Our Open Border Problem!

[HeartRN]

I looked back on the last couple pages and couldn't find it as a topic we had discussed.....how does everybody feel about illegals crossing our borders? Simply put (while realizing it's not a simple issue), I welcome any and all people who come here LEGALLY. It's the illegal aliens with whom I take issue. I think this is a MAJOR issue that both parties, including this current administration, have failed to address appropriately. I guess there are some groups of people who are attempting to monitor the borders themselves since our border patrol aren't getting the job done (I believe they are the "Minutemen", among other groups). I don't know if this is an appropriate answer to the problem, but I can see where these people are coming from.

I also think the repercussions of so many illegals coming here are tremendous, and we've not even seen the beginnings of the sapping of our resources (medical, professional, etc) that this mass movement is causing. Please don't misinterpret this....we have plenty of illegals who are patients in our hospital, including my unit. I don't treat anybody differently, and I don't think they should be denied care;(sort of similar to the IV drug user who gets a new heart valve and may possibly return to IV drug use, but they still got the new valve ) BUT for the sake of our children's future as well as our own, we MUST tighten the borders, and SOON!!!!

I think that porous borders are a problem -- what's to keep a members of terrorist groups from entering the US that way?
I wonder what the economic implications of tighter borders would be in that illegals provide labor more cheaply and for jobs that most legal citizens would not want to do. But I'm not saying that is a reason to leave things as they are...

[SueC]

I think they need to tighten the borders up, but I also think they should make some sort of stipulation for those crossing the border to work. I'm assuming that the economy down South is somewhat dependent on the labor provided by these illegal aliens, but I'd also like to conditions improved for them. It seems like a mutually beneficial system could be arranged somehow, of course I can be a bit of an idealist....

I too, think it's a HUGE problem. I have heard some very clever politicians describe implementing a guest worker system that actually allow illegals to come in and work and go home. A system like this could monitor how many come in to work and allow them to go home. Something many of them do NOT do in fear of not being able to come back and work. And provide the labor that this country depends on. Another issue brought to light recently is the fact that some of them are bringing in resistant strains of TB! This is a potentially huge health concern. Terrorism is a huge concern. My inlaws went to Cancun a few months ago and when they left Cancun to come back to Arizona, the airport DIDN'T SCREEN THEIR BAGS! I have a feeling security from Mexico to the US is very lax.
Something I heard recently as well which is related to health care is that illegals can't be turned away for treatment in any hospital. So now they get free healthcare? Some medical attorney was saying on the news that 18 hospitals in California have closed simply because they were treating so many non-paying illegals. Whether that's entirely true, I question.

Something I heard recently as well which is related to health care is that illegals can't be turned away for treatment in any hospital. So now they get free healthcare? Some medical attorney was saying on the news that 18 hospitals in California have closed simply because they were treating so many non-paying illegals. Whether that's entirely true, I question.

DH did his residency at a county trauma center in Southern California. Being a county hospital, they could not turn away anyone based on their ability to pay (in fact, no emergency room is allowed to turn away patients based on their ability to pay whether it is county or privately run). If someone without health insurance pays a visit to a county emergency room, they do not have to pay a dime even if they are an illegal immigrant.....whereas (with the insurance I had during residency) I would have to pay a $1000 deductible plus a 20% copay.... and that really steams me....I mean, here I pay a crap load of taxes plus I pay to have health insurance and I'm the one who gets stuck with the bill while someone else who pays nothing into the system gets a free ride.....but that's an entirely different topic!

Anyways, there is a major crisis going on right now in California with hospitals shutting down because they cannot support themselves due to the large number of illegal immigrants who do not pay their medical bills. The government has decided to offer some relief and will reimburse the hospitals in 5 border states when they treat illegal immigrants, but the money that the government has allocated for this is really a miniscule amount.

TB is actually a big problem in Southern California as well. My husband would see patients with TB all of the time in the emergency room. Many of these patients were illegal immigrants who were living in a tiny apartment with 10-15 other people. My husband would always urge his patients to have their housemates come in and get tested as well, but they almost never did. With those kinds of living conditions, there could easily be a TB outbreak.

Sorry for the nonsensical rambling....3 weeks to go till the baby arrives and I'm having a hard time organizing my thoughts....

WOW.....how disturbing!