Members of groups who sponsored two Syrian refugee families hold up signs as they wait for the families to arrive at Toronto's Pearson Airport in December, 2015.Chris Young/The Canadian Press

On June 18, 2012, doctors and other health care workers all across the country staged a walkout to protest the government’s changes to refugee health care benefits in Canada. Roughly two months earlier, the Stephen Harper government had announced that cuts were coming to the Interim Federal Health Program (IFHP), which provides temporary health care coverage for refugees in Canada.

The IFHP had covered both basic care and extended services, such as vision, dental, and prescription medication, but that was ending: as of June 30, that extended coverage would be eliminated (with the exception of immunizations or medications for diseases that pose a public health risk) for all refugee claimants, and refugee claimants from designated “safe” countries would see their coverage pared back almost entirely.

Doctors were livid. Health care providers staged protests outside of ministers’ offices and on Parliament Hill. One group launched a federal court challenge, which produced a decision that deemed the changes “cruel and unusual.” The Harper government appealed, but that appeal was dropped when the Trudeau Liberals took over in 2015. The following year, IFHP coverage was restored to pre-2012 levels.........

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