UK News

Deportation of positive asylum
seekers ‘a setback for human rights’

The European Court of Human Rights last month rejected an HIV positive Ugandan woman’s claim to stay in the UK.

HIV charities and campaigners have condemned the decision as ‘a setback for human rights’.

The woman’s legal team argued that to deport her to Uganda would mean she would not be able to get antitretroviral (ART) treatments and this would lead to her premature death.

They said it would be “cruel and degrading treatment” to deport her.
But both the House of Lords and the European Court rejected these arguments and now the woman, known as ‘N’, has no more appeals left.

The case has been going through the courts for nearly 10 years and the UK government argued consistently that ART is available in Uganda, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

UNAIDS and the World Health Organisation (WHO) say that only 2 million people in low and middle income countries have access to ART but over 7 million people urgently need the treatments. ART is available to some in Uganda, but not to all.

“The decision to send an HIV positive woman back to Uganda is a setback for human rights,” said Deborah Jack, chief executive of the National Aids Trust (NAT).

“Once someone is given treatment for HIV, any change or interruption to that treatment is life threatening. To return someone to a country where treatment is not accessible can mean in effect a death sentence.”

Health is a basic human right, NAT said, and for people living with HIV that means access to treatment.

The case highlights the desperate inequalities in accessing HIV treatment around the world and the urgent need to ensure that HIV care is rolled out internationally.

Just because a country has drugs does not mean that everyone in that country can access them, let alone pay for them, NAT added.
Lisa Power, head of policy at Terrence Higgins Trust (THT) said the decision to deport the woman was cruel and inhumane.

“HIV treatments are not universally available in Uganda. In many African countries it is still only accessible to a privileged minority. Why are we sending people to their deaths when within only a few years they could be returned to live a productive life?”

“THT opposes the deportation of people with HIV to any country where treatments are still being rolled out. It is a waste of human life for short term political gain,” Power added.

But another case of an HIV positive asylum seeker in the courts this spring saw a decision to deny free NHS healthcare declared unlawful.
The test case of a Palestinian man, known as ‘A’, who brought the case against West Middlesex Hospital Trust, saw Judge Mitting rule that the hospital had an obligation of care.

Many of the estimated 11,000 asylum seekers in the UK and hundreds of asylum seekers with HIV who are fighting against deportation will be affected by the court’s decision.

But the Department of Health (DH) says it is now appealing against the judgement.