Visa decision shatters family’s Kiwi dream
A young medical student has been forced to drop out of university after his family was told to leave New Zealand.
Travis von Metzinger, 18, wanted to become a medical doctor after he and his family moved to Dunedin from South Africa nine years ago.
However, the von Metzingers’ residency application and subsequent appeals have been declined, and they are scheduled to leave the country on Saturday.
According to Immigration NZ, this is due to Ethan von Metzinger, 15, who has a pre-existing chronic kidney condition that is ‘‘highly likely to require future surgery and treatment’’.
But his father, Steve von Metzinger, said that while Ethan underwent surgery when he was a year old, he had not needed surgery since.
‘‘It’s been 14 years, and I can’t tell you when or if he’ll ever require a transplant. We’ve been told that he might never need one,’’ Steve said.
He explained that both of Ethan’s kidneys were functioning as one working kidney.
The Dunedin family have offered to pay for any future medical costs and offered their kidneys for a transplant as Steve, his wife Joan and Travis are all exact matches for Ethan.
But Ministry of Health spokesperson Dylan Moran said: ‘‘You cannot undertake a privately paid operation in a New Zealand public hospital, and the ministry is not aware of any private facilities which carry out kidney transplants in New Zealand.’’
Immigration NZ area manager Marcelle Foley also confirmed that the ‘‘ability of a person or organisation to pay for health services has no bearing on whether an applicant is unlikely to impose significant costs on health services’’.
The final decision now lies with Associate Immigration Minister Kris Faafoi, whose office did not want to disclose any information relating to this case.
In the meantime, Travis will most likely have to wait several years, if ever, before he can get into another medical training programme.
Steve confirmed he paid international student fees of $35,000 last year for Travis’ first-year and he was prepared to pay $64,000 for the second year at Otago University.