Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We see some very sad things happening in our communities. Today I am going to talk about the young man in Tuktoyaktuk who suffered for no good reason.
A few weeks ago he was badly beaten, was taken to the nursing station complaining that he couldn’t breathe, mainly because he was drinking, but they looked at him quickly and took him to the RCMP cells. All night he begged for help and he was ignored. After he was released, he went back to the nursing station on his own and was flown to Inuvik. In the two days that he was in Inuvik, no X-rays were taken and he was flown back home to Tuk but he was still having trouble breathing. The nurse in Tuk sent him back into Inuvik. It turned out, Mr. Speaker, that he had a punctured lung. They had to put a tube in him to drain the blood from his lungs.
This young man is now recovering, but that is more good luck than good work by our health services. He should have not been put in police cells the first night. He could have died. His condition should also have been identified in the first visit to the hospital in Inuvik. Instead he endured five flights between Tuk and Inuvik in a week, Mr. Speaker, before he was properly cared for in the Inuvik hospital. I am not sure how this happened and how such bad decisions were made.
I will be helping this young man and his family to file written complaints to the appropriate authorities. In the meantime, I want to stress to the Ministers of Health and Justice that sometimes citizens are treated more like animals than people, Mr. Speaker. We are lucky to have this young man that lived through this ordeal. Instances like this should never happen again. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
