01/07/2008

News / Medical Exam for E-2 Visa Applicants

By Mark A. Grubbs

As the parameters of the new E-2 visa medical exam are defined, I urge caution and serious, careful deliberation of potentially unforeseen consequences of this exam. I want to highlight a few of these, and urge lawmakers, educators, and other involved officials to consider these as they clarify exactly what the exam will entail.

First, I have a few questions. Will this exam be a cursory ``visit the doctor, fill out a form, and be done with it,'' or will be an actual, complete, physical exam including a blood test and a chest x-ray? Will it be somewhere in between? Who will pay for this exam? And, most importantly to me, is how private will be the medical data that is obtained? Privacy is a huge issue for potential and existing American immigrant English teachers, and perhaps for teachers of other nationalities as well.

I am concerned about teachers' personal, private health information remaining private. Whatever the Korean doctor will finally examine, the information obtained from the exam will be viewed by Korean Immigration, an arm of the government. It will also, I assume, be viewed by the employer. In either case, who would have access to the medical records? I am concerned about what the Korean government and the hiring institution will do with the medical information they will have. Will it be available on a public government database? Will Korean Immigration seal it in some way? Will it be destroyed after the visa is granted or denied? Would it be available for other-country governments to see? These are vital issues to be resolved.

I do not know if, or how, Korean law protects a patient's medical privacy, but I do know that requiring a medical examination for a visa, and providing the data to a government institution (Korean Immigration) would give the Korean government access to it. I am not comfortable with this. In the USA, only the patient, and his/her next of kin can see his/her medical records. The government can only view them by a court order. If the Korean government held this data in any way other than in this sort of level of privacy, I would think Americans would have a big problem accepting this.

My second great concern about this medical evaluation regards exactly who would decide what specific health conditions would be reasons to deny an E-2 visa. Would the Ministry of Justice, the hiring school, and/or Immigration make this judgment? How clear and specific would this judgment be? Would it be based on clearly defined criteria? Or, would it be a judgment call, on a case-by-case basis by some agency or office? I foresee many potential problems for the potential immigrant EFL teacher here. Again, here also, is an issue of concern. When the criteria are specific and known, then the person who was denied a visa based on the medical check would automatically be suspect in a number of vague health areas. This could even have repercussions for the applicant when returning to his/her home country.

I also wonder how mental health issues would be evaluated. What treatable conditions would be allowed and which ones would not? Examinations could reveal learning disabilities, dyslexia, ADHD, and others, that many have, and have overcome through treatment, and teach quite well. Korean social stigmas attached to people with mental health issues in Korea are archaic, compared to developed countries, and could potentially block a perfectly qualified teacher from ever working in Korea. In addition, there are psychological and psychiatric disorders that are now easily treated, even in Korea, which, if flagged, could also prevent good teachers from working in Korea.

While this is done in primary and secondary education, university professors are not put under this sort of health scrutiny. Why? University teachers teach adults, not kids. An adult is assumed able to attend to one's own safety. Interestingly, in university violence in American universities, and violence in lower level schools, the teacher and students are in more danger from ``medically un-examined'' students, than they are from university teachers. One might recall the Columbine student killing students in a Colorado high school, as well as the tragic shooting of students and teachers by a student, at universities, including the tragic case at my undergraduate university, Virginia Tech. It is interesting how the student is often more dangerous than the teacher. Both in America, and here, I would think that if university teachers were to be scrutinized in mental health, then it would only be logical to submit the university student to the same testing as the teacher, since both are adults. In a university, even without guns, students can potentially harm the foreign university teacher as much as the foreign teacher can potentially harm the student.

I offer these questions, concerns, and thoughts for consideration by the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Education, Korean Immigration, and other educational and government agencies for consideration in determining policies regarding the medical exam required for applying for the E-2 visa for foreign English teachers. If the above issues are not very clearly defined, or even if they were clearly defined, but in a sufficiently threatening way to the foreign teacher, Korea could easily see a mass exodus of potential foreign English teachers.

Mark A. Grubbs is a full-time lecturer at Hanyang University. He has been teaching EFL in universities in Korea for 7.5 years. He can be reached at Mgrubbs221@yahoo.com

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