Screening Out

What happens when people with HIV apply to immigrate to Canada? Screening Out takes readers through the process of seeking permanent residency, illustrating how mandatory HIV testing and the medical inadmissibility regime are organized in such a way as to make such applications impossible. This ethnographic inquiry into the medico-legal and administrative practices governing the Canadian immigration system shows how this system works from the perspective of the very people toward whom this exclusionary health policy is directed.

As Laura Bisaillon demonstrates, mandatory immigration HIV screening triggers institutional practices that are highly problematic not only for would-be immigrants, but also for those bureaucrats, doctors, and lawyers who work within that system. She provides a vital corrective to state claims about the functioning of – and the professional and administrative practices supporting – mandatory HIV testing and medical examination, pinpointing how and where things need to change.

Winner of Best Book Award, Canadian Studies Network 2023 (Canada) Commended for

Canadian Sociology Book Award, Canadian Sociological Association

2023 (Canada)

“" Screening Out is critically important to scholarship in (im)migration and health. Its concrete recommendations for policy change are key."”

"An excellent ethnographic account of how mandatory HIV testing has become an ominous tool for rendering permanent resident applications 'medically inadmissible' in the Canadian federal immigration system, leaving some people in even more precarious circumstances than where they began."

- Chris Sanders, Lakehead University (Sociology of Health & Illness)

"The knowledge and insight that Screening Out provides into the previously hidden inner workings of Canadian immigration policy and practice would significantly benefit all audiences."

- Rachel Cruz (Osgoode Hall Law Journal)

"Screening Out is a well-researched testimony that offers a voice to those who have been placed by the immigration process in a space devoid of the very rights that Canadians proudly define for themselves."

- Cliff Pereira, University of Hong Kong (British Journal of Canadian Studies)

"Screening Out is essential reading for a general audience unfamiliar with the Canadian immigration process and governmental institutional systems."

- Kevin Madill (Medical Humanities) Laura Bisaillon's Screening Out is a brilliant and much needed study of one barely known aspect of the Canadian immigration system: the medical screening of immigration applicants and the mandatory testing for HIV. - Valentina Capurri, Toronto Metropolitan University (Canadian Journal of Disability Studies)

Laura Bisaillon is a political sociologist and associate professor in the Department of Health and Society at the University of Toronto Scarborough. Through journal articles, scholarly blogs, documentary film, photography, and creative writing, her research investigates interactions between migration, health, and the state. She has held research fellowships at the Brocher Foundation, Geneva, and the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences, Amsterdam. The research on which this book is based was awarded a Governor General's Gold Medal.

What happens when people with HIV apply to immigrate to Canada? Screening Out takes readers through the process of seeking permanent residency, illustrating how mandatory HIV testing and the medical inadmissibility regime are organized in such a way as to make such applications impossible. This ethnographic inquiry into the medico-legal and administrative practices governing the Canadian immigration system shows how this system works from the perspective of the very people toward whom this exclusionary health policy is directed. As Laura Bisaillon demonstrates, mandatory immigration HIV screening triggers institutional practices that are highly problematic not only for would-be immigrants, but also for those bureaucrats, doctors, and lawyers who work within that system. She provides a vital corrective to state claims about the functioning of - and the professional and administrative practices supporting - mandatory HIV testing and medical examination, pinpointing how and where things need to change.

This item is eligible for free returns within 30 days of delivery. See our returns policy for further details.