Health Policy
Volume 123, Issue 9, 2019, Pages 825-832

Refugee crisis in Finland: Challenges to safeguarding the right to health for asylum seekers (Article)

Tuomisto K.* , Tiittala P. , Keskimäki I. , Helve O.
  • a Department of Public Health, University of Helsinki, Finland, Department of Health Security, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland, Doctoral Programme in Population Health, University of Helsinki, Finland
  • b Department of Health Security, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland, Doctoral Programme in Population Health, University of Helsinki, Finland
  • c Department of Health and Social Care Systems, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland, Faculty of Social Sciences, Tampere University, Finland
  • d Department of Health Security, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland, Children's Hospital, Pediatric Research Center, University of Helsinki and Helsinki University Hospital, Finland

Abstract

In 2015 Finland received an unprecedented number of asylum seekers, ten times more than in any previous year. This surge took place at a time the Finnish Government was busily undergoing a wide-range health and social care reform amid growing nationalist and populist sentiments. Our aim is to explore the governance of a parallel health system for asylum seekers with a right-to-health approach. We concentrated on three right to health features most related to the governance of asylum seeker health care, namely Formal recognition of the right to health, Standards and Coordination mechanisms. Through our qualitative review, we identified three major hurdles in the governance of the system for asylum seekers: 1) Ineffectual and reactive national level coordination and stewardship; 2) Inadequate legislative and supervisory frameworks leading to ineffective governance; 3) Discrepancies between constitutional rights to health, legal entitlements to services and guidance available. This first-time large-scale implementation of the policies exposed weaknesses in the legal framework and the parallel health system. We recommend the removal of the parallel system and the integration of asylum seekers’ health services to the national public health care system. © 2019 The Authors

Author Keywords

Delivery of health care Government human rights Refugees Health services Public health Finland policy

Index Keywords

coordination government Finland public health service Article human rights asylum seeker human health care delivery
Link
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85071830707&doi=10.1016%2fj.healthpol.2019.07.014&partnerID=40&md5=78ed6d4747e27c14c678a14dcab5ad9d
DOI: 10.1016/j.healthpol.2019.07.014
ISSN: 01688510
Cited by: 1
Original Language: English