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A deportation order issued in June led to an overdose of prescription drugs on his last day of school, hospitalizing him for a week until his heart activity normalized. He said in an interview he lives in terror of being sent back.

On Friday morning, CBSA denied the family’s request to defer deportation on medical and compassionate grounds. It found they offered “insufficient evidence” that they would suffer “undeserved or disproportionate hardship.”

That meant they would be deported as scheduled on Saturday, escorted by two officers and a nurse for Vladyslav.

Despite the family’s pleas that mental health care in Ukraine is especially poor, a CBSA officer concluded Ukraine would be “better” for Vladyslav.

“I note that as the family has currently no status in Canada and is not eligible for health care coverage and has no funds to pay for their treatment, therefore it may be a better option for Vladyslav Zadorozhnyi to return to Ukraine and receive treatment, where he has a status and the treatment is available to him,” reads a letter signed by Inland Enforcement Officer D. Sliwka.

That opinion contradicts the advice of Nuha AlShammari, a psychiatrist in the crisis unit of Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children, who said deportation was likely to trigger another suicide attempt.

Soon after CBSA’s denial, around midday, the family’s Liberal MP, James Maloney of Etobicoke-Lakeshore in Toronto, escalated the case to the cabinet level, his spokesperson said, and made a “strong representation on behalf of the family” to both Goodale and John McCallum, the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship.