illegal immigration

Mainstream bioethics discourse is often just progressive politics by a higher-brow name. Now, the Hastings Center — the world’s most influential bioethics think tank — has published an advocacy essay by Loyola University bioethicist Mark G. Kuczewski, who urges his colleagues to convince hospital administrators to thwart the attempts of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to arrest illegal aliens at their institutions. Kuczewski laments the “fear” that the enforcement of immigration law is supposedly instilling in “immigrant communities,” somehow forgetting to note that whom he is really discussing are not immigrants in general but those here illegally. From “Supporting Patients and Students Who Are Immigrants: What to Do and Why Most Bioethicists Won’t Do It”: A devastating wave of fear now permeates immigrant communities. The rhetoric Read More ›

The latest New England Journal of Medicine contains two advocacy articles that essentially argue that the country should provide health care for illegal immigrants, no questions asked. The first, discusses the 1.1 million elderly people with no legal right to be here, who as a result, do not qualify for Medicare or federal Medicaid funding, which the authors call “dual ineligibility.” The article argues that these illegal residents should be covered by Medicare if they paid taxes, but realizing that is a political nonstarter, urge a combination of strategies. These range from states authorizing payments under Medicaid, to funding community health centers, to illegal elders being covered by their legal adult children’s health insurance. But what the authors really want Read More ›