Asylum-seeking Minors Research Articles

Learning How to Tell, Learning How to Ask: Reciprocity and Storytelling as a Community Process

AbstractIn this article, we discuss the discursive processes that surround storytelling of traumatic experiences in the case of minor asylum seekers involved in the recent migration flow to Italian ports. We argue that in order to understand not only how traumatic experiences are told but also how they are overcome, it is necessary to focus on the reciprocal relationships and impact of the members of the communities in which migrants are received. Such approach shifts the focus from the content of stories toward the protagonists of their tellings and from asylum seekers as ‘subjects’ to asylum seekers as members of communities to which they and others contribute. The article is based on narrative data collected through an ongoing project with teachers, researchers, and minor asylum seekers involved in a school of Italian Language for Foreigners in Palermo.

“More Alike Than Unalike?” A Personal Reflection on Working to Support the Mental Health and Wellbeing of Unaccompanied Refugee Minors in Greece

In late 2018, motivated (and intrigued) by the scale of one of the largest and long-standing humanitarian crises in history, we embarked on two separate but related journeys to the island of Lesvos to work with unaccompanied refugee and asylum-seeking minors and to link in with NGOs working in the region. Peering through the prism of the current pandemic, the aim of this paper is to reflect on this life changing experience to share the on-the-ground reality and the true stories of war, violence and displacement as narrated by the children/young people with whom we worked and whom we met. In particular, we suggest that the integration of culturally appropriate and creative mental health and psychosocial support interventions in schools/educational settings might provide one way of supporting these children, as suggested by several authors in the international literature, but also in the context of a number of key learning based on our own experiences.

Futures literacy theatre lab with unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors

This article discusses a Practice as Research project, the design and implementation of a Futures Literacy Lab in which tools derived from the arsenal of the Theatre of the Oppressed were applied. The lab involved asylum-seeking unaccompanied minors, and took place in the island of Lesvos, Greece in July, 2019. Applied theatre practices often deal with communities and individuals in a transformational manner, which is, by definition, future-oriented. In this respect, the work undertaken served as a first case study for potential interdisciplinary collaboration between Performance Studies and Futures studies. This exercise is not without its ethical implications, though. This paper will discuss some of the challenges, pitfalls and successes of this process.

Health promotion for unaccompanied minor asylum seekers – a qualitative evaluation

Abstract Background We evaluated a health promotion program (HPP) for unaccompanied minor asylum seekers (UMA) in the canton of Vaud, Switzerland. UMA are particularly vulnerable to a range of health issues, due to their age and migration experiences. Effective health promotion programs are key to empower them to overcome these challenges and to improve their health. Methods We adopted a qualitative design with ethnographic and participatory elements to identify strengths, opportunities for improvement and appropriateness as perceived by UMA, educators and nurses responsible for UMA health care and the HPP. Data collection included observation of HPP courses, focus group discussions with UMA and interviews with educators. Analysis was based on a grounded theory in ethnography approach. Results Finding include three main themes: 1) UMA’s perceived low power and control, due to predominant rules and regulations and uncertainty about the future; 2) A need for health promotion in this population, due to UMA’s risk behaviours and the educators’ perceived discomfort with health-related issues and health promotion; 3) Practical feedback regarding topics, teaching methods and HPP organisation. Main recommendations include using effective adolescent health education methods to improve the appropriateness to age and context, enhancing participation of educators in health promotion and improving practical aspects of the HPP. Conclusions We evaluated and documented health promotion practice in the hard to reach population of UMA. Feasible changes in teaching methods and multidisciplinary collaboration may improve the HPP. However, UMA’s social environment needs to be taken into consideration to provide effective health promotion programs. Key messages Unaccompanied minor asylum seeker and educators perceive the health promotion program as useful and important. To address the health promotion needs of UMA, any program must be adaptive to the contextual complexity of UMA lives.

