Canada brings medical inadmissibility policy in line with inclusivity for persons with disabilities

April 16, 2018 – Ottawa, ON– One of the Government of Canada’s priorities is to ensure greater accessibility and opportunities for Canadians with disabilities. 

Today’s announcement by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Minister of changes to the medical inadmissibility provision of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act ensures that our immigration policies better align with Canadian values and reflect the importance that the Government places on the inclusion of persons with disabilities.

While the number of refusals under this provision was not high, it resulted in cases where applicants or their children were refused despite the fact their health condition or disability was one readily accommodated in Canadian society.

The new policy on medical inadmissibility strikes a balance between protecting publicly funded health and social services and updating the policy to bring it in line with current views on the inclusion of persons with disabilities. The changes include:

• increasing the cost threshold for medical inadmissibility to 3 times the previous level, and
• amending the definition of social services by removing references to special education, social and vocational rehabilitation services and personal support services.

Presently the threshold is set at $6,655 per year and the threshold is set to be raised to three times higher than the current limit (so based on the 2017 threshold, the upper limit would be $19,965 a year).

Increasing the cost threshold will facilitate immigration for applicants with health conditions that typically require a limited range of health and social services and have relatively low health and social services costs. It is expected that this would dispense with a majority of the medical inadmissibility cases seen in Canada today.

The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act exempts certain individuals from the medical inadmissibility provision, including: family class sponsored spouses, common-law partners or conjugal partners, dependent children, Convention refugees or persons in similar circumstances, and protected persons.