Editor’s Note: I received my copy of this open letter, released by the Health for All Network on 12 October 2022, from Dr. Monika Dutt, a
public health physician in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland & Labrador whom I’ve interviewed in these pages previously and who stated, in an accompanying press release, “ Health providers are asking Prime Minister Trudeau to fix a historic wrong by delivering a comprehensive and inclusive regularization program.”
To: Hon. Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada and Hon. Sean Fraser, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship
cc: Hon. Seamus O’Regan Jr., Minister of Labour; Hon. Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Health; Hon. Carolyn Bennett, Associate Minister of Health; Hon. Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Diversity and Inclusion
RE: Full and permanent residence status for all is critical for our patients’ health
Dear Prime Minister Trudeau and Minister Fraser,
As frontline healthcare providers, members of the health community and community health organizations, we see the devastating health impacts when our patients do not have full and permanent immigration status. Our goal is to protect and promote the individual and collective health of our patients and communities based on the best available medical evidence. It is abundantly clear to us that full and permanent immigration status for all migrants is a critical policy that will keep our patients safe and healthy.
Source: Decent Work & Health Network
Many of our patients have been forced to migrate as a direct result of Canadian government and corporate interventions globally. Canadian immigration laws were created as part of a project of population replacement and land expropriation from Indigenous peoples. These laws have always denied rights to one group of migrants deemed temporary or undocumented for the very fact that it allows their labour to be exploited. The expansion of exclusionary immigration policy is intrinsically linked to the broader practices of subjugation, repression and denial of services, including healthcare, to Indigenous peoples. Ensuring full and permanent immigration status for all migrants is one part of ensuring health equity and justice for all.
We are encouraged that Prime Minister Trudeau has given the Minister of Immigration a mandate to “explore ways of regularizing status for undocumented workers” and that a parliamentary motion has passed unanimously asking the Minister of Immigration to create a plan to give permanent residency to workers of all skill levels. While all levels of government have responsibilities for the health, safety, and security of migrants, the federal government’s role in determining immigration status is critical, including through accords it has with individual provinces.
On behalf of health workers from across the country, we urge you to implement a comprehensive regularization plan for all undocumented people without exception and permanent residence for all migrants, including those in low-waged jobs.
We know that the lack of full and permanent immigration status for all leads to worse health outcomes, systemic barriers accessing healthcare, and poor working and living conditions that undermine health.
As health workers who recognize immigration status as a foundational determinant of health, we support the Migrant Rights Network’s call for a regularization plan that is based on the following core principles:
- Ensure that migrants determine the program
- Develop a simple broad program
- Clear and simple application process
- No exclusions or inadmissibility, particularly medical inadmissibility
- No detention or deportations
- Comprehensive communications strategy
In addition, we call on all provinces and territories to provide healthcare for all, regardless of immigration status. An accompanying backgrounder on immigration status as a health issue and a copy of a brief prepared by the Migrant Rights Network that includes more details on the implementation of a regularization program are attached.
We urge you to consider the negative health impacts of precarious immigration status and ensure that no one is left behind. Ensuring equal rights and access for all migrants is critical for closing systemic gaps in health inequities.
As a network of health workers with expertise on equitable health policy, we would be pleased to discuss this with you further.
[Here is the list of signatories which numbered, at the time of publication, 48 organizations—including the Ally Centre of Cape Breton—and 782 individuals. You can also view a backgrounder on the issue prepared by the Health for All Network and a comprehensive
