When 64-year-old Kamyar Samimi died in ICE custody, the agency issued a routine press release saying the preliminary cause of his death was cardiac arrest. It boasted about the nearly $200 million it had been spending annually on health care services for detainees, saying that “comprehensive medical care is provided from the moment detainees arrive and throughout the entirety of their stay.”
What the press release didn’t say was that Samimi’s death followed a series of lapses in his medical care — the sort of breakdowns that have been repeatedly identified in government investigations into the care provided at immigrant detention centers in recent years.
Samimi, an Iranian man who was being held by ICE in Aurora, Colorado, had been complaining of vomiting and pain for weeks leading up to his death in 2017, according to ICE’s investigation into his treatment. He had told medical staff upon his arrival that he had been taking methadone, a painkiller commonly used to treat opioid addiction, since hurting his back in a car accident. He said he was starting to feel symptoms of withdrawal, yet nurses told investigators they didn’t have training in opioid withdrawal.
Source: CNN
Read more at: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/04/us/immigrant-medical-care-wellpath-invs/index.html