Four years ago this month, we learned that the state has virtually unlimited power to make decisions about our lives, liberty, and property in the name of public health. Amid the COVID-19 crisis, courts have ruled that states can impose measures such as respiratory controls, mandatory vaccinations, closures of essential services, job eliminations, bans on religious gatherings, and even restrictions on interstate travel. Confirmed that regulations can be enforced. If a state can do all this and even prevent people from entering the country from other states, why can’t it also prevent people from places where the disease is endemic, such as Haiti or West Africa?
In March 2020, Texas Governor Greg Abbott banned travel from Louisiana due to early coronavirus outbreaks. Checkpoint settings There is no trouble from the court on the main road. Four years later, the same Supreme Court justice blocked the governor’s attempt to outlaw illegal entry into Texas. They did this by granting a stay of the lower court’s decision, then subtly influencing the appellate court to reinstate the injunction, which on Tuesday reinstated it.
Where have all the public health breadwinners we’ve had for the past four years gone?
Given the risk of diseases originating from immigrants’ home countries, why couldn’t the governor address the public health risk by using “police powers” to restrict entry? Or does this power only apply to Americans, making them second-class citizens compared to foreign invaders?
Early this month, measles outbreak Fifteen people were reportedly infected at a migrant facility in Chicago. This is not surprising. In 2022, CBS News reportedThe United States experienced record numbers of measles infections due to the “low immunity of thousands of evacuees flown in from Afghanistan that year.”
Requirements in schools have been legally justified for decades because we are told that vaccination, not hygiene or living standards, is the key to preventing these diseases. I did. Why doesn’t the same public health enthusiasm apply to bringing in people from places like Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and disease-ridden West Africa?
of law It clearly states that a foreigner is “a person who has not submitted documentation proving that he or she has been vaccinated against a vaccine-preventable disease.” This includes at least the following diseases: mumps, measles, rubella, polio, tetanus, diphtheria toxoid, whooping cough, influenza B, hepatitis B, and other vaccinations against vaccine-preventable diseases. I can’t.
Do we really believe that the hundreds of thousands of people Biden has flown in from Central America, Haiti, and Venezuela, in addition to the millions who waved at the border, have proof of vaccination? ? Let me tell you, this is federal law. Since the Supreme Court’s decision, Jacobson v. Massachusetts In 1902, the court held that states had even greater police powers to mandate vaccinations and impose restrictions on unvaccinated persons.
Even the few civil liberties victories we secured against the biomedical security state during COVID-19 were at the federal level. The Supreme Court has rejected appeals to strike down nearly all state-based regulations.
States could enforce restrictions by expressing speculative concerns about other states or specific groups of Americans.But what about foreign invaders from countries where tuberculosis is endemic? Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report The prevalence of tuberculosis among legal immigrants in the United States is 15.1 per 100,000, which is high enough. The prevalence of tuberculosis in Guatemalans is 106 per 100,000 people. In other words, Guatemalans are 83 times more likely to contract tuberculosis than Americans and seven times more likely than legal immigrants.
“A lot of people, recently arrived in new york have lived or traveled to a country with a high incidence of tuberculosis,” New York City Health Commissioner Ashwin Vasan explained last year.Even the California Department of Health make concessions These foreign nationals account for “over 80%” of the state’s tuberculosis cases. Since 2020, tuberculosis cases in California have increased by 24%. The number of deaths has increased by 13%.
That’s amazing! Where have all the public health breadwinners we’ve had for the past four years gone?
Other diseases like Leprosy — Hansen’s disease! — Polio and malaria, which are not endemic in the country, have appeared in places like New York and Florida since the invasion took hold.The same goes for syphilis and hepatitis B.
Europe experienced large waves of immigration from Africa long before the Americas, with associated increases in disease.of WHO warns It is estimated that 50% of the world’s immigrants are at risk of contracting tuberculosis.
Remember that almost all illegal immigrants come through the jungles of Central America and the Darien Gap, where many parasite-borne diseases occur. “Dengue, chikungunya, and Zika viruses cause mosquito-borne infections and are of increasing concern in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.Dengue fever is endemic in many parts of Central and South America.” CDC I will report it. Of course malaria endemic disease in the area.people come in too From African countries such as Guinea On the way to Darien Gap, CDC discovers diphtheria outbreak.
The same public health Nazis who just a few years ago viewed Americans as “vectors of disease” are now freely importing millions of unvaccinated and untested foreign nationals. Isn’t it strange?
Just four years ago, states violated Americans’ rights under the false pretext of keeping people from flooding hospitals. Remember “It takes him 2 weeks to flatten the curve”? Yuma, Arizona, 2023 spent $26 million, primarily regarding emergency and newborn care, including mothers who traveled to give birth to U.S.-born babies. Yuma is a small city with a population of less than 100,000 people, but it carries a heavy burden.
Of course, in major cities like New York City, prices are even higher.Manhattan hospital budget $90 million In 2023, a care plan will be formulated to house illegal immigrants. This number seems strange today.
6 U.S. Supreme Court Justices in 2021 was denied emergency injunctive relief against healthcare workers in new york They were stripped of their religious freedom exemption to state vaccine mandates. Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Samuel Alito would have granted the workers’ claims because of the irreparable harm they would suffer in pending litigation.
What about Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett? They have ruled against state-based immigration enforcement aimed at public safety, but have no objection to states ignoring human rights in the name of public health.
Not all public health emergencies are created equal. Or maybe not all people are created equal. Americans are always last in America.
