The Intransigent Faction
14th November 2014, 21:14
="The Hamilton Spectator/Toronto Star"]
Surrounded by family, including her mother Sonya, Makayla Sault, 11, spoke at an event in Ohsweken Sunday. Makayla and her family have rejected chemotherapy for her cancer, choosing instead traditional native healing. Another aboriginal girl with the same cancer has won a precedent-setting case in Ontario court to allow her to continue traditional treatment.
By: Joanna Frketich Hamilton Spectator, Published on Fri Nov 14 2014
Correction – November 14, 2014: This article was edited from an earlier Toronto Star version that mistakenly said today’s Ontario Court ruling involved Makayla Sault. In fact, it involved another aboriginal girl whose name is protected by a publication ban.
The family of a First Nations girl from the Brantford area is entitled to rely on traditional medicine to treat her cancer, Ontario Court Justice Gethin Edward ruled Friday in a precedent-setting case.
The girl’s name is protected by a publication ban.
In delivering his decision in a Brantford courtroom Friday, Ontario Court Justice Gethin Edward said he found that the child was not in need of protection.
The girl has acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The question before the court was whether she should be forced into CAS care and undergo chemotherapy.
The case saw McMaster Children’s Hospital take the Brant Family and Children’s Services to court for refusing to intervene when the girl stopped treatment in August that had an 80 to 95 per cent chance of curing her.
McMaster Children’s Hospital had gone to court to force Brant Family and Children’s Services to take her into care.
The CAS agency had refused to intervene.
“It upholds our traditional rights,” New Credit First Nations Chief Bryan LaForme said of the judge’s ruling.
The judge at Brantford Superior Court declared that traditional medicine is integral to aboriginal culture and it is the girl’s right to use it to battle cancer.
People packed the courtroom to hear the decision, which brought applause, hugging and tears from the aboriginal community.
“It is dismissed,” one family member cried into the phone on hearing the news.
Another First Nations’ girl whose parents also refused chemotherapy, Makayla Sault, is critically ill and close to death.
Sault’s cancer has relapsed, provincial court family division heard during the case of the second aboriginal girl with acute lymphoblastic leukemia who has also refused chemotherapy in favour of traditional healing.
Brant CAS also didn’t take action in May when Sault stopped chemotherapy because of side-effects. Sault, whose dad is a well-known pastor at the New Credit Fellowship Centre, said she saw a vision of Christ in her hospital room telling her she was already healed.
On Nov. 6, Christian music star Adam Crabb posted on Facebook and Twitter that Sault was critically ill. Crabb posted an update on Nov. 8 that was signed by her father, Kenny Sault.
“As many of you know Makayla suffered a major infection and had to be hospitalized (Nov. 5),” read the post.
“At that point because of her weakened immune system from chemo (that she stopped eight months ago) the doctors gave her 24 hours. She is home (Nov. 8) and is asking for the body of Christ to stand in the gap in prayer for her against this infection.”
He went on to say the Nov. 9 service at the fellowship centre was being dedicated to his daughter.
“We are asking all churches around the globe to dedicate a time to prayer in their service,” he wrote. “We are believing together for divine miracles to take place . . . Nothing is impossible. She thanks everyone for their outpouring of love.”
Another family member, Lindsay Sault, commented on Crabb’s post saying, “Praying for God’s mercy and love for this precious little girl.”
The Sault family did not respond to a request for comment from The Spectator through their lawyer, Katherine Hensel.
Just over a month ago, a Facebook video of Sault declared she was “alive and well.”
“I’m on a boat cruise right now with my friends and family,” the healthy-looking tween said in the Oct. 4 video. “I just want everybody to know that I’m alive and well and I’m healed.”
Sault went to the Hippocrates Health Institute in West Palm Beach, which believes in curing cancer with a positive attitude as well as eating a raw plant-based organic diet and clearing your life of contaminants. The other girl refusing chemotherapy sought similar treatment.
The institute’s co-director, Brian Clement, has come to Ontario — including Six Nations — at least twice in the past six months.
A talk he gave in October was on the nutritional benefits of eating raw food, and the one in May was entitled “All About Cancer and Conquering Disease with Living Foods.”
The institute is licensed as a massage establishment by the Florida Department of Health. Clement has a clear and active licence as a nutrition counsellor.
Clement did not respond to The Spectator’s request for an interview.
“Eat a raw plant-based organic diet,” Clement tells cancer patients in a promotional video for the institute. “This is how we’ve seen thousands and thousands of people reverse stage-four ‘catastrophic’ cancer.”
He also tells patients: “Change your lifestyle first with your attitude. Be positive.”
In addition, patients are advised to make sure they don’t do things that “contaminate you and pollute you.”
“Your immune system is what heals you,” states Clement. “There is no magic in this process. It’s common sense. If you use common sense and what we’ve learned here at Hippocrates for six decades, you are going to have the same results so many others have.
Thoughts? Is there evidence of the effectiveness of alternative treatments? Couldn't this set a precedent for things like Jehovah's Witnesses refusing to allow their kids to receive blood transfusions?
