police officers, who then pass them on to the persons concerned. These practices are contrary to the permitted rules; means need found to ensure distribution by healthcare professionals, handing over a course of treatment for several days to the patient concerned when it is impossible to do otherwise. The nature of the health care given – or rather not provided – can be a source of difficulties. Although the vast majority of general practitioners fulfil their duties with competence and dedication, a few appear to consider that the necessarily short length of stay in detention should lead them to only provide treatment insofar as is useful for such short periods. The inspectors have even encountered one doctor who considered that, since a treatment had been postponed before arrival at the centre, due to the patient, the said treatment was not to be undertaken in the course of the detention. It is difficult to reconcile practices of this kind with the medical code of professional ethics (articles R. 4127-7 and R. 4127-9 of the Public Health Code), under the terms of which doctors shall provide help to persons “in all circumstances” and “shall... provide assistance to all patients in danger”. Finally, in the course its inspection of one centre the Contrôle Général was able to evaluate in vivo the manner in which the presence of Legionella in the bathroom facilities was dealt with. It was ascertained that the administration of the centre was too easily left to its own devices by the bodies concerned with public health matters, which provided incomplete and inappropriate information. The technical solutions provided by a company proved to be ineffective. The prefecture, for its part, delayed closing the centre for as long as possible, a measure which nevertheless proved inevitable, the infection constantly increasing as the days went by. The head of the centre endeavoured to inform the detainees in an appropriate manner, but with the incomplete information at his disposal, was unable to answer the foreigners’ simple questions: can the water be used for washing? For making tea? Etc. f/ Applications for Asylum Once again, changes to the channels for asylum applications (of which moreover few are made in detention) are requested from the authorities. Applications are made on the sole initiative of the foreigner concerned, who is to deal with the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (OFPRA) alone for this purpose and, if necessary, a third party of his or her choice. The “registry” of the detention centre (that is to say the police administration) should not interfere with this procedure, including for the purposes of verifying that applications are complete and, a fortiori, informing the prefectural services. The only information that the border police should supply to the OFPRA is the starting point of the five-day deadline (in order to make an application for asylum) mentioned under article L. 551-3 of the CESEDA. Nothing more. On the other hand, subject to confidentiality, nothing stands in the way of the association present in the centre passing on the application to the OFPRA, if asked to do so by the person concerned. g/ Duration Finally, once again, since nothing has changed since the previous annual report, it is firmly recommended that the maximum period of detention of illegal immigrants and asylum seekers be brought down from forty-five days to thirty-two days, the maximum period before the reform of 2011. Without returning to the mistaken presuppositions which were used to justify the lengthening of this deadline22, it should be observed that such extension of the period only leads, 22 Annual Report of the CGLPL for 2012, pp. 13-14. 28