Thursday, April 23, 2009

Why is this Canadian citizen not entitled to a health card?

Kim Suk Yeung arrived nine years ago with a male friend on visitor's visas. Eugene was born in April 2001. The girl's father returned to Korea and has married. Kim held various jobs, most recently behind the counter at a drycleaner's on Davenport Rd., where the neighbours met mother and daughter.

She applied for refugee status in 2004, knowing South Koreans are rarely granted it, so Eugene could have a health card.


The mother (Kim Suk Yeung) arrived nine years ago. The child (Eugene) was born eight years ago. Therefore the child was born in Canada, and it does say elsewhere in the article that she is in fact a citizen. There is no indication in the article that they have lived anywhere other than Toronto, so surely the child fulfills the Ontario residency requirement.

So why isn't she automatically entitled to a health card? Why did her mother have to apply for refugee status to get her a health card? If the mother isn't entitled to a health card because of her own immigration status, that's one thing. But the daughter is a Canadian citizen and an Ontario resident. She should be entitled to a health card on the same basis that I'm entitled to a health card - because I was born in Canada and in Ontario and have lived in Ontario my whole life. She shouldn't be denied a health card on the basis of her mother's personal decisions. Have your parents ever made ill-advised personal decisions? Did you deserve to be denied health insurance on that basis?

The child is eight years old. She was three years old at the time when her mother applied for refugee status to get her a health card. The child has no ability to influence her mother's immigration decisions, and she does not yet have the ability to go apply for a health card on her own. She has no ability to pay for her own health care or seek out her own health insurance. Therefore, it is especially important that the government automatically provide her with all the benefits to which she is entitled as a citizen and a resident rather than punishing her for her mother's decisions.

1 comment:

laura k said...

I thought kids did automatically get OHIP. My war resister friends' kids do, even after the parents have been cut off.

This is confusing.