Value Destruction in Swedish Welfare Services: Frontline Workers’ Impact on Asylum-Seeking Minors’ Possibilities of Creating Value in Early Integration

ABSTRACTThe aim of this article is to investigate ways in which welfare frontline workers’ conceptualization of Swedishness destroys asylum-seeking minors’ (16–17 years) possibilities of creating value during the service process in early integration. Focus group interviews and in-depth interviews were conducted with coaches at accommodation centres, schoolteachers and social workers. The analytical approach employed makes use of a service logic perspective. The findings indicate that the frontline workers contribute to destructed value in three ways through: (1) conditions, (2) limitations and (3) contradictions in their interacation with the minors. All in all, during these asymmetrical service situations, it is significant to understand the importance of frontline workers being given the opportunity by management to increase their own awareness of how their professional work impact upon a minor’s possibilities of creating value.

Clinical profile and care pathways among unaccompanied minor asylum seekers in Vaud, Switzerland.

The objectives of this study were to describe the overall clinical profile (somatic and psychological health) and the care pathways of unaccompanied minor asylum seekers (UMAS) who arrived in the Swiss canton of Vaud in 2015. This was a retrospective study based on information extracted from the medical files of 109 patients over 1 year of follow-up. All the reasons for consultation and referrals as well as the diagnoses made were noted and coded using ICD-10. The healthcare providers for all diagnoses and referrals were also noted. Our sample was predominantly male (87.2%) and hailed primarily from Eritrea (39.4%) and Afghanistan (32.1%). Gatekeeping nurses at a specialized migrant care facility (MCF) referred 67.7% of the UMAS to other providers for further medical care, including 45.4% to the Interdisciplinary Division for Adolescent Health (DISA). However, 46.8% of the 109 UMAS also sought care at other structures without any referral by MCF or DISA as intended. Of the patients 39.4% were found to have at least one mental health problem, mainly functional disorders (21.1%), symptoms and episodes of depression (17.4%), symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (13.8%) and sleeping disorders (12.8%). The most common diagnoses of infectious diseases included community-acquired respiratory infections (43.1%), scabies (20.2%) and cases of skin abscesses and furuncles (13.8%). In fewer instances, cases of active tuberculosis (3.7%), chronic hepatitis B (2.8%), intestinal parasites (1.8%) and gastritis caused by Helicobacter pylori (1.8%) were also diagnosed. A significant proportion of UMAS presented traumatological (30.3%) and ophthalmological (25.7%) problems. Among the female UMAS (12.8% of the sample), evidence of genital mutilation (21.4%), pregnancy (21.4%) and abortion (14.3%) was common. An integrated approach involving efficient coordination between different providers is necessary in order to respond adequately to the major healthcare needs of UMAS. Special attention should be paid to mental health.

Implementing Narrative Exposure Therapy for unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors with post-traumatic stress disorder: A pilot feasibility report.

There are high rates of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors (UAM) and there is a requirement for feasible, acceptable and evidence-based treatments. Narrative Exposure Therapy (NET) is a short-term treatment for PTSD following multiple traumatic events. This article aims to examine the applicability of NET for UAM in routine clinical practice and to provide preliminary feasibility, acceptability and effectiveness data. The participants were four UAM receiving NET within a dedicated child and adolescent mental health service for refugee children. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to understand the acceptability of this approach and standardised measures of PTSD were used to provide preliminary data regarding the effectiveness of NET for these clients. The clients attended NET consistently with few missed appointments. At post-treatment, two clients' symptom scores were below the clinical cut-off for PTSD and all three clients who completed NET met reliable improvement criteria. The clients reported improvements in functional outcomes and mentioned that they would encourage other young people with similar difficulties to engage in NET. This study was limited by the small sample size and naturalistic time limitations in clinicians' contracts. This article highlights that it is possible to implement NET within routine clinical practice and observed improvements in PTSD symptoms and functional outcomes for UAM.

Literacy and Agency: The Case of Young Adults who Came to Sweden as Unaccompanied Asylum-seeking Minors

ABSTRACTIn this article, relations between agency and literacy are analysed focussing on unaccompanied asylum-seeking children’s literacies. A dialogic perspective on agency is used, with agency defined as dynamic, and with attention paid to the parameters time, culture, semiotic resources, and physical space and position. The material used for the analysis are interviews with five young adults. Interviews revealed the conflicting positions of the young persons in focus here, as agents acting to position themselves while simultaneously being in a vulnerable position. The social uses of written language resources outside school in this case turned out to be especially important for interaction with peers, relatives and acquaintances. The analysis also showed the importance of support for the development of multilingual literacies, and it identified restrictions at the social level that may be the result of monolingual literacy for the individual.

