MEDIA INDIGENA 229

"What did Joyce Echaquan really die of?" / MI 229

ON THIS WEEK'S INDIGENOUS ROUNDTABLE:

Justice for Joyce Echaquan. It’s a gut-wrenching, even agonizing video. As a distraught, bed-ridden Joyce Echaquan pleads for help, a nearby nurse and an orderly at a Quebec hospital do not seem particularly concerned with her condition.

"You're stupid as hell," one can be heard saying in French: the other tells the mother of seven she’s made bad choices in life, asking what her children would think of her behaviour. Those comments—streamed live to Facebook by Echaquan herself—have sparked a firestorm of reaction. But the sad truth is, it’s only the latest example of a Canadian health care system that fundamentally, and fatally, fails Indigenous people. And yet, despite all evidence, there persists a stubborn refusal to see racism as a systemic, social determinant of Indigenous ill-health.

Joining host/producer Rick Harp this week to share their thoughts on this horrific incident and the reaction in its wake are Brock Pitawanakwat, York University Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies, and Candis Callison, Associate Professor in the Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies and the Graduate School of Journalism at UBC.

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LINKS REFERENCED / CONSULTED THIS EPISODE:

• Public Inquiry Commission on relations between Indigenous Peoples and certain public services in Québec (aka the Viens Commission): Final Report & Summary

• Ignored to Death: Brian Sinclair Working Group

• "Racism in health-care system pushed into spotlight once more": Winnipeg Free Press

• "'It was sheer hatred': The Indigenous woman taunted as she died": Al Jazeera

• "Second person fired after Indigenous woman taunted before dying in Quebec hospital": CTV News

• "Groups call for action after dying Atikamekw woman subjected to 'the worst form of racism'": CTV News

• "Acute care hospitalization by Aboriginal identity, Canada, 2006 through 2008": Statistics Canada

• Perceptions of care, Aboriginal patients at the Winnipeg Health Sciences Centre: Masters Thesis, N. Riese

• Partner of Joyce Echaquan pleads with feds to find answers to her death: APTN News

• "'The worst form of racism,' denounces Trudeau": Canadian Press

• "Tribunal finds Canada wilfully and recklessly discriminated against First Nations children": Indian Country Today

• Tweet: "[T]he story isn’t that hospital staff 'insulted' Joyce  Echaquan... It’s that their bigotry, enabled by racism in health care,  killed her." @KamloopsArchaeo

• Structures of Indifference: An Indigenous Life and Death in a Canadian City University of Manitoba Press

•  "[U]ne campagne de sociofinancement sur la plateforme GoFundMe a permis de recueillir plus de 260 000 $ ... afin de soutenir les proches de Joyce Echaquan" (translation: "A crowdfunding campaign on GoFundMe raised over $260,000 ... to support those close to Joyce Echaquan") Radio-Canada

LISTEN NOW:

https://mediaindigena.libsyn.com/justice-for-joyce-echaquan-ep-229