When Nancy Morsi arrived in Oakville, Ont., last year after finishing her medical degree, she was planning to practice medicine. Instead, she’s been working as a medical assistant since September.
Morsi is one of many immigrant doctors who find themselves working in jobs that are below their qualifications due to a set of challenges that make it difficult to get their credentials recognized. That includes a long and expensive licensing process and limited residency spots, especially for those educated outside the country.
The 24-year-old went to Ireland to study medicine in 2015 after immigrating to Canada with her family from the United Arab Emirates in 2013.
“I’m working at two clinics to fill up my time. At least it’s something related to my field,” she said. “I’m not practising as a doctor.”
She hasn’t been able to secure residency training in Canada after finishing her six-year degree in Ireland and is waiting for residency applications to reopen.
“When you apply, you’re considered an IMG, international medical graduate … and then the spots are very limited compared to the Canadian graduates,” Morsi said. “(It) is a bit unfair.”
According to the Canadian Resident Matching Service, 2,844 Canadian medical graduates were matched to one of the 3,410 available residency programs in 2022. Only 439 international graduates were able to secure a spot.
The latest release of 2021 census data on education status, released by Statistics Canada on Wednesday, shows Morsi is not alone.
The number people in Canada with a bachelor’s degree or higher rose to 6.4 million in 2021, which is 32.9 per cent of the of working-age population. That’s up from 28.5 per cent 2016. The agency said recent immigrants make up nearly half of that 4.3-point growth, but they are still more likely to be overqualified for the jobs they have.
Debroy Chan, interim CEO of the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council, said the licensing process for highly educated and trained immigrants is often slow, expensive and difficult to navigate.
“Newcomers are not sure what they need to do,” Chan said.
As a result, there are also many unemployed or underemployed internationally trained doctors and nurses in Canada at a time when the health system is crying out for more workers, he said.
“It’s become urgent that we address these issues, or else Canada will lose its reputation as a destination for skilled people,” he said.
John Zhao, a section chief StatCan’s Centre for Education Statistics, said immigrants who arrived in Canada between 2016 and 2021 were more highly educated than any previous group within a five-year census period.
“Nearly six in 10 had a bachelor’s degree or higher,” he said.
Zhao said not all of these highly educated people are finding jobs that match their skills and training.
“Foreign degrees are not always recognized as equivalent in Canada,” he said. “So immigrants with them are twice as likely to be overqualified as Canadian-born or Canadian-educated degree holders.”
Hank Tsai studied mechanical engineering in Taiwan before immigrating to Canada four years ago, and he finished an aircraft maintenance and management program at Centennial College in Toronto earlier this year.
The 29-year-old said he has been working as a baker and as a server in a Toronto restaurant while applying for apprenticeships in his field for months without any luck.
“I applied for maybe 50 companies, and I only got three interview opportunities,” he said. “Many companies request Canadian working experience.”
Getting that kind of experience was all the more challenging during the pandemic. As was learning to speak English fluently, a barrier that many immigrants face when they arrive in Canada.
“In Taiwan we speak Mandarin, and we didn’t have too many opportunities to speak English in our daily life,” he said. “During COVID, everything was done remotely so it reduced the chance that I can talk to my friends, classmates (or) someone else in Canada. It was hard.”
Highly educated immigrants and a strong college sector mean Canada continues to lead G7 countries with the most educated workforce — just over 57 per cent of workers aged 25 to 64 have a college or university credential.
Statistics Canada said almost one in four working-age people had a college certificate or diploma or similar credential in 2021.
Tricia Williams, a director at the Future Skills Centre at Toronto Metropolitan University, said the overall trend tells “a great story.”
“Canada invested significantly in its education and has a really strong college system that is focused on getting people into the jobs they need,” she said.
Some employers complain that not all highly educated graduates have tangible workplace skills, Williams said, but many have recognized the value of engaging closely with the college system to target future employees.
“Universities are starting to get there as well,” she said. “They’re starting to point to some programs where they have really close relationships with employers.”
Williams said much of Canada’s immigration is coming through the highly educated or highly skilled streams but newcomers may not have the specific skills for the labour market’s needs at a specific point in time, and might face regulatory barriers.