The border event in the everyday: hope and constraints in the lives of young unaccompanied asylum seekers in Turkey

ABSTRACTThis article addresses the everyday lives of young male migrants in a state care facility for unaccompanied minor asylum seekers in Istanbul, Turkey. We focus on how the EU-Turkey Statement, which came into force in March 2016, affected the young people’s options and hopes and how they responded to the resultant strengthening of border control. Drawing on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in Istanbul and the Aegean area between 2015 and 2016 we show how this agreement became enmeshed with the young people’s life trajectories during a period of increasing authoritarianism in Turkey. While current contributions to border studies in Turkey mainly discuss new strategies of joint border management, the border spectacle of the irregular corridor to Europe and emerging humanitarian interventions at the borders, this article traces how political and legal transformations of border control trickle down to the everyday of unaccompanied minors. We suggest analysing the EU–Turkey border regime in 2015/16 as a ‘critical event’ (Das [2007]. Life and Words: Violence and the Descent Into the Ordinary. Berkeley: University of California Press) and show how violence, exclusion and humanitarianism affect young men’s lives.

‘Humanitarian borderwork’: Identifying tensions between humanitarianism and securitization for government contracted NGOs working with adult and unaccompanied minor asylum seekers in Australia

This article challenges the common assumption that non-government organizations (NGOs) are ‘natural allies’ to asylum seekers in transforming borders from below by examining theories of humanitarianism within the context of securitization. Our article examines the theoretical and policy implications of the ‘humanitarian borderwork’ of NGOs, defined as practices that contain a security logic that construct, shift and erase internal and external borders. Our case study explores the involvement of government contracted NGOs in the delivery of services to adult and unaccompanied minor asylum seekers on the community detention and release programme in Australia. Documentary analysis of policy and contractual arrangements informing the establishment of community detention and release is supplemented by key informant interviews with government officials and service providers. We analyse the contradictory tensions that exist between humanitarian objectives that seek to ‘transform borders from below’ and governmental security imperatives that tend to co-opt agencies and limit their ability to achieve humanitarian aims. Based on the case study presented, we illustrate how the ‘humanitarian borderwork’ of NGOs can shape the translation of government power and contribute to the government agenda of border securitization.

Culture, migration, and identity formation in adolescent refugees: a family perspective

ABSTRACTLooking through a cultural lens at the family system level, expressions of distress in adolescent refugees are explored using the constructs of postmigration cultural identity formation and cultural idioms of distress. Asylum-seeking minors have heightened risk of developing mental health problems. Family is an important protective factor, and a sustained lack of parental figures further increases these young peoples’ vulnerability to mental health problems. The family plays a significant role as an anchor to cultural identity. Case studies from a cultural consultation service in a clinical psychiatry department were used to illustrate two potential trajectories regarding identity formation and the impact on expressions of distress and family functioning. Case analysis also emphasized the clinical relevance of exploring meaning making and cultural idioms of distress in the face of trauma and loss at the individual and the family level. Clinical implications focus on a family and a cultural lens to emphasize the importance of contextualizing expressions of distress in adolescents who had to flee from war-affected areas.

Intertwined Journeys of a PhD Student and Unaccompanied Minors: Autoethnography of Research with Vulnerable Participants

