baba1234 said:
Dear Leon,
I really appreciate for your prompt and good advices to the needy people. And i had a question for you I always observe in this forum that the only obligation is to complete 730 in canada and can live outside not more than 1095 days to maintain PR status, but when i went for health card registration there the official told me that i cannot stay more than 6 months outside canada in order to keep my health card valid.
Dear leon can throw some light on this issue.
Your health card has absolutely nothing to do with your PR status. Your PR status has to do with Immigration Canada. To keep your PR status, you must stay in Canada for at least 730 days in any rolling 5 year period. The PR status allows you to live, work or study in Canada.
Your health card is issued by your province. Each province has its own rules. Some will give you a health card on the first day of taking up residence if you are moving from another country. Others make you wait for 3 months. All of them, as far as I know, require you to live in the province for at least 6 months a year in order to keep your health care coverage. They do not want a person who doesn't live and pay taxes in the province to keep a health card indefinitely and only come to get some free care when they have a health problem. In some provinces, there may be exceptions where you are leaving temporarily and let them know about it, you may be able to keep your health card longer and in Ontario, I know there is a requirement how long you must live in ON in your first 6 months of having OHIP.
Therefore, you can be a PR without a health card or you can have a health card (temporary worker for example) without having PR. The two have nothing to do with each other.