Would it be a colonial attitude to compel First Nations communities to use more standard, medcally-licensed treatments?
Surrounded by family, including her mother Sonya, Makayla Sault, 11, spoke at an event in Ohsweken Sunday. Makayla and her family have rejected chemotherapy for her cancer, choosing instead traditional native healing. Another aboriginal girl with the same cancer has won a precedent-setting case in Ontario court to allow her to continue traditional treatment.
By: Joanna Frketich Hamilton Spectator, Published on Fri Nov 14 2014
Correction – November 14, 2014: This article was edited from an earlier Toronto Star version that mistakenly said today’s Ontario Court ruling involved Makayla Sault. In fact, it involved another aboriginal girl whose name is protected by a publication ban.
The family of a First Nations girl from the Brantford area is entitled to rely on traditional medicine to treat her cancer, Ontario Court Justice Gethin Edward ruled Friday in a precedent-setting case.
The girl’s name is protected by a publication ban.
In delivering his decision in a Brantford courtroom Friday, Ontario Court Justice Gethin Edward said he found that the child was not in need of protection.
The girl has acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The question before the court was whether she should be forced into CAS care and undergo chemotherapy.
The case saw McMaster Children’s Hospital take the Brant Family and Children’s Services to court for refusing to intervene when the girl stopped treatment in August that had an 80 to 95 per cent chance of curing her.
McMaster Children’s Hospital had gone to court to force Brant Family and Children’s Services to take her into care.
The CAS agency had refused to intervene.
“It upholds our traditional rights,” New Credit First Nations Chief Bryan LaForme said of the judge’s ruling.
The judge at Brantford Superior Court declared that traditional medicine is integral to aboriginal culture and it is the girl’s right to use it to battle cancer.
People packed the courtroom to hear the decision, which brought applause, hugging and tears from the aboriginal community.
“It is dismissed,” one family member cried into the phone on hearing the news.
Another First Nations’ girl whose parents also refused chemotherapy, Makayla Sault, is critically ill and close to death.
Sault’s cancer has relapsed, provincial court family division heard during the case of the second aboriginal girl with acute lymphoblastic leukemia who has also refused chemotherapy in favour of traditional healing.
Brant CAS also didn’t take action in May when Sault stopped chemotherapy because of side-effects. Sault, whose dad is a well-known pastor at the New Credit Fellowship Centre, said she saw a vision of Christ in her hospital room telling her she was already healed.
On Nov. 6, Christian music star Adam Crabb posted on Facebook and Twitter that Sault was critically ill. Crabb posted an update on Nov. 8 that was signed by her father, Kenny Sault.
“As many of you know Makayla suffered a major infection and had to be hospitalized (Nov. 5),” read the post.
“At that point because of her weakened immune system from chemo (that she stopped eight months ago) the doctors gave her 24 hours. She is home (Nov. 8) and is asking for the body of Christ to stand in the gap in prayer for her against this infection.”
He went on to say the Nov. 9 service at the fellowship centre was being dedicated to his daughter.
“We are asking all churches around the globe to dedicate a time to prayer in their service,” he wrote. “We are believing together for divine miracles to take place . . . Nothing is impossible. She thanks everyone for their outpouring of love.”
Another family member, Lindsay Sault, commented on Crabb’s post saying, “Praying for God’s mercy and love for this precious little girl.”
The Sault family did not respond to a request for comment from The Spectator through their lawyer, Katherine Hensel.
Just over a month ago, a Facebook video of Sault declared she was “alive and well.”
“I’m on a boat cruise right now with my friends and family,” the healthy-looking tween said in the Oct. 4 video. “I just want everybody to know that I’m alive and well and I’m healed.”
Sault went to the Hippocrates Health Institute in West Palm Beach, which believes in curing cancer with a positive attitude as well as eating a raw plant-based organic diet and clearing your life of contaminants. The other girl refusing chemotherapy sought similar treatment.
The institute’s co-director, Brian Clement, has come to Ontario — including Six Nations — at least twice in the past six months.
A talk he gave in October was on the nutritional benefits of eating raw food, and the one in May was entitled “All About Cancer and Conquering Disease with Living Foods.”
The institute is licensed as a massage establishment by the Florida Department of Health. Clement has a clear and active licence as a nutrition counsellor.
Clement did not respond to The Spectator’s request for an interview.
“Eat a raw plant-based organic diet,” Clement tells cancer patients in a promotional video for the institute. “This is how we’ve seen thousands and thousands of people reverse stage-four ‘catastrophic’ cancer.”
He also tells patients: “Change your lifestyle first with your attitude. Be positive.”
In addition, patients are advised to make sure they don’t do things that “contaminate you and pollute you.”
“Your immune system is what heals you,” states Clement. “There is no magic in this process. It’s common sense. If you use common sense and what we’ve learned here at Hippocrates for six decades, you are going to have the same results so many others have.
Thoughts? Is there evidence of the effectiveness of alternative treatments? Couldn't this set a precedent for things like Jehovah's Witnesses refusing to allow their kids to receive blood transfusions?
Would it be a colonial attitude to compel First Nations communities to use more standard, medcally-licensed treatments?