Aim/Purpose: The aim of this article is to discuss a PhD student’s experience of working with unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors, amidst a rapidly changing global situation. The focus is on how the research process influenced the novice PhD student, and how the student’s subject position influenced the research. Background: The incentive for this article comes from an examiner’s comment, which argued that the student’s thesis did not clarify her subject position, or allow her voice to be heard. Paulo Freire’s (2005) concept of “pedagogical love” is used in unpacking these dimensions. Methodology: The paper adopts an autoethnographic approach. The data, consisting of 48 pages of field notes written during the doctoral study, are analyzed abductively (Timmermans & Tavory, 2012), in dialogue with theory. Contribution: The paper brings to the fore the ways in which the doctoral research processes may influence students, especially those working closely and intensively with participants in emotionally challenging situations and within a research field in flux. This knowledge is rarely included in doctoral training, but is relevant in today’s world where migration and refugees have become a popular theme. Secondly, the paper contributes to the already well-established body of literature about how doctoral student’s positionality influences the research. Findings: The article utilises the ideas of storytelling (Weir & Clarke, 2018) and communicates findings in the form of three intertwined journeys: that of the author through her PhD process; the journey of her research participants from their countries of origin to Finland; and the journey of the PhD research within the historical turbulence of 2015 in global refugee situation. The findings show that acknowledging and reflecting one’s own emotional stance is required for the wellbeing of the student, as well as for an ethical research process resulting in a trustworthy outcome. The findings also suggest that although the love-rhetoric may sit awkwardly within our current academic perspectives, a focus on emotions does not diminish rigor in research. Instead, it enables ethical relationships and processes that are meaningful for all participants. Recommendations for Practitioners: The paper recommends that practitioners in academia (including doctoral supervisors) encourage doctoral students to “know with [their] entire body, with feelings, with passion and also with reason” (Freire 1997, p. 30), and to reflect on their positionality, as well as map their doctoral journeys in the intersection of others. Recommendation for Researchers: The paper highlights that researchers working with people in challenging situations must continuously question their biases, show interest in the research participants as individuals, and create trust through long involvement in the research field. Impact on Society: By highlighting the complexities encountered in this research project, the paper aims to disrupt the simplistic, often deficit-focused assumptions about people from refugee and asylum-seeking backgrounds. Future Research: The scope of the findings leaves open a discussion on critical moments during the shared journeys: how to enter the research field ethically, and how to exit after creating trust and building relationships?

Meetings of the Art: Cultural Encounters and Contact Zones in an Art Project for Asylum-seeking Minors in Denmark

ABSTRACTCultural encounters are commonly understood as transformative meetings across difference. Drawing on four months’ ethnographic fieldwork at an art project for asylum-seeking minors at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark, this paper argues that these kinds of framings may tend to overlook important interactions on either side of the meeting. I use the notion of the ‘contact zone’ (Clifford, J., 1997. Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge: Harvard University Press) to focus on three entangled dimensions of the project: space, sociality and materiality. The placement of the project at the museum and the absent spaces of the Red Cross asylum centres and schools, where the students spent the bulk of their time, structured it in particular ways. Further, the distinct social space of the project at once allowed students to continue and transform a variety of social relations with their peers and with staff. This was of particular significance for the students in a wider social context marked by transitoriness and uncertainty. Finally, the materialities of the project, the particular tools and objects used, were also significant in marking out the project as a contact zone. Taken together these dimensions at once enabled and constrained the transformative potential of the art project as a cultural encounter.

Building seven bridges with young asylum seekers living in exile in the UK (Part 2)

This paper is derived from a talk given in November 2016 as the Birkbeck Counselling Association Autumn Talk in collaboration with Psychodynamic Practice. The original talk has been divided into two related papers of which this is the second, concentrating on the effects on young asylum seekers of the political and social situation in which they find themselves when they reach the UK. Both papers explore how, working with young asylum seekers, we can slowly build sturdy and protective connections during and after the developmental years following experiences of sequential violence. This means building links within the internal worlds of these young people between themselves and: (i) different aspects of themselves that emerge after violence and loss; (ii) their peers; (iii) listening adults; (iv) various social influences; (v) cultural influences; (vi) their past, present and future lives; (vii) links with local, national and international communities. Describing further the work that takes place at the Baobab Centre, a ‘transitional therapeutic community’, and using case material to illustrate this, the author raises the challenge of how we might best address the needs of this group of children, adolescents and young adults who objectively have to live for several years of their lives in a situation of ongoing uncertainty that is in fact much more than a young person can bear. As Jo Goldstein a legal specialist, Anna Freud a child psychoanalyst and Al Solnit a paediatrician write, in their trilogy of works, States and State Agencies cannot parent children, and children need involved parenting, (i.e. involved relationships with individual caring adults). Often for children separated from their original families, the parenting role is split between large bureaucracies and foster carers who work with agencies outsourced from the Social Services Departments. Yet this country makes Social Services Departments and the Home Office responsible for decisions about whether or not child asylum seekers might remain in the UK, in fact often without a very deep assessment and hence little knowledge and understanding of their experiences and their developmental needs. Asylum seeking minors usually have to wait for decisions about their safety and protection, and about permanence and continuity, for a much longer period of time than a child can bear.

