{"id":597063,"date":"2026-04-11T13:09:30","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T13:09:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/597063\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T13:09:30","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T13:09:30","slug":"has-canada-learned-nothing-from-the-grassy-narrows-mercury-poisoning-tragedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/597063\/","title":{"rendered":"Has Canada learned nothing from the Grassy Narrows mercury poisoning tragedy?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

A demonstrator protests at Queen’s Park after a press conference announcing the intention to litigate against the Ontario government over contamination of Grassy Narrows.Christopher Katsarov\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

Last Monday, at a press conference in Toronto, a Grassy Narrows First Nation woman suffering from mercury poisoning named Chrissy Isaacs started shouting in the background. At the podium, with Ontario Premier Doug Ford and Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow standing behind him, Prime Minister Mark Carney paused his speech, then quipped: \u201cI can outlast her.\u201d<\/p>\n

The politicians behind him, arguably among the most important in the country, laughed nervously.<\/a><\/p>\n

Maybe they did not know what she was protesting about; the Prime Minister\u2019s Office later released a statement that Mr. Carney could not hear what the demonstrators were saying. But I believe that the leaders did know, and that they ignored her. And if that\u2019s the case, that was morally wrong.<\/p>\n

First Nations chiefs demand apology after Carney says he could \u2018outlast\u2019 demonstrator<\/a><\/p>\n

In one of Canada\u2019s worst cases of environmental racism, the Dryden Chemical Company in northern Ontario released more than 9,000 kg of mercury into the Wabigoon-English River system from 1962 to 1970. This poisoned multiple generations of Anishinaabeg from the First Nations communities of Asubpeeschoseewagong Netum Anishinabek (Grassy Narrows) and Wabaseemoong (White Dog). The province eventually ordered the plant to stop the practice, but according to the Canadian Environmental Law Association, airborne emissions continued<\/a> until the company ceased using mercury-based processing in October, 1975. <\/p>\n

Mr. Carney brushed aside Ms. Isaacs\u2019s protest as an irritant. But the Prime Minister should know better than to be this callous, because prime ministers should be held to higher standards. His predecessor, Justin Trudeau, learned this when he too made sarcastic remarks<\/a> during a 2019 Liberal Party fundraiser in Toronto, after a Grassy Narrows demonstrator disrupted that event to call attention to the issue. \u201cThank you very much for your donation tonight,\u201d he said. \u201cI really appreciate it.\u201d He later apologized publicly.<\/p>\n

But what Canada and Ontario have not done is publicly apologize to all affected by the poisoning and, most importantly, make a sweeping effort to not just make this right, but prevent it from happening again. Construction began one year ago on a long-term care centre in the community, but as Grassy Narrows elder Judy Da Silva tells me, \u201cIt won\u2019t heal us. It is just a place to take care of our sick people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Mark Carney’s ‘outlast her’ remarks were directed towards Chrissy Isaacs, who suffers from mercury poisoning.Fred Lum\/the Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Until there is wholehearted acceptance of what happened, why it happened and how to stop it from happening again, First Nations will continue to turn to the courts. In 2024, Grassy Narrows filed a lawsuit <\/a>against Ontario and Canada, saying they have violated their treaty rights and other constitutional duties by failing to protect them from decades of contamination. And as they wait, the crisis only deepens: A University of Western Ontario study from 2024 has indicated that continuing industrial pollution from the mill\u2019s wastewater has made things worse by contributing to the increased production of methylmercury, the most toxic version.<\/a><\/p>\n

This is what happens when you ignore environmental policies, assessments and protections. Almost everyone living in the Grassy Narrows and White Dog First Nations became sick after eating the river\u2019s fish, in which the methylmercury accumulated. Mercury poisoning presents with a variety of acute neurological symptoms resembling Parkinson\u2019s, including arm and leg tremors, body shakes, and severe kidney and heart problems, to name a few. <\/p>\n

Methylmercury in pregnant women also passes through the placenta, thus influencing growing fetuses<\/a>, and through breast milk to babies,<\/a> in much smaller amounts. In some cases, the youth are sicker than their parents and grandparents, said Ms. Da Silva, who has suffered from mercury symptoms for decades.<\/p>\n

Mr. Carney\u2019s comment \u201cput a knife in an open wound,\u201d she said. \u201cWe live with the poison every day, with every part of our lives. He doesn\u2019t have to live with it. He can make comments like that because he is in a place of comfort, wherever he is.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is needed here is a resolution, once and for all. People who have been poisoned should not have to jump through hoops or go to court to get compensation or disability payments.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you are a humanitarian, you understand the callousness of the government. Sixty years of callousness \u2013 1962, they started dumping. They permitted it, gave the stamp of approval,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In the name of all those who have died from mercury poisoning at Grassy Narrows and White Dog, environmental protection laws must be strengthened, not swept aside in the name of an economic boost. Instead, Ontario and Ottawa have passed bills that allow for quicker building of major infrastructure projects and mining projects in defiance of environmental regulations.<\/p>\n

If Canada wants to be an economic superpower, it must not sacrifice decades of environmental protection laws, even if they were lax or flawed. It is time for Canada to protect the people and the environment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: A demonstrator protests at Queen’s Park after a press conference announcing the intention…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,32924,221904,226455,1008,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-597063","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-environment","11":"tag-first-nations","12":"tag-grassy-narrows","13":"tag-mercury-poisoning","14":"tag-pleasemod","15":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}