A week after President Donald Trump signed an executive order to stop the separation of families at the border, pediatricians say that the practice will have a lasting impact on detained children.
Detention is just another step in the toxic stress among the children, according to Dr. Lanre Falusi, from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
“Before these children even reached the border," Flausi said, "many of them have already experienced lots of trauma, and left their home countries for that reason, whether it was gang violence or abuse or feeling that they had no other choice economically or around their safety.”
Pediatricians who have tended to these children are seeing immediate behavioral impacts, as they act differently, either by becoming withdrawn or more aggressive. But in the long-term, doctors believe the risk of depression, anxiety and suicide is increased due to the trauma.
Dr. Nathalie Quion is a pediatrician at Children's National, a hospital in Washington, D.C.
"This is what the children are going to have if they are continuously separated and even now that they had the experience of distress and trauma," Quion said.
Other doctors say that some of the children are at high risk of developing diseases in the future if they contract viruses in the detention centers.