Medical Insurance for refugees

[Gary Goldshmidt]

The press has published an article of the change in provincial health benefits for refugees.

Ontario hospitals absorb health costs to treat refugees
By: Nicholas Keung Immigration reporter, Published on Sat Jun 08 2013

http://www.thestar.com/news/immigration/2013/06/08/ontario_hospitals_absorb_health_costs_to_treat_refugees.html

While I do support tougher legislation to combat immigration fraud or those traveling here for medical visits at the taxpayers expense, this legislation seems to have exceeded its purpose. While I agree there is a lot of fraud and abuse there are also genuine refugees that do not have the financial means to buy health insurance or pay for their medical bills. It would seem that the Federal Government need to have a system in place to filter out real refugees form those abusing our system. In the meantime in Ontario the provincial government is paying the bills and I doubt they would be able to recover any money for the medical services provided to refugees without medical insurance and not covered under the provincial health plan.

There has already been an outcry from religious groups and ethnic media on this issue. I wonder when there is some common sense to this issue we are punishing one of the most vulnerable groups in our society. There has to be a better way to address this issue than what is taking place.

 

[Boetie]

The changes in the system are good and long overdue. We offer threatened people the opportunity for asylum and we provide (and continue to provide) refugees with extended health care not offered to most Canadians. In the past, people didn`t object about the extra medical care because the assumption was that refugees were real and they needed extra help. Canadians have traditionally been very generous about this and Canada has benefited tremendously from the waves of refugees and immigrants seeking safety and security in Canada. Most people were willing to give the odd person who slipped through the cracks the benefit of the doubt but times have changed. lot of Canadians are no longer willing to accept collective guilt because we are better off than others. A lot of Canadians are suffering economically. A lot of new Canadians who waited in line for years to come here and can`t bring their own relatives resent people who simply arrive with ridiculous excuses and then proceed to reap benefits that they do not get.

And most of all the numbers of people who have obviously abused the system is just overwhelming and has sucked away support for real refugees. That is the only really unfortunate part of this and I hope that willingness to accept real refugees does return because the world is full of real refugees who desperately need our help.

The problem is the media and the religious organizations don`t seem to know the difference between a refugee and a failed claimant. In the past anyone could make a claim and milk it for years. The recent deportation of a convicted terrorist and murderer who got 26 years of free extended health care and other benefits is just unacceptable to most people. A refugee claim came to be just a tactic for those who can`t qualify to immigrate and delaying strategy for staying if something else went wrong with some other plan. There have been so many cases where individuals lived here illegally for years and then claimed refugee status when they got sick or got caught.

The woman in this article is a failed claimant from Panama. She says she is a victim of domestic abuse and that is a legitimate reason in a very few cases but people here in Canada are also abused. They move to another city or seek other solutions.

Since she required a visa to enter Canada, she must have been able to make a convincing case that she had strong ties to her home and would return. Obviously she was lying about that to get the visa or lying now about not being able to return because she is facing death or torture. The fact she is now sick and the hospital is continuing to treat her is unfortunate but she should go home.

The paper is trying to make it look terrible that she is being asked to pay for medication and yet Canadian citizens who don`t have extended health care and many who do also have to pay for medication. Even chemo that is not given in a hospital and insulin and other treatments for life essential services are paid for by the individual. Why should she get what Canadian citizens don`t get.

This situation show improve as the new changes take effect and faster processing and removals follow.

 

[Gary Goldshmidt]

That may all be true but the provincial government and hospitals are still absorbing the medical bills.

 

[Boetie]

True because they won`t just let someone die in their waiting room. It also continues to drain other programs. Many cases highlighted in the media have stateded openly that the person has claimed refugee status when they became sick and they almost always assure the readers that the person paid taxes (even when they were likely working illegally and not paying taxes or had a very low income job that would not have put them in a tax level high enough to cover their expenses) or that they are getting medication supplied free from a pharmaceutical company. Those programs are usually limited to a specific number and meant for Canadians who do not have extended coverage and can`t afford expensive medications so every failed refugee claimant getting medications from those programs means someone else is losing them. I know someone who has been doing that for 13 years. Just one of her meds is $500 a month and yet I, a Canadian citizen, whose family has been here since the days of the loyalists, pay and have to ask the doctor to prescribe something cheaper rather than the best for me. She by the way is a refugee from New Jersey.

It is all going to go on for awhile until the backlog of endless appeals is cleared. Given the media`s strong distorted sense of justice for fake refugee claimants (in comparison say for the treatment of seniors in nursing homes), it would be very difficult to deport people who are very sick.

However, as I said the situation should improve quickly as a result of the fast tracking of claimants from countries that do not produce refugees, restricting work permits that carried with them rights to medical care and faster removals. The number of inland claims has been greatly reduced as people now realize it is just not going to work the way it used to work and the future savings are going to be far more than expected.

 

[torontosm]

The changes in the system are good and long overdue.

Agreed. I hope these changes will deter refugees of convenience from showing up here expecting a range of free benefits. Now if we could only do something about all of the people like the woman in the article whose refugee claim was denied and yet remains in the country.