Promoting the health of refugees and Migrants

THE WORLD MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, INC.
L’ASSOCIATION MEDICALE MONDIALE, INC
ASOCIACION MEDICA MUNDIAL, INC
Centre International de Bureaux FEIN : 13-2566243
Immeuble A “Keynes” Website : www.wma.net Postal Address :
13, chemin du Levant Telephone : (33) 4 50 40 75 75 Boîte Postale 63
01210 FERNEY-VOLTAIRE Fax : (33) 4 50 40 59 37 01210 FERNEY-VOLTAIRE Cedex
France E-mail address : wma@wma.net France
72nd
World Health Assembly
12.4 Promoting the health of refugees and migrants
Distinguished Delegates,
Thank you for the opportunity to speak on behalf of the World Medical Association, which
represents 9 million physicians worldwide.
We welcome the draft WHO Global Action Plan to Promote the Health of Refugees and Migrants
developed in collaboration with IOM and UNHCR amongst others. This inclusive partnership
constitutes a positive advancement to address the complexity of the issue. We welcome the
references to the required need to develop educational tools for health professionals in relation with
the health of migrants and refugees.
However, the Plan fails to address key issues necessary to ensure proper access to health care to
migrants and refugees in line with human rights and medical ethics standards:
1. The Plan should include an explicit reference to the human right to health of refugees and
migrants, regardless of their legal, civil or political status. This reference would be in line with
SDG 3 “Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages” and would prevent the
risk that undocumented migrants be left behind in this important process.
2. The Plan should also address the ethical challenge physicians face and condemn any practice
involving their participation to non-medically justified examination, diagnosis or treatment –
such as sedatives to facilitate easy deportation, or bone examination for age assessment. These
practices constitute a diversion of medically justified measures for police or judicial purposes. It
can undermine the trustworthy patient-physicians relationship indispensable for the provision of
quality care and may constitute a violation of medical ethics.
3. Regarding the priority 5 on health information systems, the ethical aspects of health data
collection need to be addressed, in particular the rights to confidentiality, autonomy and privacy
as well as the required informed consent of the individuals concerned. These values are essential
safeguards to any possible misuses in health data collection. We regret that the Plan, in its
current version, does not include a single reference to this fundamental issue.
Thank you