Ontario migrant workers face health disparities
I love local peaches. A lot.
Much like the next Ontarian — I eat peaches and other local fruits and vegetables to my heart’s content.
But, with the end of the season approaching, how often have you or I considered the migrant workers who are ripe with health vulnerabilities?
Each year, Ontario sees 18,000 to 24,000 migrant workers through the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP).
They come from Jamaica, Mexico and Caribbean countries to work on fruit and vegetable farms, greenhouses, nurseries, tobacco farms, wineries, and various meat and dairy farms.
I’ve recently had the great pleasure of working alongside two of those migrant workers during their hospitalization for serious injuries. These workers shared their experiences of life before injury.
They explained that housing can be overcrowded in inadequate shared accommodations — not only sleeping corridors but also bathroom and kitchen facilities.
In fact, 27 per cent of Ontario’s migrant farm workers perceived their housing to be damaging to their health.
These workers also described long working hours, with risks for exposure to many occupational health hazards, such as harmful chemicals, faulty equipment, extreme weather and repetitive motions, to name a few.
While the individuals I spoke with were brought into care by first responders, I am left to wonder if they had less serious health circumstances would they have sought out health care at all?
Other workers face challenges in accessing health care services due to living in rural locations, having limited or no access to transportation and significant language barriers. With this also comes a fear of being fired and repatriated or not rehired the following season.
Seven-hundred and eighty seven of the 170,315 migrant farm workers in Ontario were repatriated within a period of 10 recent years for medical reasons including surgery and external injuries such as chemical exposure as the top indicators for repatriation.
For Ontario farm owners, the inclusion of migrant workers within the labour market helps to meet high work demands with experienced and dedicated individuals.
There is no denying that the SAWP is also beneficial for the migrant workers’ home country, as the fruits of the workers’ labour are shared with their families back home. This bolsters the home countries’ economy and allows workers to build homes and support their children in receiving an education.
For these reasons and many more we should be treating migrant workers with respect, honour and care — which is just not the case.
Plain and simple — migrant workers do not have equal access to quality care in a country that raves about their health care system. So, what can we do about it?
Agencies such as Quest in the Niagara area offer aid with the Migrant Agricultural Worker Program. This specialized service provides drop-in clinic hours on Sundays, with transportation and translation services provided free of cost as needed. Programs, such as this, that pay attention to the unique needs of migrant workers are needed across Ontario.
Collaboration between partnering countries needs to take place as the exploitation of this population can begin before ever arriving in Canada. Among these conversations we need to demand better working and living standards that are regulated and frequently monitored.
Stronger health policies are needed to prevent ill health and promote wellness. When workers such as those in Min Sook Lee’s Migrant Dreams documentary share their lived experiences it helps to inform policy changes. They have lived this reality and will therefore have the best ideas on why and how it needs to be changed. Watch it and share it widely.
While we have begun to recognize employment and working conditions as important social determinants of health, we also need to identify migration as a social determinant of health that intersects with race, age, ethnicity, class and social isolation.
Ontarians eat local fruits and vegetables whenever possible, and what’s more — we are all human. We have a responsibility to take action together — big and small changes when made together can have a lasting impact.