This article examines how health care services in Canada are denied to precarious status migrants, either through outright exclusion based on immigration status, or due to the realities in migrants’ lives that make it difficult for them to access health care services. The author argues that this situation is unfair, given the contribution made by precarious status migrants to Canada’s sociocultural and economic fabric, and exhorts the courts and policymakers to do more to make health care services available to these migrants.

Afer years of cuts, Canada’s refugee health-care program, the Interim Federal Health Program (IFHP), was fully restored in 2016. In this exploratory study, eleven semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with refugee service providers in the City of Ottawa to learn about their experience with the restored IFHP to date. Five themes emerged from the interviews: service provision challenges during the years of IFHP cuts; support for IFHP restoration; entitlement gaps in the current IFHP; ongoing confusion about the IFHP; and administrative barriers deterring health professionals from IFHP participation. More research is needed to determine whether the identifed challenges with the reinstated IFHP arise on a national scale.

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