Nursing in asylum seeker detention in Australia: care, rights and witnessing

Nursing in asylum seeker detention in Australia: care, rights and witnessing.

The system of asylum seeker detention in Australia is one in which those seeking refuge are stripped of many of their rights, including the right to health. This presents serious ethical problems for healthcare providers working within this system. In this article we describe asylum seeker detention and analyse the role of nurses. We discuss how far an "ethics of care" and witnessing the suffer...

Psychiatric status of asylum seeker families held for a protracted period in a remote detention centre in Australia.

OBJECTIVE To document the psychiatric status of a near complete sample of children and their families from one ethnic group held for an extended period of time in a remote immigration detention facility in Australia. METHOD Structured psychiatric interviews were administered by three same-language speaking psychologists by phone to assess the lifetime and current psychiatric disorders among 1...

Nursing of Refugee and Asylum Seeker Families: An Integrative Review

The need for a rights-based public health approach to Australian asylum seeker health

Public health professionals have a responsibility to protect and promote the right to health amongst populations, especially vulnerable and disenfranchised groups, such as people seeking asylum and whose health care is frequently compromised. As at 31 March 2016, there was a total of 3707 people (including 384 children) in immigration detention facilities or community detention in Australia, wi...

Detention of asylum seekers: assault on health, human rights, and social development.

The end of World War II ushered in a new era of international commitment to provide humane protection to all people fleeing persecution. This decade, however, has witnessed a steady erosion of that ethos, the most disturbing change being the tendency to confine asylum seekers in detention centres in countries of the West. Many of these people have suffered torture and other abuses, raising part...