“You get the quintessential example of a doctor driving a taxi … that’s really bad for the individual,” she said. “That’s actually really bad for Canada as well.”
Ruchi Gera is familiar with those challenges.
She was a dentist in India before arriving as an immigrant in Mississauga, Ont., in June.
While she has a degree in dentistry and a graduate degree in oral medicine and radiology from India, she won’t be able to work as a dentist in Canada before passing licensing exams that could take up to three years. The alternative is going back to school for two to three years in Canada.
“It’s definitely very frustrating,” she said.
“I understand that an equivalency is important for me to start working over here, but just the length of the process is a little disheartening.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 30, 2022.
TORONTO – Unifor says workers at a Walmart warehouse in Mississauga, Ont., have voted to join the union.
The union says it’s Walmart’s first warehouse to unionize in Canada.
Unifor national president Lana Payne says the employees stood up for their rights and the union is excited to get to work on their first collective agreement.
Unifor’s campaign at Walmart’s facility began in December 2023.
The vote was held from Sept. 10 to 12.
Unifor represents 315,000 workers across the country.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
The Canadian government says it will donate up to 200,000 vaccine doses to fight the mpox outbreak in Congo and other African countries.
It says the donated doses of Imvamune will come from Canada’s existing supply and will not affect the country’s preparedness for mpox cases in this country.
Minister of Health Mark Holland says the donation “will help to protect those in the most affected regions of Africa and will help prevent further spread of the virus.”
Dr. Madhukar Pai, Canada research chair in epidemiology and global health, says although the donation is welcome, it is a very small portion of the estimated 10 million vaccine doses needed to control the outbreak.
Vaccine donations from wealthier countries have only recently started arriving in Africa, almost a month after the World Health Organization declared the mpox outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.
A few days after the declaration in August, Global Affairs Canada announced a contribution of $1 million for mpox surveillance, diagnostic tools, research and community awareness in Africa.
On Thursday, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said mpox is still on the rise and that testing rates are “insufficient” across the continent.
Jason Kindrachuk, Canada research chair in emerging viruses at the University of Manitoba, said donating vaccines, in addition to supporting surveillance and diagnostic tests, is “massively important.”
But Kindrachuk, who has worked on the ground in Congo during the epidemic, also said that the international response to the mpox outbreak is “better late than never (but) better never late.”
“It would have been fantastic for us globally to not be in this position by having provided doses a much, much longer time prior than when we are,” he said, noting that the outbreak of clade I mpox in Congo started in early 2023.
Clade II mpox, endemic in regions of West Africa, came to the world’s attention even earlier — in 2022 — as that strain of virus spread to other countries, including Canada.
Two doses are recommended for mpox vaccination, so the donation may only benefit 100,000 people, Pai said.
Pai questioned whether Canada is contributing enough, as the federal government hasn’t said what percentage of its mpox vaccine stockpile it is donating.
“Small donations are simply not going to help end this crisis. We need to show greater solidarity and support,” he said in an email.
“That is the biggest lesson from the COVID-19 pandemic — our collective safety is tied with that of other nations.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
MONTREAL – A 20-year-old man arrested over an alleged Islamic State terror plot to kill Jews in New York City will return to court in December in Montreal.
Muhammad Shahzeb Khan, a Pakistani national living in Ontario, was arrested last week in Ormstown, Que., allegedly on his way across the border into New York state.
Khan has been charged in the United States with one count of attempting to provide material support and resources to a terrorist organization, and officials are seeking to have him extradited to stand trial.
He was not present for a hearing today in Quebec Superior Court, where lawyers said they are waiting for extradition documents and for authorization from Canadian officials before proceeding in the case, which will return before a judge on Dec. 6.
U.S. authorities allege that Khan, also known as Shahzeb Jadoon, intended to use “automatic and semi-automatic weapons” in a mass shooting at a Jewish centre in Brooklyn around Oct. 7, the one-year anniversary of the Hamas attack on Israel.
Authorities allege he began planning his attack in November 2023.
Earlier this week, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said Khan arrived in Canada in June 2023 on a student visa.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
