MCpl. Clayton Matchee in the early 90s. Photo courtesy flyingdust.net
A Flying Dust First Nation man has been named in an Ontario military mom’s plea for the federal government to end its “culture of denial” towards the psychiatric effects of a drug that was misused during the Canadian Airborne Regiment’s Somalia deployment in the early 1990s.
The regiment used the anti-malarial drug mefloquine, which was unlicensed at the time, as part of a drug safety monitoring study.
Flying Dust First Nation’s Cpl. Clayton Matchee and Ontario Cpl. Scott Smith were among those who were not properly screened or monitored before being administered mefloquine under the Health Canada drug trial. Regiment members were not told of the military’s agreement that soldiers should report side effects of the drug, as evidenced by a 1999 Auditor General report.
Smith committed suicide in 1994, and Matchee was involved in the fatal beating of a Somali captive. That killing was part of the Somalia Affair.
When Matchee was charged with murder, he suffered brain damage after attempting suicide. Matchee now lives in a special care home in North Battleford.
On Friday, Smith’s mother Val Reyes-Santiesteban made a submission to the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs, saying “we now know that my son was one of at least two soldiers who are reported to have experienced symptoms of psychosis while taking mefloquine in Somalia.”
Her comments are based on testimony from the VA committee, which has been probing the military use of mefloquine and the drug’s side effects since October. The committee’s audio can be accessed here: http://www.parl.gc.ca/Committees/en/ACVA/Meetings
Reyes-Santiesteban’s carefully worded three-page letter says the Department of National Defence’s misuse of mefloquine in Somalia led to miscalculculations about the drug’s “true rate of severe side effects” that led Health Canada to deem mefloquine safe.
The military’s official stance has not changed in the years since it was first licensed. This, despite the fact that a number of Canada’s allies – the United States, Britain, Australia, and Germany – have either changed mefloquine (also known as Lariam) to a drug of last resort or stopped using it entirely.
This summer, Health Canada quietly inserted a warning for mefloquine saying “in a small number of patients it has been reported that dizziness or vertigo and loss of balance may continue for months or years after discontinuation of mefloquine and, in some cases, vestibular damage may be permanent.”
The VA committee has sent a letter to the Minister of National Defence, Minister of Health and Minister of Veterans Affairs asking for a thorough examination of the effects of mefloquine.
Reyes-Santiesteban’s letter says the years since her son’s death have shown the Canadian government’s “intentional and self-imposed ignorance” on mefloquine, which features an “unrepentant culture of denial regarding the drug’s inherent dangers.”
Clayton Matchee’s wife Marj has been adamant for decades that mefloquine contributed to his actions in Somalia, but has not spoken to media since the late 1990s. However, buoyed by the anti-mefloquine movement, Marj is now speaking out.
“I’m so proud of everyone, the mothers that have lost their sons that are standing up. There was a lady back then who lost her son, Scott Smith. I’ll never forget him,” she said.
“They’re all standing up strong, and we have answers, but we need the government to understand and listen as well now.”
Reyes-Santiesteban’s letter asks for the VA committee to help her get details about her son’s death from the Department of National Defence. She has further questions about how Smith and Clayton’s “severe reaction to mefloquine” was overlooked in Somalia.
This comes after a number of experts and veterans, as well as VA committee member Cathay Wagantall, have made calls for the Somalia Inquiry to be reopened.