Haitians losing TPS can still get medical care in South Florida. Here’s how

At the UHI CommunityCare Clinic in Opa-locka, anyone without health insurance can get primary and specialty care, including free dental care, eye exams and prescription glasses.

That includes Haitians who lost work authorizations on Monday as a result of a recent Supreme Court ruling concerning the Trump administration’s efforts to end their Temporary Protected Status. The loss of the legal protection is spreading fear in the community, especially among immigrants in need of medical care.

“We are preparing, and we are trying to accommodate” patients’ needs as TPS ends, said Shabbir Motorwala, a founding board member of the nonprofit clinic.

At UHI, patients only need to provide their name, date of birth and a photo ID, he said. No Social Security number, immigration status or other information is needed. The mission of the privately funded clinic, Motorwala said, is “to provide health to the people who need it, regardless of any status, ethnicity, religion.”

Since last year, Motorwala said the clinic has been seeing an increase in uninsured patients after people started getting kicked off Medicaid and others were forced to drop their health plans due to costlier health insurance premiums. The federal government’s strengthened immigration enforcement, including the termination of TPS for Venezuelans and other immigrants who live in South Florida, has also led people to turn to UHI for health needs.

Even still, some are still afraid to seek medical care. As a result, many are asking for telehealth visits, an option the clinic offers and encourages to abate patients’ fears that visiting the doctor could lead to a run-in with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Patients are still “afraid to come, that somebody might be watching them,” said Motorwala.

Some of the fear stems from a Florida law that requires hospitals that accept Medicaid to ask patients about their immigration status. Hospitals must report the data, without any of the patient’s identifiable information, to the state, though patients can decline to answer the question and still receive care.

The law doesn’t apply to other healthcare providers, including community health centers like UHI, which is not government funded, urgent care centers, anti-abortion pregnancy health centers, abortion clinics, or retail pharmacies like CVS Health and Walgreens.

Under the federal HIPAA privacy law, providers are also generally prohibited from using or disclosing a patient’s personal health information without consent. The National Immigration Law Center, in a blog post about doctor and patient rights, explained that healthcare providers “may refuse to provide information about patients to law enforcement officials unless the request is pursuant to a warrant issued by a judge or magistrate for a specifically identified individual or another order issued by a court.”

UHI was founded in 2008 by South Florida’s Muslim community and last year saw over 6,000 patients. Two years go, it moved from Miami Gardens to 870 Fisherman St. in Opa-locka. In addition to private fundraising, it partners with many organizations to help provide care, including The Coalition of South Florida Muslim Organizations (COSMOS) and Florida International University’s medical school, whose faculty and students volunteer at the center.

The clinic also works to relieve hunger and tackle malnutrition in the underserved population it cares for, a problem Motorwala anticipates will escalate with TPS ending and people losing their jobs. Opa-locka already has high poverty rates and is often considered a “food desert.”

Starting next month, the clinic will provide free ready-to-eat hot and healthy meals as part of a new initiative with Islamic Relief USA. The Halal meals will be available every Wednesday from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the clinic starting Aug. 5, said Motorwala. Through its partnership with Caring for Miami, an initiative of Christ Fellowship Church, the clinic also provides fruits and vegetables on a monthly basis from a mobile grocery bus.

The clinic has even launched a community garden and is helping to teach patients how to grow their own food. Another initiative, in partnership with Hunger for America and Quest Diagnostics, will give free food vouchers to patients who come to the clinic to check their heart health to help them buy healthy food.

There is also a relationship with Jackson Health System, Motorwala said. Jackson is planning to send a social worker once a week to the clinic to help patients who may be eligible for care through Miami-Dade’s public hospital system.

Jackson and South Florida’s other public hospital systems — Broward Health and Memorial Healthcare System in neighboring Broward County — told the Miami Herald that their hospitals, emergency rooms, urgent care centers and other facilities are ready to care for patients, even those who lose their TPS status.

As public safety-net health systems, the hospitals take care of everyone, regardless of their ability to pay or insurance or immigration status, they said.

Even so, the hospitals’ own staffs are not immune to the Supreme Court’s decision allowing the Trump administration to end the protections against deportation.

On Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security told employees that Haitians’ TPS status ended as of Monday — even though the federal judge who issued the initial stay on termination has yet to post an order lifting her stay — and that they must re-verify employment authorizations of Haitian nationals and others who had TPS. Absent another immigration benefit, they cannot work, the agency warned.

About 50 of Jackson’s over 15,000 employees are Haitian TPS holders, the health system said. Broward Health meanwhile employed 47 individuals with the status and Memorial, 27.

“Jackson Health System recognizes that the expiration of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) is a difficult and uncertain time for affected employees and their families. Jackson has worked closely with these employees to submit any documentation that could establish continued work authorization,” Jackson Health said in a statement, explaining that federal law prohibits it from employing people “whose work authorization expires and who cannot provide alternative eligibility documentation.”

All three health systems said they’ve been working with the affected employees to help them understand the options with their 401(k)s and Health Savings Accounts. Affected TPS holders — not just at the hospitals, but across South Florida — who were enrolled in a work-sponsored group plan for health insurance may also be eligible to continue receiving health coverage under COBRA.

COBRA is a federal law that gives employees who lose their jobs the ability to stay on their previously work-sponsored health insurance plan for a certain period of time. The affected employee usually has to pay the full premium for COBRA, though some employers may agree to pay some or all of the cost as part of the severance package, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

At Broward Health and Memorial, affected TPS employees will have health insurance coverage through the end of July and will then be eligible to continue health insurance coverage through COBRA for 18 months if they assume the cost of the premiums.

All three health systems also indicated that all affected TPS employees could be hired again if the situation changes.

“Jackson has continued to employ affected team members for as long as federal TPS extensions remained in effect, and we would welcome them back should they regain work authorization,” Jackson said.

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