Second Opinion: Warning - Curtailing civil liberties is bad for your health

Humans have made a dog’s dinner out of, well, being human and, in particular, upholding the rights of migrants. Nearly a million adults and children have migrated, or attempted to migrate to the EU this year. Most of these people are refugees. Many just want a better life.

EU governments are struggling to cope. Some countries want to close borders and build fences to keep migrants out, whether they are refugees or not.

Recent terrorist acts perpetrated in Paris and elsewhere have ratcheted up anxiety levels, even though terrorism and migration are not connected. As far as anyone knows, none of the three million Irish who migrated before, during, and after the Great Famine were terrorists. Now EU governments are talking about lock-downs, increased surveillance and intelligence-gathering, and using emergency powers, all of which will curtail human freedom and civil liberties. This is not good news for the health of either incomers or indigenous populations.

Health and country freedom levels are inextricably linked. A 2010 study of 181 countries (98 per cent of the world’s population) found very strong associations between country-level freedom and health outcome indicators. These links remained after adjusting for confounders such as national wealth and government expenditure on health. Cumulative levels of freedom over time were also strongly linked to health indicators.

Inequality

Health indicators used in the study included infant and maternal mortality, percentage of GDP spent on health, and inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient (a number between 0 and 1 where 0 corresponds with perfect equality and 1 corresponds with perfect inequality).

Researchers used freedom level ratings measured by Freedom House from 1972 to 2005. Freedom House is an independent watchdog which has measured freedom in the world since 1941. Eleanor Roosevelt was an ardent supporter and its first co-chair. It scores countries from one (free) to seven (not free). Political rights and civil liberties measured each year include freedom of speech, the right to protest, freedom of association and electoral processes.

Only 46 per cent of countries are classified as free. Almost all recent migrants to the EU came and are coming from countries with the worst "not free" ratings. Syria, unsurprisingly, scores seven, and Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya score six. Only 5 per cent of North Africa and the Middle East, comprising 21 countries and 410 million people, is classified as "free". Just 12 per cent of sub-Saharan Africa, with 50 countries and a billion people, is rated as "free". Ghana and Senegal are among the "free" African countries and few migrants come from there. Most EU countries, including Ireland, score one, so it is no wonder people from "not free" countries want to live here.

Change from within

Xenophobes wonder why migrants “do not stay in their own country” and change things there. As the researchers from the 2010 study point out, it is not easy to campaign for freedom when people “are consumed by a struggle to garner basic necessities such as food, water and shelter”.

Also, as we know from Irish history, political change is difficult when citizens have few rights or civil liberties. In the 1980s and 1990s, Northern Ireland was classified by Freedom House as "not free". It was upgraded to "partly free" status following the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. Nearly 20 years later it still scores only 2, the same as Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary, countries migrants want to bypass.

Migration to the EU is not going to stop any time soon. It will be a major force shaping 21st-century society. According to Freedom House's Freedom in the World report 2015, many countries are becoming less instead of more free, so migration to the EU will inevitably increase.

Climate change, floods, droughts and food insecurity will cause more migration.

Human rights

We need to ensure migrants have their human rights vindicated from day one. EU governments also must do whatever possible to advance freedom in countries that are "partly free" or "not free". In a speech to the Irish Humanitarian Summit in July, President Michael D Higgins noted that "the current discourse [about migration and climate change] has focused on security, border controls, and alleged 'pull' factors". We "must make a fresh commitment to the universality of human rights and human dignity".

These rights include freedom and EU governments must preserve this right for citizens, whatever the consequences.

[ drjackyjones@gmail.com ]