一群寻求为被拘留的移民提供免费流感疫苗的医生称，他们于周二被联邦当局逮捕。他们一直在边境巡逻队圣地亚哥总部外抗议移民局拒绝他们的申请。

在发送给新闻周刊由反对在美国拘留移民的医生成立的“医生为营地关闭服务”组织说，几名医生在边境巡逻大楼被捕。

“我们是拥有数十年经验的执业医生和从业人员。特朗普政府让我们别无选择，只能出现在圣地亚哥边境巡逻队总部，乞求为这些孩子提供救命的医疗服务，”该组织表示。“我们已经写信给移民官员，并试图与他们会面——但他们无视我们，因此儿童的生命处于危险之中。我们不会放弃。”

在脸书发布的更新中，营地关闭医生组织后来表示，周二被捕的每个人都“安全”

“他们被拘留、拘留、引用，然后被释放，”该组织说。"谢天谢地，没有人受到身体伤害。"

丘拉维斯塔警察局的斯科特·阿特金斯中尉称，联邦当局在边境巡逻站外逮捕了几名抗议者。尚不清楚他们被拘留和传讯的具体原因。

“我的理解是，是联邦当局实施了逮捕，”阿金斯告诉记者新闻周刊。

他说，他的部门确实有一些官员在边境巡逻总部监视局势，并“确保事情不会失控”

“我们部门没有参与任何逮捕，”他说。

几周以来，医生们一直在竞选被允许为被拘留的移民免费注射流感疫苗。随着今年流感季节的提前开始，他们已经开始呼吁负责边境巡逻的美国海关和边境保护局(CBP)采取行动。

在接受采访时新闻周刊周二，在当天的抗议和随后的逮捕之前，来自纽约市的急救医生、营地关闭医生组织的创始人之一玛丽·迪鲁卡博士说，医生认为阻止人们“不必要地受苦和死亡”是他们的职责

在上一个财政年度，至少有三名年龄分别为2岁、6岁和16岁的儿童在联邦拘留期间死于流感，最近有消息透露，16岁的卡洛斯·格雷戈里奥·埃尔南德斯·瓦斯奎兹在生病后躺在拘留室的地板上数小时后才被发现死亡。

11月初，迪鲁卡和免费流感疫苗接种活动的组织者致信移民官员，请求“立即允许”进入加利福尼亚州圣思多罗的CBP设施，以便“免费”运行一个试点项目，提供100剂流感疫苗

他们曾希望向CBP展示，从长远来看，建立这样一个项目是多么简单有效。

官员然而，忽略了这封信，CBP发言人说新闻周刊在过去的一周中，由于被拘留的移民只能被拘留最长72小时，他们的机构无法监督流感疫苗接种。

周二，国土安全部(DHS)新闻办公室加大了联邦政府对该倡议的反对力度，该部门新闻办公室猛烈抨击医生。推特上发表的一份声明称:“边境巡逻队当然不会让一群激进的政治活动家随机出现并开始给人们注射毒品。”

尚不清楚是什么促使了这一声明，也不清楚DHS是否意识到抗议者是合格的医生，他们提供的“药物”是流感疫苗。

该声明也是在迪鲁卡告诉记者后发表的新闻周刊CBP官员刚刚开始对试点项目表示一些兴趣，在一次会议上告诉组织者，他们不反对促进流感疫苗接种的想法，但怀疑这一举措是否会成为现实。

2019年12月9日，星期一，医生和支持者在加州圣地亚哥圣思多罗入境港附近的丘拉维斯塔边境巡逻站外抗议，要求为被拘留的移民提供免费流感疫苗接种。抗议者在边境巡逻队圣地亚哥总部外集会后第二天被逮捕。

“我们正在保护公众健康，”移植外科医生、代表全州46，000多名成员和医生的加利福尼亚医学协会主席彼得·布雷坦博士补充道。

“我们是加州的执业医师——这就是我们所做的，”布雷坦在与新闻周刊。“上个赛季，这些拘留中心的人死于流感。我们正在努力防止更多的流感死亡。这是芝加哥商品交易所的政策。这符合有利于公共健康的医疗实践。”

在接受采访时新闻周刊周二，儿科急救医学医生阿利娅·桑德吉博士回顾了在CBP监护下死于流感的儿童的尸检报告，他说CBP拒绝实施疫苗接种计划是没有任何借口的。

注意到疾病控制和预防中心(疾病预防中心)已经建议被联邦拘留的移民接受这种疫苗接种，这位医生说她对CBP公然无视这一潜在的拯救生命的建议感到“震惊”。

“如果传染病爆发能够在非常困难的情况下根除...没有理由不在CBP监管下注射流感疫苗，”她说。“流感季节就要到了。这里有一个防止其他孩子死亡的机会，是时候抓住它了，”医生补充道。

FEDERAL AUTHORITIES ARREST DOCTORS CAMPAIGNING TO GIVE MIGRANTS FREE FLU VACCINATIONS

A group of doctors seeking to provide detained migrants with free flu vaccinations say they were arrested by federal authorities on Tuesday. They had been protesting outside the Border Patrol's San Diego headquarters over the immigration agency's resistance to their bid.

