MSF response to UK announcements on asylum policy

"The UK Government’s plans to make refugee protection temporary will trap people in a perpetual limbo of uncertainty, compounding already severe and complex trauma. Our medical teams in the UK support people seeking asylum and refugees suffering from PTSD and other serious mental health conditions resulting from significant and repeated violence, persecution or abuse in their countries of origin and during extremely traumatic journeys. They already face a situation of hostility and precarity in the UK, now this added level of uncertainty is likely to inflict further harm and suffering. ​

Furthermore, the UK government continues to criminalise and punish people forced to take irregular routes while offering virtually no safe or accessible pathways. This leaves men, women and children with no choice but to risk dangerous and often fatal journeys. The few schemes that exist are grossly inadequate. For Palestinians in Gaza the UK has granted a handful of student visas and created a medical evacuation scheme that has only supported just over 50 children, despite the thousands in need of lifesaving care. There is no safe route to flee from Sudan, where our teams witness extreme levels of violence including ethnic-based violence and mass atrocities, shocking rates of malnutrition amongst children and adults, and where nearly 12 million people have been displaced from their homes.”

- Dr Natalie Roberts, Executive Director of Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF UK).