Rural America relies on foreign doctors. Trump's visa fee shuts them out.
SHELBY, N.C. - The overworked kidney doctors in this small town were supposed to get reinforcement this fall with the arrival of a new colleague from India. Patients already had appointments scheduled with the incoming nephrologist.
Then the Trump administration demanded that companies pay a $100,000 visa fee to bring highly skilled workers from abroad, including doctors and medical professionals urgently needed in health care deserts. Nephrology Associates of the Carolinas could no longer afford to sponsor the Indian kidney specialist, and it has not found an American well suited for the job.
Two months after President Donald Trump signed the executive order restricting H-1B visas, soaring costs are roiling rural health care facilities that have long struggled to find staff. The fee increase for visa applicants, coupled with broader crackdowns on legal pathways for foreign-born workers, threatens a growing industry and jeopardizes patients who need timely care, according to labor experts and immigration lawyers.
In Shelby, about an hour’s drive west of Charlotte, the three kidney doctors came from abroad, two working on H-1B visas. But retaining talent in a rural region can be hard: Another H-1B doctor decamped to Los Angeles last summer, increasing the others’ workload.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/rural-america-relies-foreign-doctors-162403390.html
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