A Human Family in a Common Home

Support for the very poor, including refugees and people forcibly displaced amid the COVID-19 crisis, is both a global moral imperative and in the self-interest of better-off countries. Despite their responsibilities to their own citizens, developed countries have obligations to displaced people and the poor countries that host them.

May 17, 2020

By Prof Fr David Hollenbach
Support for the very poor, including refugees and people forcibly displaced amid the COVID-19 crisis, is both a global moral imperative and in the self-interest of better-off countries. Despite their responsibilities to their own citizens, developed countries have obligations to displaced people and the poor countries that host them.

Catholic social thought, with its orientation to the common good both nationally and globally and its insistence that we share a common home across the earth, provides a persuasive way to combine legitimate national concerns with the imperative of global solidarity.

The church can and should provide leadership in responding to the needs of refugees and very poor people who are facing the COVID-19 crisis. The Christian community is already responding to their needs through the important work of Catholic Relief Services, Jesuit Refugee Service, the broader Caritas Internationalis network and other agencies. Leadership by Catholic bishops, pastors and educators will also be essential. Such moral leadership could provide indispensable guidance on how to reconcile obligations to the citizens of one’s own country with obligations to global humanity. The church’s contribution could include providing guidance on how to address short-, medium- and long-term dimensions of the crisis.

Short term. Developed countries and international organisations should provide funds to enable developing countries and humanitarian organisations to acquire the medical supplies needed to treat those infected by the virus and to prevent the spread of infection to vulnerable displaced people and to others in extreme poverty. These supplies should include test equipment and personal protective equipment for medical staff. The response should address the growing hunger and even starvation that is rising in poor countries due to the loss of jobs and the restricted movement brought by the pandemic. In developed countries like the United States, COVID-19 testing and treatment should be available at no cost to the poor and the displaced regardless of their immigration status. Asylum seekers should be treated in ways that reduce their vulnerability to the coronavirus and provide them with screening and with treatment when needed.

Medium term. A major effort should be made to develop a vaccine against the virus and to finance its wide distribution in the poorer countries that host the majority of displaced people. Such a vaccine will be essential to preventing very large numbers of deaths due to the spread of COVID-19 among refugees and in both poorer and better-off countries. Christians should support efforts to relieve the burden of the debts carried by poor countries so these countries can deal with the pandemic more effectively. They should also back the UN secretary general’s appeal for a worldwide cessation of conflict so that war does not further impede efforts to treat and prevent the spread of COVID-19, both in poor countries suffering from war and among persons forcibly displaced by conflict.

Long term. The Holy See and national bishops’ conferences should advocate a strong response by international agencies like the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Food Program, and by national governments in the developed world, to the needs that make very poor countries especially vulnerable to the virus. They should call for strengthening the global refugee and migration regime and the wider humanitarian system that are in danger of being weakened by the economic and political consequences of the pandemic.

The Christian community should be a vigorous advocate for the global common good in the face of COVID-19’s severe threats to the poor and displaced. It should work to ensure that in the post-crisis future, poor people and refugees have a more just share in the common good than they do today.--America Magazine

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