Validity of screening for psychiatric disorders in unaccompanied minor asylum seekers: Use of computer-based assessment.

Self-report screening is an important element of transcultural research. Problems concerning illiteracy, cultural sensitivity, and possible misunderstandings have been handled differently in different settings. The aim of this study was to evaluate the validity of two well-known instruments: the Hopkins Symptoms Check List (HSCL-25), and the Harvard Trauma Questionnaire (HTQ, Part IV), with a sample of 160 unaccompanied asylum-seeking adolescents from Afghanistan and Somalia. Assessments were performed 4 months after arrival in Norway, and the screening instruments were presented to the informants on computers with touch-screen function, using the program MultiCASI. Sound-files in the native languages of the informants appeared simultaneously with the written items and could be repeated by touch. We found that the screening procedures were well received and understood by the informants regardless of reading and writing abilities. Agreement between diagnoses (CIDI) and screening results were similar to other studies. Computer-based assessment in this setting was practical, cost effective, and can be recommended.

Unaccompanied minor asylum seekers – processes of subject formation and feelings of belonging in the context of educational experiences in Switzerland

Abstract. This article addresses unaccompanied minor asylum seekers' (UAMs) educational experiences in Switzerland. Drawing on ethnographic research we explore what it means for UAMs to get an education and how having access or not having access to particular forms and spaces of education plays a part in the process of their subject formations. We get insights into such processes in diverse spaces of education and in phases of transition between them. We point out how educational arrangements can produce feelings of belonging and non-belonging and highlight that these feelings are entangled with life experiences and the responsibilities of UAMs in their daily lives in Switzerland. We argue that although at first glance the category unaccompanied minor asylum seeker seems to dominate and determine the formation of a possible educational subject and feelings of belonging for UAMs, the subject formation and feelings of belonging in the highly regulated field of UAMs' education are far more complex and fluid. To capture this complexity, we draw on geographies of education and understand spaces of education as connected to other spaces as UAMs' learning and educational processes are entangled with the demands of their everyday lives.

”Ja, da begynner vi rett på Amir, det som er, er at du har en mamma 25 som døde i 2009, stemmer det?”– Om enslige asylbarns deltakelse i samtaler med miljøarbeidere i barnevernet

Enslige mindreårige asylsøkere er barn og unge som kommer til Norge alene for å søke asyl, uten foreldre eller andre med foreldreansvar. Dette er barn i en sårbar situasjon, som står i et spesielt avhengighetsforhold til de profesjonelle omsorgsgiverne de møter i Norge. Denne artikkelen ser nærmere på møtet mellom enslige asylbarn og miljøarbeidere på institusjon, med fokus på hvordan barna deltar i et sett av formaliserte, skjemabaserte samtaler. Gjennom en tostegsanalyse som både omfatter en mikroanalyse av konkrete interaksjonelle dimensjoner og en bredere kontekstuell analyse, demonstrerer artikkelen hvordan barna i liten grad deltar i samtalene – både når det gjelder antall samtalebidrag, typen bidrag og innhold. Dette tolkes som et resultat av en prosedyriell bruk av skjemaer, der middelet miljøarbeiderne har til å bli kjent med barna, blir målet for samtalen. English abstract Unaccompanied asylum seeking minors are children applying for asylum in Norway, alone, without their parents or others with parental responsibilities. These children are in a vulnerable situation, and are particularly dependant on their professional caregivers. This article investigates the communication between unaccompanied minors and social workers in an institution run by the Child Welfare Service. The focus is on how the children participate in a set of standardized, form-based conversations. Through a two-step analysis including both a microanalysis of concrete interactional dimensions, and a broader contextual analysis, the article demonstrates how the participation of the children is marginal. This is interpreted as a consequence of a procedurical use of the forms, where the means the social workers have to get to know the children, become the measure.

