Man with terminal cancer faces deportation

Dying wish is to stay in Canada. Shawn Pompey knows his liver cancer is terminal, but he wants to stay in Canada, where an oncologist is providing palliative care for free. Toronto Star photo

TORONTO — Despite having terminal cancer, Shawn Pompey refused handouts and continued to work at an Etobicoke window factory until January, when he was slated to be deported to St. Vincent.
Pompey, 42, has been without health care coverage since June, when Ottawa’s new refugee health cuts kicked in, prohibiting unsuccessful asylum seekers awaiting deportation from accessing care.
Fortunately, his oncologist at Brampton Civic Hospital, Dr. Philip Kuruvilla, has continued to treat him for free and managed to get him free medications for his liver cancer through various pharmaceutical companies’ compassionate drug access programs.
Pompey’s dying wish is to remain in Canada and continue with the palliative care he cannot get or afford in St. Vincent.
“This is an advanced incurable malignancy for which the goals of therapy are palliative,” Kuruvilla wrote in a letter on behalf of Pompey, in requesting deferral of his deportation, which will be confirmed next Friday at a meeting with border enforcement officials.
“Shawn has already survived for years with metastatic disease and is running out of treatment options. His survival may be as short as several months, with or without therapy,” Kuruvilla wrote.
Pompey said his father left him and his mother for Canada when he was a baby, and he’d always wanted to look for him. When he saved up enough money as a farm labourer and construction worker, he travelled to Toronto in 2007.
Although his father, a Canadian citizen, had already died of the same cancer in 1998, Pompey reconnected with his two sisters and a brother in Toronto.
He stayed on, making a living under the radar until the day in late 2009 when he was found unconscious by a friend in his Mississauga basement apartment. Taken by ambulance to hospital, he was diagnosed with cancer.
He could not afford the treatment, but at a friend’s suggestion filed an asylum claim to get health care coverage. His claim, based on the harassment of a hostile neighbour, was denied in 2011.
Pompey has worked at a window factory in Etobicoke since he arrived, except for about a year in 2010, when he was too sick to work. He only quit working in January when he was notified of his pending deportation.
“I want to support myself as long as I’m able to,” Pompey said from the home he shares with three other tenants.
Meanwhile, his lawyer, Daniel Kingwell, has asked the Canada Border Services Agency to indefinitely defer Pompey’s removal until a decision is made on his humanitarian application to remain in Canada.
“Mr. Pompey is simply asking to stay here while he fights for his life. He is receiving free treatment and does not cost Canada a penny. In fact, it would cost money to deport him,” Kingwell said.
Rudolph Clarke, Pompey’s pastor at Brampton’s Faith Ministry, likens Pompey’s deportation to sending him to a death sentence.
“We just want him to be given a fair chance to live,” he said.
Bron: http://www.mississauga.com/news/article/1582127--man-with-terminal-cancer-faces-deportation

In Nederland zouden we dan een beroep doen op artikel 3 EVRM (St Kitts) en artikel 64 Vw.  Typisch een illustratie van een geval waarbij de mens geen recht heeft op een verblijfsvergunning maar waarbij eigenlijk iedereen hem een wat comfortabeler einde gunt.



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Cancer: Tough choices for Syrian refugees in need of life-saving assistance

ERBIL, Iraq, December 20 (UNHCR) - Most refugees flee their homeland to escape violence and persecution. For Ahmed,* leaving Syria was literally a matter of life or death. Ahmed, 43, had been fighting stomach cancer for six months before he fled last August to Erbil, the main city in northern Iraq's Kurdistan Region.
Until then, he had been travelling to Damascus every two weeks to receive medical treatment. But it was becoming increasingly difficult to make the journey from his home in north-eastern Syria to the capital as the country's conflict worsened.
"I had to travel for 12 hours from Al Hassakeh to Damascus every couple of weeks in order to get chemotherapy treatment. I had to drive in the middle of shelling and bombarding. I took the risk to survive," Ahmed said.
Still pale and gaunt and holding a large package of medicine at his sister's house in Erbil, Ahmed explained that the violence in Syria eventually made it impossible to get the life-saving cancer treatment he needed. There is a huge and growing lack of medicine in local hospitals throughout much of the country and doctors are sometimes unable to reach hospitals.
"My life was in danger, I could not find medicine anymore and I was about to die. I had to leave Syria to save my life," Ahmed said. "When I arrived here in Erbil, I registered with the UNHCR. This registration enabled me to get residency in [Iraq] Kurdistan. UNHCR staff referred me to Nana Kelly hospital in Erbil, where I get free medical treatment."
Ahmed said he was satisfied with the treatment and chemotherapy he was receiving. "It even includes vitamins. I've gained five kilos in the last five months. I can see my hair growing again. I have been born again. I am very thankful to UNHCR."
The Syrian refugee pointed to the darkened blood vessels on his arms, which he attributed to his continuing chemotherapy. "It is very painful. I lie in bed for three to five hours every time I get the medical treatment. It hurts a lot. But it is saving my life," he said in a low voice.
Ahmed first arrived in Erbil by himself, leaving his wife and four children back home. "I was very concerned about my family. By then, there was a lot of shelling taking place in my neighbourhood. But I had to leave to save my life," he repeated.
Seliman,* aged 10, is Ahmed's only son. He was born with a mental disability. Two months after Ahmed left Syria, the boy became very sick and was admitted to the hospital in Hassakeh.
"Seliman had pneumonia, but there was no more medicine to save his life," Ahmed said softly, his eyes filling with tears. "I lost my only son. I cannot believe it. No more medicine to save my son's life. That is too much."
Ahmed's wife and three daughters finally joined him in Erbil in early November. They all live with Ahmed's sister, who had fled earlier. More than 20 people live in the three-bedroom apartment.
The family members are among some 9,500 Syrian refugees living with the local community in Erbil. Iraq's Kurdistan Region hosts three-quarters of all Syrian refugees in Iraq. Throughout Iraq, the number of those registered or awaiting registration has tripled since September 1 - from 18,700 to more than 65,000. And hundreds more continue to arrive every day.
* Names changed for protection reasons.
By Mohammed Abu Asaker in Erbil, Iraq


Bron: http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/tough-choices-for-syrian-refugees-in-need-of-life-saving-assistance



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