Alleged gag order at refugee camp on US-Mexican border -- threat of arrest if doctors talk to press

Well. I already say someone doesn't know what lice look like.

“When they found out the kids had scabies, the charge nurse was adamant – ‘Don’t mention that. Don’t say scabies,’” the nurse recounted. “But everybody knew they had scabies. Some of the workers were very concerned about touching things and picking things up. They asked if they should be concerned, but they were told don’t worry about it.”
The nurse said the lice issue was epidemic – but everything was kept “hush-hush.”
“You could see the bugs crawling through their hair,” she said. “After we would rinse out their hair, the sink would be loaded with black bugs.”

Click to expand...

Scabies or Lice?


So. If the kids are ill, and I have no doubt that some of them are ill, you treat them. If they have lice, you treat them. I really don't see the issue here, beyond the claimed gag order. If their cellphones were confiscated, I would imagine that was due to being on a military base as opposed to any other reason, frankly. Not due to the cellphone itself but due to the cameras the cellphones contain. Security and all that.

But, I do question the whole private security claim. A church group is providing security? Seriously? That does not make sense to me.

See how the URL places it as an opinion piece?

This is what I've long said about Fox News.

That doesn't make it better, but they're not even claiming to be producing objective journalism here.

The only way I would see this on Fox news is as an opinion piece. I can't see them ever presenting this type of stuff in an objective "news" segment.

Those quotes don't sound at all like they come from a nurse. Medical staff generally don't run around clutching their pearls over scabies and lice. This is Fox News telling you that sick, dirty brown people are coming into your country.

TerzaRima said:

Those quotes don't sound at all like they come from a nurse. Medical staff generally don't run around clutching their pearls over scabies and lice. This is Fox News telling you that sick, dirty brown people are coming into your country.

Click to expand...

And church security services do not have the power to arrest people.

they can, however, tell god on them.

Plot Device said:

Can someone with a better bullshit detector than mine please help sort out the truth from what could be a truly reprehensible piece of yellow journalism?

Click to expand...

Okay. This is a truly reprehensible piece of yellow journalism.

That help any?

caw

Even if this did happen - which I doubt, but let's just go with it - it wouldn't be disturbing. Well, it would because it's stupid and bananas, but it wouldn't in the way I think you mean.

A church security service, or some other security service, making dumbassed threats and claims is just that. Mostly people who do that are drunk on their own perceived power. It's not like anyone with actual power would recommend acting in a way that'd be called out in a hot second by a lot of people. They're just acting in a way they think they can get away with - doesn't mean it's sanctioned and certainly doesn't mean it'd be backed up.

A guy with a suit and an earpiece, because he was spiffy like that, once told me to move along and not stand on the sidewalk near the event or whatever he was guarding (I had no interest in it, was just waiting for someone). I just looked at him and kept standing on the sidewalk. When he realized I wasn't intimidated by his stare he grunted at me and walked off. Not a cop? Keep your commands about public property to yourself, dipshit.

I can't imagine a whole lot of medical personnel, as they're by definition well-educated people (not in that area but still), all just kowtowing to random people giving commands that'd be violations of their rights, under the guise of being 'security.'

None of these are serious medical problems: scabies, lice, strep throat. They are all treatable by courses of medication, and they are all a part of general pediatric practice, especially when children are kept in close, cramped quarters. Two weeks after diagnosis, with proper threatment, these are gone. None of these "taint" the bearer, no more than an ear infection does, and they say as little about the inherent worth of the child.

Chicken pox is a virus. It is vaccinated against now, but long term sequelae are rare if one is a child. It's much more severe if contracted by adults, but most adults in the US are immune by exposure during prior outbreaks or through vaccination. Giving the vaccine immediately is cheap and shortens the length of the outbreak.

Measles is a virus. It spreads extrordinarily quickly, and something like 90% of those exposed who are not immune will catch it. If it is there in the camps, it can be contained and will die out naturally. This isn't a long term issue, except for whatever unfortunate sufferers develop serious consequences (encephalitis, orchitis, etc.). But those children will not remain infectious, just affected long term.

Any medical or nursing staff person is going to be more worried about measles exposure on public transport than lice or scabies. Someone can be shedding the virus before symptoms start, and that space could pass on infection still for hours after they are gone. Luckily, most of us are vaccinated.

No physician or nurse is going to speak about these children as if they are a festering sore on American property.

Added: Mental and emotional problems? These are refugee children. What on earth do you expect? Have you ever met a child on a *good* vacation?

“I would be talking to children and lice would just be climbing down their hair.”

Click to expand...

Right. Nix and a comb, or Ovide if you have resistance. A single 10-minute application of Sklice doesn't even require a nit comb.

There is lice all through some schools now. Scabies less so, but still there. It can be hard to eradicate in certain populations because it can be hard to get everyone on board at once (unlike, say, in a refugee camp). The drama of "oooh, scabies! lice!" comes from an era when these were not easily treated. To the mortification of yellow journalism, we do not live in Victorian England anymore.

Makes for good copy, though. In certain circles.

Quick question -- the title says these kids are at a border camp, but the quote in the OP has them at the AFB in San Antonio. Were they moved to the base? Because if so, the facilities should be much better equipped than what's available at your typical refugee camp. They'd definitely be able to control the environment at Lackland, which is something like 150-200 miles from the border.

The FoxNews opinion piece linked in the original post has been updated as follows:

Editor's Note: The contractor running the refugee camp at Lackland Air Force Base is "BCFS," not "Baptist Family and Children's Services" - as noted in a previous version of this story.

Click to expand...

The children are at Lackland Air Force Base.

The security is not being provided by "Baptist Family and Child Services," or BFCS, but rather by BCFS, which is "a global system of non-profit health and human service organizations operating programs throughout the U.S., Eastern Europe, Latin America, Southeast Asia and Africa." This is the organization that has been contracted by FEMA to develop an emergency management training program.


No, I'm not joking. Acronyms are hard, y'all.

I'm sure the rest of the article is just as carefully crafted.



http://discoverbcfs.net/about
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20121115006757/en/BCFS%E2%80%99-Emergency-Management-Division-Contracted-FEMA-Develop#.U7VJ2dco7Dc

I wouldn't trust Todd Starnes further than I could comfortably spit a rat.

He couldn't say "good morning" without lying twice.

I was listening to right-wing radio earlier (because I enjoy crazy people), and heard 'it's not just lice and scabies...'

A caller was talking about this story, on about how there were LOTS of diseases, like TB, to which the host excitedly said he'd heard a border control agent had TB. This news brought tsking and a fresh rant about the diseases "these people" could bring in to the U.S., including, I swear she said this, Ebola.

Her reasoning was that there is an outbreak in West Africa (not that she specified) and that you never know where 'these people' are coming from! She said they're coming from 'the third world,' so, you know, Ebola.

I literally laughed out loud.

Yes, people are walking across the southern U.S. border, from Liberia, with Ebola, because that wouldn't hamper that trip at all. The host started on about how right she was and how terrorists were a big danger too.

The sources say security forces
called themselves the “Brown Shirts.”

Click to expand...

Really, guys?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmabteilung