From August 2021 until November 2022, Calgary received 4,200 newly arrived refugees. Since January 2022, Calgary received 1,465 Afghans and 435 other government-assisted refugees who were resettled permanently in Calgary. Due to a shortage of affordable housing, many refugees were housed in temporary accommodations across five hotels for a prolonged period. At one point, over 1,000 refugees were living at resettlement hotels throughout Calgary.
The Mosaic Refugee Health Clinic (MRHC) provides essential medical care services to newcomers who arrive as refugees, along with other health services refugees may need. Despite a desire to serve all refugees arriving in Calgary, the MRHC lacked the resources to provide care to such a high number of refugees.
This is where TD Bank Group (TD) came to help.
Thanks to a grant from TD through its corporate citizenship platform, the TD Ready Commitment, MRHC was able to expand its staffing to serve these refugees while they are living in temporary accommodations. The clinic was also able to hire a position to specifically address health concerns at the hotel and provide a number of supports and services, including access to vaccinations, obtaining health benefits, dental and pharmacy care, prenatal supports, cognitive assessments, counselling, and help with transportation and resettlement. MRHC also engaged 29 community volunteers from the Alberta International Medical Graduates Association (AIMGA) as health navigators, many of which are newly arrived refugees themselves and are internationally trained physicians.
Without this gift from TD, the clinic would not have been able to address health concerns, prevent unnecessary visits to the emergency department, and meet the health needs of Calgary’s most vulnerable newcomers.
“The generous funding from TD allowed the Mosaic Refugee Health Clinic to meet the health needs of Afghan Newcomers upon their arrival in Calgary,” said Annalee at the MRHC.
“By meeting their needs at the resettlement hotels, we were able to provide timely care in the community and prevent their health from deteriorating requiring the services of our already overloaded hospitals.”
The TD funding also helped MRHC address unique mental health challenges many newly arrived refugees face, provide access to IQ assessments for newly arrived adult refugees with intellectual disabilities, and provide gift cards for families to ensure parents can access basic supplies.
We’d like to thank the Mosaic Refugee Health Clinic for providing necessary care for our vulnerable newcomers and ensuring they have a safe environment to access this care, and to TD for their ongoing support of the MRHC and helping even the newest members of our community get access to health care needs.
