Life Fund blanks Shannen

The funding, according to a letter addressed to attorney Gerald Ramdeen and signed by CLFA chairman Dr Maritza Fernandes also said, a document from Bambino Gesu Paediatric Hospital in Italy, submitted by Shannen’s parents, showed that the toddler will be admitted to the hospital on May 2, and that the total cost of 158,000 euros has already been paid in full by the family.

She acknowledged that Ramdeen also mentioned that payment has already been made.

However, the Children’s Life Fund Act, she said, “does not allow for reimbursements but rather it provides a detailed upfront application, assessment and approval process at Sections 18 and 21, premised on specific legal criteria.” Meanwhile, Shannen’s mother Michelle Luke told Newsday yesterday, “to be honest we did not expect anything but if we had gotten anything, we would have been grateful.” She did not expect anything, she said, because of the haste with which the CLFA called on her on April 4 to put through her application and based on the processing time.

Luke said as soon as she and her husband had been given an admission date by the paediatric hospital on January 2, they wrote the Ministry of Health on January 17 seeking assistance from the Children’s Life Fund. She said they received no response. After the matter was raised in the Parliament in late March, she said, she received a telephone call from the CLFA on April 4. By then, she and her husband had mortgaged their home and embarked on a fund-raising drive. There was no way, she said, she could postpone the date for the bone marrow transplant after waiting for almost three years to have it done.

Since Shannen’s medical condition was diagnosed, Luke said, she and her husband began saving for the medical procedure.

“We made the sacrifices. People rallied around us. We got a lot of prayers. I am trying to save my child. We are moving on,” she said. Ramdeen wrote a letter to Minister of Health Terrence Deyalsingh on February 6, seeking his intervention on behalf of Shannen’s parents on their application. The letter was forwarded and received by the CLFA the following day.

Prior to this, Fernandes confirmed that Shannen’s parents’ application for grant funding under the Children’s Life Fund Act was received by the CLFA on April 4. “You will appreciate the Act prescribes a comprehensive application, assessment and approval process regarding an application for grant funding,” she said.

After outlining the application process, she said, the application was lacking essential supporting documents such as medical reports. She noted also that based on the application process, a beneficiary departing the country on an airplane may take between one to three months.

Fernandes assured that all applications are treated with urgency and sensitivity in keeping with the Act.