A Honduran woman who was six months pregnant went into premature labor and delivered a stillborn baby while in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody last week. In a statement, immigration officials said they didn’t immediately report the death because, in their words,“a stillbirth is not considered an in-custody death.”
The 24-year-old woman, who has not been named, was initially detained by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on Feb. 18 and then taken to a hospital, where she reportedly cleared two medical screenings. It’s not noted what kinds of screenings she underwent. She was then taken into ICE custody, according to a joint ICE/CBP release, and later released when she began to complain of abdominal pain.
“At that time, she conveyed that the baby was coming,” the statement continues. “She went into premature labor, at 27 weeks pregnant, and delivered an unresponsive male infant. [ICE Health Service Corps] initiated CPR and EMS transported them both to the Valley Baptist Medical Center in Harlingen, Texas, where the infant was later pronounced dead.”
ICE already detained pregnant women, and under the Trump administration implemented a new memo to detain even more. There is “substantial evidence,” said the American Immigration Council’s Katie Shepherd, that detention “has been linked to serious health implications to the mother and unborn child and also constitutes a significant barrier to receiving a meaningful day in court.”
Detaining pregnant women in substandard conditions is deadly. In early 2017, Jacinta Torres suffered a miscarriage about four weeks into her pregnancy while in immigration detention. She complained of heavy bleeding but was told to wait. ”Morales guesses she waited another hour, while other women were seen. She said one had a toothache.”