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Pikangikum First Nations Pikangikum, Ontario POV 2LO Tel. 807-773-5578 or 773-5523 Fax 807-773-5536 Press Release Friday, April 9, 1999 -12:30 pm CST |
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First Nations Fast to Seek Answers to Health On Friday, April 9th, peoples from the Pikangikum First Nation and Kitchenuhmaykoosib lnninuwug, including Chief Paddy Peters and Chief Donny Morris, will begin a fast to seek answers about the deterioration of health services in the Sioux Lookout Zone. The fast is the last avenue for the community as their only means left to force the Crown, and Medical Services Branch to address the health crisis in the North that began in June 1998. "We want to make it clear that this is a peaceful fast in our quest for answers. We do not want to interfere with the day-to-day operations of the hospital." says Chief Paddy Peters of Pikangikum. Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug Chief Donny Morris states: "This peaceful action should not impede access for the people seeking hospital services." Since the crisis, First Nations people in the north have coped with minimal physician coverage. Nurses in community Nursing Stations are burning out and leaving, being replaced by relief staff, offering no consistency of care for the patients. The Sioux Lookout Zone Hospital can no longer offer hospital services to the North, thus forcing patients to travel by bus to urban centres such as Thunder Bay or Winnipeg for medical care. Newborns and their mothers, the elderly, and the sick are being shipped home on buses, compromising their fragile health. "When will this end? Do our people have td start dying on the side of the road before they will listen?" asks Chief Paddy Peters of Pikangikum First Nation. The deterioration of services has hit the community of 2000 First, Nation members hard. The Nursing Station, which normally staffs nine nurses, has been closed for several months. Concerns about the high number of prenatals who refuse to give birth in Thunder Bay or Winnipeg go unheeded. This is one example of many situations where agents of Medical Services Branch have failed to respect and ignored the peoples of Pikangikum First Nation. The community of Pikangikum is the most Populated first Nation community in the Sioux Lookout Zone, with 86% of the population being 39 years of age or younger. Pikangikum has a high number of children and young people, with high rates of pediatric respiratory disease, infection and high risk obstetrics. |
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