Union President: Record number of Border Patrol agents calling in sick, CDC needs to

Union President: Record number of Border Patrol agents calling in sick, CDC needs to step in

Border Patrol agents calling in sick EL PASO, Texas - A record number of Border Patrol agents are calling in sick and others are showing up to work sick because they are out of sick time, the head of the local Border Patrol union tells ABC-7.


"I believe this is probably the record, you know, Border Patrol-wide, since ever, of agents calling in sick," said Carlos Favela, president of the National Border Patrol Council Local 1929.


Favela said the trend started at the same time as the surge of migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. in late 2018. Newly-released figures from the Department of Homeland Security reveal Border Patrol agents encountered 109,144 migrants in April 2019, the highest since 2007. The figure includes more than 58,000 migrant parents and children and 8,800 unaccompanied children taken into custody, according to Homeland Security.


Favela said agents are filing reports with the union, saying they came into contact with undocumented immigrants infected with the H1N1 virus and diseases like chicken pox and Legionnaires'.


The union is having a hard time getting "evidence and documentation" from the U.S. Border Patrol that would allow it to formulate a plan to protect agents, Favela said, adding that also makes it more difficult to pinpoint how widespread the problem is.


The union is now calling on the Centers for Disease Control to step in and investigate. It is also demanding better protection for agents, better health screening procedures conducted by doctors, not nurses, and new facilities where sick immigrants can be quarantined.


Officials with the Border Patrol told ABC-7 they do not see a trend of more agents calling in sick.


Favela disagrees: "That's false. Ever since the big surge of the immigrants started coming in, even as far back as September, we started seeing those numbers slightly increase - of agents calling in sick."


According to Favela, an average of 20 to 25 agents in the El Paso sector are calling in sick every day. The union leader said some agents are even reporting to work sick because they have run out sick time.


"The nightmare for the agent out in the field is that they contract tuberculosis or some kind of bacterial disease and they unknowingly take that home to their families and then their whole family is sick," said Favela.


Favela told ABC-7 officials with the CDC are expected to visit several Border Patrol facilities in El Paso in the coming weeks.

https://www.kvia.com/news/border/uni...-in/1076444202

May 10, 2019
By Monica Showalter

Should catching the measles, or mumps or chickenpox or tuberculosis, be part of a federal employee's job description? You know, take the TB the way the military at war with an enemy takes the bullet? Except, of course, that the military can defend itself. Border Patrol agents cannot.

It is now. InfoWars, via Drudge Report, has some news on just this appalling state of affairs:

More agents than ever before are calling in sick to work or showing up sick, says a Border Patrol union representative who worries too many agents are succumbing to illnesses brought by illegal aliens.

Carlos Favela, president of the National Border Patrol Council Local 1929, says the number of agents affected by illnesses has reached alarming levels in recent years, with an estimated 20 to 25 agents from the El Paso sector calling in sick each day, while others come in to work sick because they've used up their sick days.

"I believe this is probably the record, you know, Border Patrol-wide, since ever, of agents calling in sick," Favela told ABC-7.

That's the situation with the current border surge, which has seen 109,000 illegal migrants pour into this country without any vetting, medical screening, or paperwork in just the past month. With little in the way of a wall, a Democratic Party that's encouraging mass illegal migration from abroad, a Democrat-led House that refuses to do anything to halt the current border surge, and numerous incentives from blue states for illegals to enter illegally, at least one end result is this effective standing order for Border Patrol agents to take the diseases the illegals they apprehend are bringing in with them, before releasing them to move about the country.

'Caged children' is a powerful Democratic talking point, after all.

So much for the Democrats' supposed concern for the working man. So much for Democrats' 'narrative' about being the party of OSHA, living wages, and humane working conditions, something the supposedly mean Republicans are supposedly all against. Where's their concern for the unprotected Border Patrol agents subject to infectious diseases from unvetted migrants? Democrats can't even be bothered to issue hazmat suits to these affected Border Patrol agents, which is what this situation would call for were this any private-sector establishment they seek to regulate. And it's certainly something they insist on for EPA workers at toxic dump sites, or NASA workers in space industries. Border Patrol guys, though, get nothing in the way of protection. These Democrats can't even get a bill together to fund actual medical establishments for these hundreds of thousands of illegals they're inviting in, or better yet, a law that illegals certify themselves as disease-free at their own expense before they are allowed to cross illegally. The only thing that matters to Democrats is that the illegals get in, and what happens happens.

We all know why it's happening, too: Democrats benefit, big time, from illegal immigration — for the votes, the federal funds, the Electoral College votes they benefit from as a result. The ends justify the means, as Alinsky would say. What's spreading a little measles to Border Patrol agents or a little TB to their family members compared to an extra Electoral College vote or power from a district with a 9% voter turnout rate?

It's all so incredibly cynical. Not even Ellis Island, in the days of legal ship-led migration a hundred years ago, permitted the entry of immigrants with diseases. Many were turned back merely for having a cold or the flu. But with the open borders policies in place today, any contagious disease is no disqualifier, and with the Border Patrol still required to process these people to give them the court dates most never show up for, they're coming in disease and all.

You'd think the Democrats responsible for this state of affairs would at least get going on issuing the Border Patrol the hazmat suits it needs. Or more seriously, take steps to reform easily abused asylum laws, approve money for the construction of a wall with a door, and allow Border Patrol agents on the grounds of health hazards to deport illegal aliens caught anywhere on this side of the border, on the spot.

Not a chance of it, given the Democrat 'priorities.'

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog...and_mumps.html