Last Updated on: 21st April 2015, 01:22 pm
I know rules are rules, but this is ridiculous.
A couple immigrated here from India. The mom was three months pregnant. Apparently, in Ontario, the rule is that you have to wait 3 months before you are elligible for OHIP, the province’s health care. Well, the twins didn’t want to wait that long. They were born in Sunnybrooke hospital, and by the sounds of it, they’re doing well. Thankfully, their care was covered since they were born here, but mom wasn’t so lucky. That’ll be $22000, please.
I sort of kind of understand a rule being put in place to keep people from coming over, getting some kind of care they couldn’t get where they were, getting it for free, and leaving, even though that seems like a far-fetched scheme. It’s not easy to immigrate here. You would have to go through one hell of a lot of hoops just to leave again.
But even if I completely understood the rule, this was not planned. This was an emergency. Plus, what kind of trouble are we setting people up for if they can’t get access to health care? What if someone who doesn’t have a lot of extra money gets some kind of contageous disease and feels they can’t pay for it to be treated? Wouldn’t it end up costing the system more in the end?
The couple is saying they’ll find a way to pay, and are amazingly not angry. But it’s just ridiculous that no one wants to revisit the issue of this three-month waiting period rule, even though this case seems like the perfect reason to have a look.
