More aboriginal children are expected to abandon chemotherapy for traditional healing, now that a provincial court has expanded First Nations rights.

“The paths the children took in this case are likely going to be a trend,” Dawn Martin-Hill, chair in indigenous studies at McMaster University, said during a forum Thursday.

The precedent-setting decision gave the mother of an aboriginal girl, who can’t be named because of a publication ban, the right to forgo Western medicine proven to have a 95 per cent chance of success in treating acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The constitution specifically protects First Nations culture, including traditional healing.

“It’s as normal as everyday cooking,” said Martin-Hill, who fears aboriginal medicine is portrayed as “superstitious” or “bizarre.”

First Nations appear to be distancing themselves from a controversial Florida clinic whose owner has been fined and ordered to stop practising medicine without a licence by the state after the girl and another young aboriginal cancer patient visited there.

“Neither went there seeking alternative medicine,” said Martin-Hill. “They fled Canada . . . fleeing threats of apprehension, incarceration and hostile acts of aggression. In the U.S., they found peace, a safe place.”

It’s a major shift from the days following the Nov. 14 decision, when the girl’s mother described the “symphony of care” the West Palm Beach wellness centre provided.

In fact, Hippocrates Health Institute sent out a media release Jan. 16 when the girl went into remission, claiming she sought “naturopathic alternatives” there and did “faithful practice of all she learned.”

Now, the mother of the other girl is calling it a “private family vacation” that has been “exploited.”

Sonya Sault took her 11-year-old daughter, Makayla, to the institute where its co-director, Brian Clement, claims a raw plant-based organic diet has helped “thousands and thousands” of people reverse the most deadly types of cancer. The institute also promotes a positive attitude and ridding your life of contaminates.

“At Hippocrates, me and Makayla received nutritional counselling and she rested in the sun and swam in the ocean,” Sault said at the McMaster forum. “The point of going to Hippocrates was to let her rest and relax and to learn to eat well. This was meant to strengthen her immune system and to help her to recover from chemotherapy.”

Makayla died Jan. 19 from a stroke that her family believes was caused by the chemotherapy she received nearly a year earlier. Some in the medical profession say her death was likely due to a relapse of her rare and aggressive form of leukemia.

“She was always wise beyond her years,” Sault said of her daughter. “She understood the world, other people and herself more than we ever thought a girl her age could … She was young and playful but her intelligence and her maturity were remarkable.”

Her parents have no regrets about supporting Makayla’s decision to stop chemotherapy, which was taking a “horrific toll” on her health but had at least a 70 per cent chance of success.

“We still share Makayla’s belief that with chemotherapy she would have died in a hospital bed in May or June of 2014,” said Sault.

The treatment of the two girls at Hippocrates “with unproven and possibly dangerous therapies” was the reason the Florida Department of Health fined Clement $3,738 and ordered him to cease and desist practising medicine without an appropriate licence.

“We deny these allegations from the Department of Health in their entirety and are vigorously contesting these allegations through the administrative process,” said spokesperson Vicki Johnson. “Hippocrates Health Institute is not a medical facility or a medical provider, and has never claimed to be . . . Brian Clement is a Florida licensed nutritionist. At no time has he claimed to be a medical doctor or practised medicine.”

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A Six Nations family physician said the Florida institute is about reconnecting and balancing the body, mind, spirit and foods we eat.

“I wish we had something here,” said Dr. Karen Hill.