Filipino Carlo Ramirez was told he could get a health waiver after he graduated but that turned out to be untrue. Photo / Dean Purcell
Filipino Carlo Ramirez was told he could get a health waiver after he graduated but that turned out to be untrue. Photo / Dean Purcell
People with medical conditions are being signed up by education agents as international students on one-year study programmes and duped into believing they can get a medical waiver, an immigration lawyer says.
Under immigration rules, students who study for 12 months or less do not have to undergo full medicalsand need to present only an x-ray certificate.
But these students are not told they have "no hope" of securing future work visas or even continuing their studies after the year is up, lawyer Maricel Weischede said.
Immigration lawyer Maricel Weischede. Photo / Michael Craig
Weischede believes the practice is widespread and is aware of at least three such cases, including one of her clients, Carlo Ramirez, 40, who has liver fibrosis.
"There is a real issue of education agents luring students to study here without evaluating the effect after the study," she said.
"The agents are focused on getting these students a visa in order to get a commission from the schools, which is paid by the school whenever they enrol a student and the visa is approved, and the student spent two weeks in the course."
Weischede said the agents sold "false dreams" and deliberately hid the students' medical conditions from Immigration NZ.
"The agents are being made aware by the applicants that they have medical conditions ... but because they know it can cause a decline, they avoid presenting the whole health condition," she said.
Students with health issues from the Philippines are lured here by education agents to study. Photo / Dean Purcell.
The x-ray certificate which a short-term student needs to present will not show any other medical condition except for perhaps lung diseases, Weischede said.
Ramirez, who hails from Mindanao in the Philippines, spent about $30,000 to enrol for a one-year business course in Auckland and a further $5000 for his medicals.
He spoke to the Herald on the condition that his Manila-based agent and school were not named for fear of retribution.
"I wanted to study in the US, but when I told my agent I had a health condition, he told me to apply for NZ instead," Ramirez said.
"He said I could get a health waiver once I am in New Zealand, and that I can find a job, work here and get residency. I found out later that this was just a lie."
International student Carlo Ramirez, who has a health issue, was told he could get a health waiver after he graduated but it turned out not to be the case. Photo / Dean Purcell
Ramirez said he had to sell everything he owned and borrowed money to pay his agent to get him here, and had come with dreams of eventually settling in New Zealand.
"I've actually paid everything I have and more to come here, only to find out what I've been told by my agent is just a lie."
Immigration NZ visa services manager Michael Carley said the agency was not aware of international students with medical issues being duped by agents.
Ramirez was not granted a work visa because he did not have an acceptable standard of health as required under immigration instructions, he said.
"INZ does have the ability to consider whether a medical waiver may be appropriate based on the individual characteristics of the situation," Carley said.
"In this case, the applicant was not eligible for a medical waiver."
The requirement for international students to complete full medical screening was removed in 2012.
But Carley said they continued to have to complete x-rays if there was a risk of tuberculosis (TB).
"The rationale behind the student visa applicants not needing to complete full medical screening is that international students are required under the Code of Practice which is administered by NZQA, to hold comprehensive medical insurance for the duration of their study," he said.
"And their education provider must be satisfied that the student holds this insurance."
Carley said the number of international students failing to meet health requirements historically had been small, and full health screening could be perceived as a barrier due to additional costs, time and efforts required.
The Education (Pastoral Care of International Students) Code of Practice 2016 required education providers to manage and monitor their agents to ensure they provide international students with proper advice about studying, working, and living in New Zealand.
However, Weischede said this rule was not policed and there were no repercussions for education agentswho acted unethically.
In the past 12 months, INZ approved 82,403 student visa applications with 1535 to Philippine nationals.
The agency was not able to say how many of these were to students who were studying 12 months or less.
