Cat Lake First Nation’s nursing station has burned down, leaving the distant northwestern Ontario group and not using a central access level to health-care companies.
Nishnawbe Aski Police Service (NAPS) confirmed {that a} fireplace broke out on the Margaret Gray Nursing Station Saturday evening simply earlier than 9:30 p.m. Saturday.
“When officers arrived, they noticed smoke and visual flames coming from the group’s nursing station. Officers remained on the scene and assisted group members trying to extinguish the fireplace,” NAPS mentioned in a information launch issued Sunday afternoon.
“At 11:46 p.m., it was deemed too harmful to proceed fireplace suppression efforts. The building seems to be a complete loss, nonetheless, no accidents had been reported on account of the fireplace.”
About 650 folks stay in Cat Lake, an Ojibway group situated about 440 kilometres northwest of Thunder Bay, alongside the Albany River.
An investigation into the blaze stays ongoing, with help from members of the NAPS Crime Unit and Office of the Ontario Fire Marshal.
This is the third main fireplace in a First Nation in northwestern Ontario this winter. Earlier this 12 months, the only school in Eabametoong First Nation burned down, and house fire in the remote Cree community of Peawanuck killed two people and sent three others to the hospital.
Kiiwetinoong MPP Sol Mamakwa calls the fireplace in Cat Lake a devastating blow to the group.
“I feel that this hearth is type of a marker of a much bigger subject of how we have to enhance the infrastructure within the north, how we have to enhance the [health-care] companies even additional to that,” Mamakwa mentioned in an interview with CBC News Sunday.
Mamakwa mentioned he is been involved with Cat Lake’s Chief Russell Wesley, who was unavailable to instantly converse with CBC News.
CBC News has additionally contacted Ontario’s Minister of Indigenous Affairs Greg Rickford, and federal Minister of Indigenous Services Patty Hajdu, for remark.
Another blow amid ‘well being care disaster’
Last month, Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) Chiefs handed a decision to declare one other health state of emergency and to ascertain a NAN territorial First Nations well being companies Ombudsman’s Office, designed to establish obstacles to care and advocate for options in any respect ranges of presidency. NAN represents 49 First Nations throughout Treaty 9 and 5 in northern Ontario.
The decision comes after NAN first declared a state of public well being emergency in February 2016.
Mamakwa mentioned the lack of Cat Lake’s nursing station speaks to health-care inadequacies throughout the area.
Kiiwetinoong MPP Sol Mamakwa, seen in Eabametoong First Nation on this January 2024 photograph. Mamakwa says the lack of Cat Lake FIrst Nation’s nursing station speaks to the broader health-care challenges First Nations are dealing with. (Marc Doucette/CBC)
“I feel general within the north, the nursing stations are usually not functioning to the complete capability simply due to the deterioration of a few of the buildings. Not solely that — communities are rising, their populations are [growing] exponentially, and it actually has an influence,” Mamakwa mentioned.
The infrastructure hole, mixed with a rising inhabitants that wants extra nursing and scientific companies however lacks the employees to fulfill calls for, has created a recipe for catastrophe, he defined.
“It doesn’t work. It is a nursing disaster. It is a health-care disaster what we see up north, and that results in useless deaths after which the pointless struggling for the those who stay there,” Mamakwa mentioned.
For bigger First Nations in northwestern Ontario, akin to Eabametoong, Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, Pikangikum and Sandy Lake, Mamakwa want to see hospital companies delivered in-community to assist bridge the health-care hole.
“We want to have the ability to put in important sources to higher the system, and one of many methods is health transformation,” he mentioned, referencing NAN’s ongoing technique to enhance health-care access inside communities.
“Health transformation to me is giving again energy within the First Nations and bringing companies nearer to home.”
