Postscript

I opened the introduction to this book by citing the inspiration, both for the focus and the work plan of our efforts, that was received from Pope Francis' Message for the 100th World Day of Migrants and Refugees (2014). That message included the words "Towards a Better World" in its title. At the outset of our project, little did any of us know how prophetic those words would be. In fact, it was not until we already had assembled all the written inputs as well as the data reported in our primary and secondary research and had been gifted with the testimonies of migrants themselves that the human family became more acutely aware, perhaps more than ever before, of the need to join forces, energy, and creativity, to work "towards a better world" in the face of the global pandemic of COVID-19.

Now, in the midst of the COVID crisis, the impact of which goes far beyond public health challenges, it would seem irresponsible to ignore the migration-related implications of this pandemic. Thus, I am sharing some reflections on this global phenomenon by which a miniscule virus, invisible to the naked eye, has so powerfully stopped what we once thought to be "normal" human progress but now has been revealed as a world fraught with deep fractures and inequalities. Truly, we have been living in a "throwaway culture," as it is so often described by Pope Francis. In the context of COVID-19, we have become more keenly aware of how this culture favors the privileged few but leaves the vast majority of people on the margins and peripheries without access to basic human needs, dignity, and rights, including education, health care, and decent work.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is a story still being told, but already we have observed and recorded that, although no sector of the world's population is "exempt" from the pervasive spread of this virus or from the serious illness and premature death that it has caused to millions of people, migrants already have borne a heavier and more lethal burden of this disease. In its report on protection of migrant workers during the COVID-19 pandemic, the International Labour Organization (ILO) noted the following¹:

• The COVID-19 crisis is having an unprecedented impact on global economies, businesses, and workers. ILO estimates that nearly 2.2 billion workers, representing 68 percent of the global workforce, are living in countries with recommended or required workplace closures.

• Migrant workers represent 4.7 percent of this global labor pool comprising 164 million workers, with nearly half being women. In many countries migrant workers represent a significantly larger share of the workforce making important contributions to societies and economies and serving on the front lines carrying out essential jobs in health care, transport, services, construction, and agriculture and agro-food processing.

• Yet, most migrant workers are concentrated in sectors of the economy with high levels of temporary, informal or unprotected work, characterized by low wages and lack of social protection including in care work which in many countries is largely carried out by women migrant workers.

• Migrant workers are among the most vulnerable. Reports document rising levels of discrimination and xenophobia against migrants and in some cases food insecurity, layoffs, worsening working conditions including reduction or non-payment of wages, cramped or inadequate living conditions, and increased restrictions on movements or forced returns (where migrants may be stigmatized as carriers of the virus).

In April 2020 the Civil Society Action Committee on migration, convened by ICMC, the International Council of Voluntary Agencies (ICVA), and the UN Committee on Migration issued a global statement entitled "First, Save Lives: Solutions for the COVID-19 Pandemic and New Solidarity with Migrants and Refugees."² These organizations noted their gratitude "for frontline responders and essential workers serving the public, as healthcare professionals, producers and sellers of essential goods, agriculture and food chain workers, cleaners and sanitation workers, transport providers, humanitarian aid workers, and many others. A large number of these caregivers and workers are migrants and refugees, caring for sick people in hospitals and at home. Migrants and refugees are essential to public health in this crisis, risking their own health and lives to serve society." They expressed grave concern that the pandemic "... further jeopardizes the health and lives [of many migrants, refugees and their families across the globe] ... and reduces the possibility of what they may offer as solutions to this crisis, from healthcare to social and economic recovery. A fully inclusive, whole-of-society approach is essential to an effective response to this pandemic."

This same group called, inter alia, for such measures as:

• Remove obstacles that discriminate against migrants, refugees, and their families residing in the country regarding access to health care, other emergency services, and shelter (including suspending evictions). Obstacles may also include legal, regulatory, or documentation requirements; language; cultural barriers; and other deterrents. Migration status should not be a ground to prevent migrants from accessing health care.

• Erect "firewalls" against immigration enforcement. Migrants and refugees should not be prevented from accessing essential health care for fear of immigration enforcement, including the possibility of the loss of immigration status or access to public services, detention, family separation, or deportation.

• Respect the need for decent work. Ensure that enforcement of isolation measures, curfews, etc. does not punish those who must work to survive. Mechanisms put in place to control the spread of COVID-19 should not undermine the livelihoods of those living in the informal economy and reliant on daily income.

• Fundamental labor rights of all workers, including migrant workers, must be scrupulously respected. Safeguards should be put in place against forced labor — where migrants and refugees are coerced or forced to work against their will or their wages are reduced or withheld.

