Family Prevented From Caring for Daughter

May 4, 2005 permalink

The following story from CBC News reports that the teenaged girl from British Columbia seeking alternative medical treatment in the United States has been sent back to British Columbia.

It appears from the story that the girl's health will be better with her Canadian doctors than with the alternative, and that is the only kind of case of involuntary medical treatment that reaches the press. These articles, containing snippets of privileged information, can only come from the social services system. In cases where the proposed treatment is harmful to the patient, such as unnecessary psychotropic drugs or confinement to a mental hospital, the press remains silent, and no one in social services feeds them with information. Even in the present case, the lack of names makes it impossible to confirm the accuracy of the story.

For the dangers inherent in involuntary care, refer to an interview with Thomas Szasz on The Therapeutic State, or a speech by Siv Westerberg, in which he shows that the police state has been supplanted by what he calls the socio-medical totalitarian state. The oppression is not conducted by the army or the police, but by persons the public initially thinks of as their friends: doctors, therapists, teachers and social workers.

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Teen back in B.C. for cancer treatment

Last updated May 4 2005 08:38 AM PDT, CBC News

VANCOUVER - The Okanagan girl who has been fighting to avoid blood transfusions as part of chemotherapy treatment is back in hospital in Vancouver, says a source in the B.C. Ministry of Children and Families.

Doctors in B.C. have told the 14-year-old, who is a Jehovah's Witness, that they need to have the option of giving her blood transfusions while she's getting chemotherapy treatments.

The teen and her family then fled to Ontario to avoid that court order. But an Ontario judge ordered her to be returned here.

Now under government guardianship, she was flown back to Vancouver onTuesday night. And the ministry source says she is now at B.C. Childrens Hospital.

While Children and Families deputy minister Jeff Berland will not confirm the girl's whereabouts, he admits it will be a tough hurdle if the girl actually does need a transfusion.

"It will be tricky, but it isn't the first time these kinds of cases have happened in Canada. They happen from time to time and doctors and social workers have established ways of working through them," he says.

Berland also says his officials and hospital staff will work with the parents to try to restore relationships that has been damaged by all the court action.

"Our hope would be that we'll be able to work with the parents and restore to them their rights and responsibilities as soon as possible, " he says. "It's not our intention to deprive the parents of their role of planning for their daughter."

Source: CBC