demographic variables, clinical presentation, diagnostic testing results, and microbiological findings. We generated descriptive statistics and examined univariate and multivariate associations between the variables collected and symptomatic status. Results We identified 327 patients with confirmed PTB disease (incidence rate, 92.8 per 100 000); the majority of patients were asymptomatic (79.2%) at diagnosis. Adjusting for all other variables in the model, the presence of cavitary lesions, acid-fast bacillus smear positivity, and multilobar presentation were significantly associated with symptomatic status. Among all patients identified with TB disease who had a tuberculin skin test (TST) result recorded, 27.2% were both asymptomatic and TST negative, including those with smear-positive disease. Conclusions Asymptomatic PTB disease is a significant clinical entity among immigrant detainees and placement in a congregate setting calls for aggressive screening to prevent transmission. Early identification, isolation, and treatment of TB disease benefit not only the health of the patient, but also the surrounding community.

Pills and Control in the Carceral State

Contexts ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 74-75
Author(s):  
Meghann Lucy
Keyword(s):  
Active Duty ◽  
Carceral State ◽  
Active Duty Military ◽  
Care Systems ◽  
State Prisons ◽  
Immigrant Detention ◽  
Contemporary United States ◽  
And Control ◽  
Detention Facilities

The book review explores Silent Cells: The Secret Drugging of Captive America by Anthony Ryan Hatch explaining how the contemporary United States’ carceral state—prisons, nursing homes, foster care systems, active duty military, immigrant detention facilities, and schools—is mired in its own self-imposed drug addiction to psychotropic medication to control those in its “care.”

scholarly journals Examining the everyday micro-economies of migrant detention in the United States

2014 ◽  
Vol 69 (5) ◽  
pp. 335-344 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Conlon ◽  
N. Hiemstra
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New York ◽  
New York City ◽  
The United States ◽  
Private Companies ◽  
Daily Routines ◽  
Daily Rate ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Immigrant Detention ◽  
Detention Facilities

Abstract. Securitization of immigration, the rise of interior immigration policing, and forces of carceral privatization have occasioned a remarkable expansion of immigrant detention throughout the United States. Previous studies have drawn attention to the importance of the daily rates paid by the federal government to individual facilities in driving the emphasis on detention. This paper, in contrast, argues that tracing the political and economic geography of money inside detention facilities is also critical for understanding detention expansion and its consequences. We define the processes, mechanisms, and practices of generating profit above and beyond the "per-bed" daily rate as "internal micro-economies" of migrant detention. Drawing on an ongoing examination of migrant detention facilities in the greater New York City metropolitan area, we identify four micro-economies evident in detention facilities: the commissary systems, phone and other forms of communication, detainee labor, and detainee excursions outside detention. These economies show how detained migrants' needs and daily routines are tailored in ways that produce migrants as both captive consumers and laborers. Recognition of multiple micro-economies also highlights the fact that the numbers of individuals and entities invested in the incarceration of immigrants proliferate in tandem with the objectification of detainees. The paper further suggests that attending to relationships embedded in the inner workings of detention exposes economic links across carceral boundaries, rendering visible the porosity between government, private companies, and publics.

scholarly journals COVID-19 Outbreaks in US Immigrant Detention Centers: The Urgent Need to Adopt CDC Guidelines for Prevention and Evaluation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
John J Openshaw ◽  
Mark A Travassos
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Homeland Security ◽  
Vulnerable Populations ◽  
Department Of Homeland Security ◽  
Detention Centers ◽  
Cdc Guidelines ◽  
Control And Prevention ◽  
Immigration And Customs Enforcement ◽  
Immigrant Detention ◽  
Detention Facilities

Abstract There have been several significant outbreaks of COVID-19 in federal immigrant detention centers, which lack clear and consistent guidelines across Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agencies to limit the spread of COVID-19. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued detailed guidelines for the control, prevention, and evaluation of COVID-19 in detention facilities. Although the DHS’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has stated that it complies with CDC recommendations, its policies significantly differ from these CDC guidelines, placing detainees at risk for contracting COVID-19. This submission urges the adoption of CDC guidelines across DHS-associated facilities. Such a policy change has the potential to protect and save the lives of the most vulnerable populations under the auspices of the federal government.

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