• Occupational safety and health for all workers, including migrant workers, must be a priority. They must be provided with the necessary safety equipment (masks, gloves, sanitizers etc.) and accommodations made in workplaces for physical distancing, hand washing, and other public health measures.

• Measures to relieve the social and economic consequences of the crisis should fully include migrants and refugees without discrimination, including those working in the informal economy and with full inclusion of migrant women workers in domestic and care work. These measures can include wage support; insurance; social protection; measures to prevent bankruptcies and job loss; crisis-related worker and unemployment benefits; extensions on payment of taxes, rents, mortgages and other financial obligations; as well as renewal of migrant worker contracts and visas.

In June 2020 the United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres launched a policy brief on "COVID-19 and People on the Move,"³ which updated and further detailed the migration-related impact of the pandemic as:

• First, a health crisis as people on the move find themselves exposed to the virus with limited tools to protect themselves. In addition to their often poor or crowded living or working conditions, many people on the move have compromised access to health services due to legal, language, cultural or other barriers. Particularly impacted are those migrants and refugees who are undocumented and who may face detention and deportation if reported to immigration authorities. Many people on the move also lack access to other basic services — such as water and sanitation or nutrition — and those in fragile, disaster-prone and conflict-affected countries are facing higher risks owing to weak health systems, which is compounded by travel restrictions constraining delivery of lifesaving humanitarian assistance.

• Second, a socioeconomic crisis impacting people on the move with precarious livelihoods, particularly those working in the informal economy with no or limited access to social protection measures. The crisis has also exacerbated the already fragile situation of women and girls on the move, who face higher risks of exposure to gender-based violence, abuse, and exploitation and have difficulty accessing protection and response services. Meanwhile, loss of employment and wages as a result of COVID-19 is leading to a decline in migrant remittances, with devastating effects for the 800 million people relying on them.

• Third, a protection crisis as border closures and other movement restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19 have a severe impact on the rights of many people on the move. Migrants may be forcibly returned to their home countries with fragile health systems, which are ill-prepared to receive them safely, while returning internally displaced people may face a similar predicament in their home localities. Additionally, fear of COVID-19 is exacerbating already high levels of xenophobia, racism, and stigmatization, and has even given rise to attacks against refugees and migrants. In the long-run there is a risk that COVID-19 may entrench restrictions on international movement and the curtailment of rights of people on the move.

Pope Francis constantly reminds us of the urgency for solidarity with the most needy, marginalized and forgotten persons, including migrants and refugees. The data and trends reported above clearly indicate that these latter brothers and sisters must be counted among those with significnt vulnerability to COVID-19. Thus, we can be sure that they certainly were in his mind when, on 17 April 2020, he presented a "Plan para resucitar"⁴ (Plan to resurrect) from the COVID-19 crisis. In his reflection, the Pope asked haunting questions, some of the same that were posed in the Laudato Sì encyclical⁵ and that ICMC and its partners explored and witnessed in the course of this labor migration initiative: "Will we continue to look the other way with complicit silence in the face of those wars fueled by desires for dominance and power? ... Are we willing to change the lifestyles that plunge so many into poverty, promoting and encouraging us to lead a more austere and humane life that enables an equitable distribution of resources? ... Will we adopt, as an international community, the necessary measures to stop the devastation of the environment or will we continue denying the evidence?" He prayed that, when the COVID-19 crisis is over, we will have the "necessary antibodies of justice, charity and solidarity." He insisted that "if we act as one people, even in the face of the other epidemics that lie waiting for us, we can have a real impact." He expressed the fervent hope that the lessons learned from COVID-19 "will break all the fanaticism in which we had immersed ourselves and will allow us to feel ourselves to be the creators and protagonists of a common history and, thus, to respond jointly to so many ills that afflict millions of brothers around the world."

The coronavirus pandemic already has unleashed astonishing disruptive power — entire aspects of our routine, everyday lives grounded to a halt. Truly, we have experienced the fragility that underpins our lives and our societies.

Five years ago, Pope Francis, in his encyclical Laudato Sì, already identified the need for us, members of the one human family, created in the image and likeness of our one God, to stay firm in the "conviction which we today share, that everything is interconnected, and that genuine care for our own lives and our relationships with nature is inseparable from fraternity, justice, and faithfulness to others."

Let us also make it a time for empathy and solidarity; let us also be deeply sensitive to the needs of the most vulnerable, including the migrants and refugees. While we continue to accompany the many displaced people throughout the world as well as those affected by the coronavirus and other needy people in our local communities, let us get ready for when the coronavirus crisis is no longer a global public health threat. May this crisis open our eyes and hearts to the possibility of our world being different — more caring, more just and more inclusive.