In a statement sent to Newsweek, Doctors for Camp Closure, a group founded by physicians opposing the detention of migrants in the U.S., said several doctors were arrested at the Border Patrol building.

"We are licensed medical doctors and practitioners with decades of experience. The Trump administration has left us with no choice but to show up at the San Diego Border Patrol Headquarters and beg to provide life-saving medical care for these children," the group said. "We have already written to immigration officials and tried to set up meetings with them as well—but they are ignoring us and children's lives are at risk as a result. We will not stand down."

In an update published to Facebook, the Doctors for Camp Closure group later said everyone arrested on Tuesday was "safe."

"They were taken into custody, detained, cited and then released," the group said. "No one came to physical harm, thank goodness."

According to Lt. Scott Adkins of the Chula Vista Police Department, federal authorities arrested several protesters outside the Border Patrol station. It is unclear what exactly they were detained and cited for.

"My understanding was that it was federal authorities that made the arrests," Adkins told Newsweek.

He said his department did have some officers present at the Border Patrol headquarters to monitor the situation and "make sure things didn't get out of hand."

"Our department wasn't involved in any arrests," he said.

For weeks, doctors have been campaigning to be allowed to provide detained migrants with free flu shots. With flu season getting off to an early start this year, they have sought to ramp up calls for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency, which oversees the Border Patrol, to take action.

In an interview with Newsweek on Tuesday ahead of the day's protest and subsequent arrests, Dr. Marie DeLuca, an emergency physician from New York City and one of the founders of Doctors for Camp Closure, said physicians felt it was their duty to stop people from "needlessly suffering and dying."

In the last fiscal year, at least three children, ages 2, 6 and 16, died of influenza while in federal custody, with it recently being revealed that 16-year-old Carlos Gregorio Hernandez Vasquez had been left lying on the floor in a holding cell for hours after falling sick before he was found dead.

In early November, DeLuca and fellow organizers of the free flu shot campaign had sent a letter to immigration officials requesting "immediate permission" to access CBP facilities in San Ysidro, California, in order to run a pilot program providing 100 doses of the influenza vaccine "at no cost to the U.S. government or its agencies."

They had hoped to show the CBP how simple–and effective–it would be to institute such a program in the long term.

Officials ignored the letter, however, with CBP spokespeople telling Newsweek repeatedly this past week that it does not make for their agency to oversee flu vaccinations given that detained migrants are only meant to be held in their custody for a maximum of up to 72 hours.

On Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) press office ramped up federal opposition to the initiative, with the department's press office lashing out at doctors. A statement published on Twitter said: "Of course Border Patrol isn't going to let a random group of radical political activists show up and start injecting people with drugs."

It is unclear what prompted the statement or whether the DHS is aware that the protesters are qualified doctors and that the "drugs" they are offering are flu vaccines.

The statement also came after DeLuca had told Newsweek that CBP officials had just been starting to express some interest in the pilot program, telling an organizer in a meeting that they were not opposed to the idea of facilitating flu vaccinations, but were doubtful that such an initiative would become a reality.

Doctors and supporters protest outside the Chula Vista Border Patrol Station near the San Ysidro port of entry in San Diego, California on Monday, December 9, 2019, demanding access to provide free flu vaccinations for detained migrants. Protesters were arrested the following day after rallying outside the Border Patrol's San Diego headquarters.

"We are guarding public health," added Dr. Peter Bretan, a transplant surgeon and president of the California Medical Association (CMA), which represents more than 46,000 members and physicians across the state.

"We are licensed practicing physicians in California—this is what we do," Bretan said in a statement shared with Newsweek. "People died of the flu last season in these detention centers. We're trying to prevent more flu deaths. This is CMA policy. This is consistent with medical practice for the benefit of public health."

In an interview with Newsweek on Tuesday, Dr. Alia Sunderji, a pediatric emergency medicine physician who has reviewed the autopsy reports of the children who died of flu in CBP custody, said there was no excuse for CBP's refusal to carry out a vaccination program.

Noting that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have recommended that migrants held under federal custody receive such vaccinations, the physician said she was "appalled" that the CBP would blatantly ignore that potentially life-saving advice.

"If Infectious disease outbreaks can be eradicated in very difficult circumstances...There's no excuse not to give the flu vaccine in CBP custody," she said. "The flu season is upon us. There's an opportunity here to prevent other children from dying and it's time to take it," the doctor added.