====== FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ======
America First Party
1630 A 30th Street #111
Boulder, Colorado 80301
http://www.AmericaFirstParty.org
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Swine Flu is a Wake-Up Call For Open Borders Crowd
Boulder, CO - As the death toll rises and the World Health Organization raises its alert level to indicate an imminent pandemic, Americans are finding reason to question the open borders policies which leave our nation exposed. The Senate is poised to hold hearings today on "Comprehensive Immigration Reform in 2009," which according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, would include amnesty for 12 million illegal aliens; any such proposal is expected to prompt a surge of opportunistic illegals crossing the southern borders. Will the risk of pandemic now cause the Senate to rethink its present course?
It is certain that illegal immigration increases the risk of infectious disease crossing international borders. Indicators show that illegal aliens have reintroduced many diseases into the U.S. which were eradicated over a period of several decades by systematic research and preventative medicine. In the Spring 2005 Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Madeline Cosman wrote that these include "drug-resistant tuberculosis, malaria, leprosy, plague, polio, dengue, and Chagas disease." Leprosy was so rare for 40 years, that only 900 people were infected, but in a recent 3 year period, this count exploded to 7,000 cases. There have also been outbreaks of a recent strain of TB which is endemic to Mexico, Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis; in Prince William County, Virginia, public health officials blamed immigrants for a 188% spike in the local TB infection rate.
Before 1924, legal immigrants were examined for infectious diseases. Those who tested positive for TB were not admitted. Similar health screening occurs today. According to federal immigration authorities, some "health conditions" can cause a person to be "barred from admission into the United States." It is obvious that this policy is in the national interest. But why do policy makers, with their tolerance of illegal immigration and their failure to secure our nation's borders, allow this policy to be so gravely undermined? Will it take a severe pandemic to make them yield to evidence and reason?
The America First Party is opposed to any form of amnesty, regardless of what elected officials choose to call it. Our platform contains detailed prescriptions for ending the present immigration crisis, and for returning the immigration rate to one which has been proven to be sustainable over the course of our nation's history.
Contacts:
Jonathan Hill, National Chairman, 1-866-SOS-USA1, ext. 4
Michael Lynch, Press Secretary, 1-866-SOS-USA1, ext. 2
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