4 - The Determinants of the Health of Irregular Migrants

Summary

This chapter explores whether international and European human rights laws provide for the determinants of health of irregular migrants. The determinants of health, together with health care, are part of the scope of the right to health and constitute a particularly important area within the field of public health. Indeed, the enjoyment of human and social rights that support the determinants of health is in keeping with the concepts of empowerment, indivisibility, interrelatedness and vulnerability, which ground human rights law. However, an examination of the applicable human rights jurisprudence reveals that where irregular migrants are concerned, these narratives often – but not always − dissipate in the face of the imperative, as states see it, to control immigration, resulting in the social rights – other than the right to health care − of irregular migrants being guaranteed at only a basic or survival level.