Free DNA tests offered after 4 Manitoba men switched at birth, 2016

[dotr]

http://cnews.canoe.com/CNEWS/Canada/2016/08/30/22663037.html

Norway House resident Leon Swanson weeps at a press conference last week, where Manitoba's former aboriginal affairs minister Eric Robinson, centre, announced Swanson and David Tait Jr., right, were switched at birth in 1975 when their mothers gave birth at Norway House Indian Hospital. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods)

Aug 30, 2016

"The community, of course, has a lot of questions," says Evans, who is now chief of the Norway House Cree Nation.

"Was it honest mistakes that were made or was it malicious? That's what's going through the minds of many, including mine." Two men from Norway House announced last week — and two men from nearby Garden Hill revealed last year — that they had been switched at birth at the federally run hospital in 1975.
David Tait Jr. and Leon Swanson cried in front of news cameras Friday after receiving initial DNA test results. Tests last November showed Luke Monias and Norman Barkman also went home from the hospital with each other's families.
The two cases have raised the question of whether there could be more.

 

[katydid23]

That is really sad. How does that happen? Don't they put on baby wristbands with family name? How hard is it to do that?

 

[dotr]

That is really sad. How does that happen? Don't they put on baby wristbands with family name? How hard is it to do that?

Apparently the policy of putting wristbands on new babies was only implemented after 1980.

Could there be more?

https://www.thestar.com/news/canada...red-after-manitoba-men-switched-at-birth.html

The department has started reviewing the hospital’s historical files, said Morrissette, who added an independent third party will soon be tasked to investigate the mix-ups. The results are to be made public.

If one person was at fault, he said, it’s possible he or she may no longer be alive. Evans can recall the names of some nurses from the ‘70s, but they have died, he said.

The policy of putting identification bands on babies immediately after birth began at the Norway House hospital in 1980.

 

[dotr]

https://www.thestar.com/news/canada...bies-being-switched-at-birth-in-manitoba.html

[h=1]DNA tests confirm second case of babies being switched at birth in Manitoba[/h]Leon Swanson is the biological son of woman who raised David Tait Jr. and Tait is the son of woman who raised Swanson. It’s the second case of a mix-up at Norway House Indian Hospital.

He says the tests show Leon Swanson is the biological son of the woman who raised David Tait Jr.
The 41-year-old men announced at a news conference last month that tests had revealed Tait is the son of the woman who raised Swanson.
Robinson says the latest results were anticipated, but needed for Swanson to move on.
It’s the second case of a mix-up at the federally run Norway House Indian Hospital in the same year, and the government has tasked an independent third party to investigate what went wrong.

 

[dotr]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/norway-house-births-1.4270527

[h=1]No criminal wrongdoing in switched-at-birth cases, Manitoba RCMP say[/h]
[h=3]2 cases of babies being sent home with wrong parents occurred in 1975 at Norway House hospital[/h] CBC News Posted: Aug 31, 2017

The federal department found that in 1975, Norway House Indian Hospital did not place identification bands on babies in the room where they were born.

"In general we found the infant identification practices at that time were not very robust," said one of the report's authors, Dr. David Creery.

He and co-author Maura Davies concluded that there is no way of knowing for certain whether other babies born in Norway House were switched, but noted there were exceptional circumstances around the births of boths sets of babies switched in 1975.

Around the time the first two men were born, one of the mothers had a health concern and was transfered to Winnipeg and in the moments after the second pair was born power at the hospital went out, said Creery.

"We could not find that anyone did anything with the intent to cause harm," he said.

While only emergency births now occur at Norway House Hospital, Creery and Davies made recommendations for how the hospital, and any other Health Canada facility where births occur, could still improve in order to prevent infants from going home with the wrong parents.

 

[dotr]

'Mar 22, 2024
Two Manitoba men who were accidentally separated from their families at birth have received a long awaited apology. Allison Bamford reports.'

 

[grannygates]

This is now the third case in Manitoba and I’d assume there are many more that just haven’t been discovered yet.

Manitoba premier to apologize to two men switched at birth in 1955

Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew is set to apologize on behalf of the government to two men who were switched at birth in 1955 in a hospital north of Winnipeg.

winnipeg.ctvnews.ca