Kinew orders declaration jail not be used to force TB treatment after Manitoba woman’s detention
Premier Wab Kinew has ordered Manitoba’s chief provincial public health officer to write an order banning jail from being used as a way to treat a person with tuberculosis.
Kinew gave the direction to Dr. Brent Roussin Monday after public health officials ordered the detention of a First Nations woman to treat her condition.
Geraldine Mason, who spent a month in jail, told the Free Press she was held despite not being charged with a crime and not being infectious at the time.
Kinew said he will apologize to Mason, who lives in God’s Lake First Nation in northern Manitoba, if he gets an opportunity to speak to her directly.
He told reporters he contacted senior government officials Monday morning to request “an order ensuring nobody is ever jailed for having tuberculosis again,” after he learned of Mason’s “terrible” situation.
“I haven’t had a chance to speak to him directly, but I understand that Dr. Roussin is going to sign a public health order to that effect today,” Kinew said.
“There’s a public health order that will say that public health officials are not going to seek incarceration as part of a way to treat people who have tuberculosis, or in a situation like this I think, yeah, that’s just not the right way to do it.”
Kinew visited the Winnipeg-area Prairie Green Landfill Monday morning to watch the start of a targeted search for the remains of two slain First Nations women.
When he returned to the legislature, he told reporters he had not yet had a chance to speak to Mason or follow up with Roussin regarding the public health order.
“I did basically say we’re not doing this again, get me the paperwork to back it up,” the premier said.
Kinew said he had not yet been given more information about Mason’s circumstances.
Tuberculosis, or TB, is an infectious bacterial disease spread through the air when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
The disease, which usually affects the lungs, can almost always be cured with proper medical treatment, according to the province.
Chris Kitching
Reporter
As a general assignment reporter, Chris covers a little bit of everything for the Free Press.
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Malak Abas
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Malak Abas is a city reporter at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg’s North End, she led the campus paper at the University of Manitoba before joining the Free Press in 2020.
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Credit: Kinew orders declaration jail not be used to force TB treatment after Manitoba woman’s detention
