In New Brunswick, temporary foreign workers are only eligible for public health care if they can prove they will be residents in the province for 12 months. However, many temporary foreign workers are employed in the seasonal industries in the province and hold six, eight or ten-month work permits and return to their home countries during the off-season. Many workers are thus unable to access public health care. Since these decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, however, we encourage migrant workers to apply rather than assume ineligibility.

We are asking the Government of New Brunswick to:

1.     Provide Medicare coverage to all temporary foreign workers upon arrival in the province.

2.     Provide accessible information about what Medicare covers, including in Spanish and other languages of temporary foreign workers.

3. Provide community-based health services that are responsive to migrant workers' needs.

Media Release

  • Madhu Verma Migrant Justice Centre, Migrant Workers Alliance for Change,  Cooper Institute, No One Is Illegal – Nova Scotia  Atlantic Regional Solidarity Network

    Extend Medicare to all: migrant advocates’ message for First Ministers’ Meeting on health care. As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the Premiers meet in Ottawa for a First Ministers’ meeting on health care on February 7, migrant rights groups in the Maritimes are calling on provincial governments to extend Medicare coverage to everyone in their provinces regardless of immigration status. Public health care advocates want strings attached to federal health transfers to the provinces to ensure accountability and access to health care. Migrant rights groups in the Maritimes say one of those strings should be Medicare on arrival for temporary foreign workers and Medicare for all regardless of immigration status. The groups want the federal government to extend the Interim Federal Health Program to temporary foreign workers while the provinces work to change provincial legislation on health care coverage.

Quotes

  • Aditya Rao, Founding Board Member of the Madhu Verma Migrant Justice in New Brunswick:

    “We want Medicare on arrival for temporary foreign workers in New Brunswick like Quebec has extended to most seasonal agricultural workers. Migrant workers with six to eight-month work permits are often precluded from ever being eligible for Medicare because of the province’s one-year residency requirement. While employers are required to provide private health insurance to workers until they are eligible for Medicare, we know these private health plans are far from comprehensive and do not cover primary health and laboratory fees. It is unacceptable that migrant workers, many of them earning well below a living wage, must pay out-of-pocket for health care. It violates the principles of universality, accessibility and comprehensiveness found in the Canada Health Act.”

  • A temporary foreign worker employed in a lobster processing plant in New Brunswick who wishes to remain anonymous to avoid reprisals as told to Niger Saravia Arevalo, an Organizer with the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change in Miramichi:

    “When we come here to work, we do not get any information about how to get health care in New Brunswick, So when someone gets sick and goes to the doctor, we have to pay $30 per visit. Employers do not share any information on how to apply for a Medicare. Most of the workers don't even know what is Medicare or how to access those services.”

  • Kerian Burnett, a cancer patient and former migrant farm worker who is advocating for health coverage for migrant workers in Nova Scotia:

    “There are lots of Jamaicans here and other migrant workers here, which they come here for work. Nobody wants to be sick, but eventually you get sick. Now we are working for the minimum wage. There is no way if you get sick, and you have a bill at the hospital, how are we going to pay these bills? Actually, I’m not really doing this for myself alone. I’m doing this for every farmworker that doesn’t have access to public health care here in Canada.”

  • Stacey Gomez, Manager of the Migrant Workers Program, No One is Illegal – Nova Scotia:

    “In Nova Scotia, migrant workers must have a one-year work permit to have access to public healthcare coverage. Migrant workers in the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program can only be in Canada for up to a maximum of eight months of the calendar year, though many come year after year. They and other migrant workers are systemically excluded from public health care coverage. Health care is a human right and everyone should have access.”

  • Rebecca MacDonald, an Organizer with the Atlantic Regional Solidarity Network in Sydney, Nova Scotia:

    “International students do not qualify for MSI in Nova Scotia until they have been here for 12 months; they are required to purchase health coverage at a high cost through their designated learning institution which provides basic overall coverage, yet does not cover everything. For example, a student who gets pregnant and delivers their child before their MSI takes effect can end up thousands of dollars in debt to the public health care system (tens of thousands if there are any complications with the birth). Yet, if a student's spouse has an open work permit, they can obtain MSI and then claim their partner as a dependent, resulting in MSI coverage before the 12 month waiting period. The various requirements for students to gain access to MSI in Nova Scotia has left many without access to the care they need and deserve, and has left others indebted, often in scenarios where they cannot afford to pay. International students deserve access to health care upon arrival to Nova Scotia.”

  • Ryan MacRae, Program Coordinator for Cooper Institute in PEI:

    “To receive Medicare in PEI, international workers must have a valid work permit entitling them to work in PEI for over 183 days. Many workers do not meet this threshold, forcing them to rely on the emergency medical insurance required to be purchased by their employer. The coverage under these plans is similar to travel insurance and requires workers to pay for medical services out of pocket to be reimbursed in the future. We have seen workers turn down medical attention because it would require them to pay nearly $900 at the ER. Such thresholds result in workers not receiving the medical attention they deserve.”