”Jeg var helt alene, men så kom Sama.” En teoretisk analyse af uledsagede 11 mindreårige asylansøgere og flygtninges udøvelse og dannelse af venskab

Venskab blandt uledsagede mindreårige asylansøgere og flygtninge er et underbelyst område. På baggrund af et etnografisk feltstudie på et asylcenter i Midt-Norge fokuserer denne artikel på uledsagede mindreåriges oplevelser og erfaringer i hverdagen. Venskab blev omtalt som noget særlig vigtigt og ønskværdigt for de unge i det transit, hvor de ventede i uvished på at opnå bosættelse og starte et nyt liv i Norge. Ud fra et førstepersonsperspektiv og med blandt andet Henrik Vighs (2009) analytiske begreb social navigation belyses, hvordan venskab blandt de unge er yderst betydningsfuldt. Perspektivet er interessant, da det åbner op for en forståelse af de unges mobiliseringsmuligheder og bidrager derved med et indblik i deres tilblivelse samt navigering i et dynamisk landskab. English abstract Knowledge about friendship and its importance for unaccompanied minor asylum seekers and refugeesis an underexposed area. The basis for this article is an ethnographic field study on an asylum center in central Norway, focusing on the day-to-day experiences of unaccompanied minors. Friendship was mentioned by the minors as something particularly important and desirable, in the transitory state, in which they waited in uncertainty to settle down and start a new life in Norway. The purpose of this article is, from a first-person perspective and using, among other things, Henrik Vigh’s (2009) analytical term social navigation, to illuminate and understand in which ways friendship is something highly important. The perspective is interesting, as it opens up for an understanding of the mobilization possibilities of the young subjects and thereby contributes with insights into their genesis and social navigation in a dynamic landscape.

Barriers for unaccompanied refugee minors in accessing mental health care: Is it the therapy or the therapist?

IntroductionRefugee children, particularly unaccompanied refugee minors, present with disproportionately high prevalence of mental health and emotional difficulties. However, the mental health service access and treatment engagement of this vulnerable group has been consistently shown to be poorer than the general population. Despite of this, so far there hasn’t been much research to explore the possible underlying reasons or barriers for these young people to access mental health service in their host countries.Aims and objectivesThis research aims to understand unaccompanied refugee children's barriers to access and utilize mental health services. To explore any potential characteristics in the service provision that can be linked with the observed poor treatment engagement and service access is also an objective of this study.MethodsThe study was conducted by using semi-structured interviews with 15 unaccompanied asylum seeking minors and their carers to elicit their views, perceptions and beliefs based on their experience of receiving treatment from a specialist mental health service in the UK.ResultsThe interview transcripts were analysed using thematic analysis. The main findings were categorised into two broad themes, the participants’ perceptions of the intervention received, and perception of the professionals involved. The different elements and pertinent issues within these two broad areas were discussed.ConclusionsFindings will help stimulate further exploratory research gaining better understanding of the barriers for these young people to access treatment, and contribute in developing innovative services that are more efficient in engaging this vulnerable group and suitable to meet their specific needs.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.

Tuberculosis infection and disease in the 2015 cohort of unaccompanied minors seeking asylum in Northern Stockholm, Sweden

Background: Minors with a stated age <18 years unaccompanied by a responsible adult form an increasing part of refugees to Europe. They are older than other asylum-seeking children and many come from countries with a high tuberculosis (TB) incidence. During the 2015 refugee crisis, 35,369 of 162,877 refugees (22%) seeking asylum in Sweden were unaccompanied minors, which gave us the opportunity to study their burden of TB infection and disease.Methods: Of the unaccompanied minors seeking asylum in Sweden during 2015, 2936 (8.3%) were allocated to northern Stockholm. Of these, 2422 were from countries with an incidence of TB exceeding 100/105, and were screened for TB infection with a Mantoux tuberculin skin test or a QuantiFERON-TB Gold®. Those from countries with a lower TB incidence were screened only if they had other risk factors for TB exposure.Results: Of those screened, 349 had a positive test and were referred to the northern paediatric TB clinic at Astrid Lindgren Children’s Hospital. Of these, 16 had TB disease and 278 latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI), while we considered 53 uninfected. In addition, eight sought medical attention with symptomatic TB outside the screening system. Cohort rates were 6.8% of LTBI and 0.5% of TB in minors from Afghanistan and 26–32% of LTBI and 3.4–3.5% of TB among those from Eritrea, Ethiopia or Somalia.Conclusion: We conclude that TB infection and disease is common among asylum-seeking unaccompanied minors, especially among those from the Horn of Africa.