(Re)locating the border: pre-entry tuberculosis (TB) screening of migrants to the UK

This paper investigates the UK government’s recent expansion of pre-entry tuberculosis (TB) screening of visa applicants to include migrants from over 80 countries. I will focus on how the offshoring of infectious disease surveillance, often conducted on behalf of the UK government by a third party, has (re)shaped the spatialities of border control. During last two decades, human mobility has increased exponentially, with worldwide passenger traffic carried on scheduled airlines almost trebling to nearly three billion. Nation states have sought to regulate these mobilities in order manage risk and filter out ‘threatening’ bodies. In particular, states and transnational organisations (such as the EU) are increasingly outsourcing border controls to overseas territories where migrant bodies are screened prior to departure. Yet, although scholars have conceptualised the relocated border in relation to counter-terrorism and national security, there has been less consideration of the effects of these changes on geographies of health security. This paper seeks to address this gap in knowledge through a qualitative case study of the changing geographies of detection and management of TB at (and beyond) the border in view of recent policy announcements by the UK government. I consider extent to which UK health security enactments have resulted in a ‘biosecuritisation’ of the offshore border as they continue to be implemented across diverse spatial and political settings. In conclusion, I identify the need for further theoretical and empirical investigation into the impact of these measures on the scales of public health governance and spaces of biosecurity and biosurveillance.