As Australia’s ‘ally’ the US, begins to rip away legal representation from children arrested by immigration agencies – meaning you’ll see toddlers sitting across immigration judges and ICE lawyers in court, without legal representation (Australia also put children into immigration detention and locks up children in prisons domestically, with the age of legal responsibility as low as 10 in some jurisdictions) the University of Sydney has found there is NO SAFE FORMS OF DETENTION FOR CHILDREN.

From the release:

The study led by psychologists at the University of Sydney reviewed findings from 21 English- language studies involving 9620 children in eight countries. It reveals alarming levels of mental health issues, including depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), among children held in all forms of immigration detention.
As global population displacement continues to rise, the review highlights an urgent need to consider alternatives to the detention of children and families seeking asylum.
The research has been published in The British Journal of Psychiatry. It is the first study to focus on the impact of a broad range of detention experiences on children’s mental health.
Senior author Professor Caroline Hunt, Head of Clinical Psychology at the University of Sydney, said: “The data shows any level of detention will put a child’s mental health at risk, with the lengthiest and most restrictive showing serious harms, including high levels of post-traumatic stress, self-harm and suicide attempts.
“Our findings are a clarion call for change. Immigration detention for children is not just an administrative issue; it’s an ongoing global public health crisis.”

The study showed 42.2 percent of children experienced depression and 32.0 percent displayed
symptoms consistent with PTSD