{"id":12775,"date":"2016-05-23T17:56:21","date_gmt":"2016-05-23T21:56:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/live-immigrationreform.pantheonsite.io\/?p=12775"},"modified":"2018-12-28T13:27:32","modified_gmt":"2018-12-28T18:27:32","slug":"colombian-au-pair-with-cancer-wants-to-stay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2016\/05\/23\/colombian-au-pair-with-cancer-wants-to-stay\/","title":{"rendered":"Colombian Au Pair with Cancer Wants to Stay"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Washington Post reported May 21<\/a> on a Colombian woman working in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., whose one-year au pair visa is expiring. She is being treated for non-Hodgkin lymphoma and says, \u201cIf I go back to Colombia, I\u2019m going to die.\u201d<\/p>\n

This report is unusual for both the facts and the unanswered questions.<\/span><\/p>\n

The facts as reported are:<\/span><\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The 28-year-old au pair has a law degree and came on the au pair visa to improve her English.<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Her employer is an immigration attorney who has been working unsuccessfully to get the au pair agency to extend her visa for other year. He is now trying to get her a different visa to cover her stay for medical care.<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Her employer used to be an aide for Rep. Sam Farr (D-Calif.) who was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Colombia and lost a visiting sister there from injuries she sustained after being thrown from a horse. Inadequate medical care was partly to blame for her death, he claims. Rep. Farr has also weighed in to try to get the au pair visa extended.<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The au pair agency cites long-standing policy for not requesting a one-year extension of her visa that expires next month basing it on the well-being of the child the au pair is caring for (and, perhaps, liability issues).<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Colombian is receiving outpatient medical care from the National Institutes of Health, which includes drugs circulated by a portable chemotherapy pump she wears.<\/p>\n

The questions that the reader would like to have had the journalist answer are:<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Is it true that the woman would not be able to continue to receive treatment in Colombia? What would the Colombian embassy have replied?<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What are the resources of the woman (whose parents have visited her during her stay as an au pair)? Could she pay for treatment in Colombia if it is available?<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What is the medical prognosis? Is this a short-term or extended treatment?<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 On what basis is the NIH providing this treatment to the au pair \u2013 presumably at U.S. taxpayer expense?<\/p>\n

The answers to these questions might clarify whether this is truly a humanitarian situation that warrants an extension of her visa, or whether this is a situation in which the extensive influence \u2013 including the reporting of the Washington Post \u2013 is being exerted to preclude her having to return to Colombia. These answers would also inform whether the medical resources of the NIH are legitimately provided to nonimmigrants and on what basis.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think most readers would like to know whether it is true the woman would be sent to her death if she had to leave, or is it just that she is receiving free medical care that she wishes to continue to receive?<\/span>