More than 2,000 migrants quarantined in US detention centers due to disease outbreaks raising concerns of limited access to lawyers

REUTERS

With more than 50,000 migrants in detention according to ICE data, a total of 2,287 detainees were allegedly quarantined around the country as of March 7

236 cases of mumps in 51 facilities in the past 12 months were confirmed or probable compared to none between January 2016 and February 2018

Last year, 423 detainees were determined to have influenza and 461 to have chicken pox, both illnesses vaccine preventable

Detainees are arriving with illnesses and medical conditions ‘in unprecedented numbers’ despite high vaccination rates in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras

The number of detainees under the Trump administration is raising concerns about outbreaks and the resulting quarantines limiting access to legal services

Christian Mejia thought he had a shot at getting out of immigration detention in rural Louisiana after he’d found a lawyer to help him seek asylum. Then he was quarantined. In early January, a mumps outbreak at the privately-run Pine Prairie Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Processing Center put Mejia and hundreds of other detainees on lockdown. ‘When there is just one person who is sick, everybody pays,’ Mejia, 19, said in a phone interview from the Pine Prairie center describing weeks without visits and access to the library and dining hall.