KEVON FELMINE
Senior Reporter
kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt
While the Government criticised the former People’s National Movement (PNM) administration for failing to improve the Children’s Life Fund Authority (CLFA), Opposition Senator Dr Amery Browne said many of the 80 rejected applications were due to bleak prognoses.
Making her maiden contribution in the Senate yesterday, Ministry of the People and Social Development’s Parliamentary Secretary, Dr Natalie Chaitan-Maharaj, revealed that several children died while awaiting approvals under the fund. She cited the 2022 case of 14-year-old Tristan Ramlochan, who succumbed to acute lymphoblastic leukaemia while waiting for funding and travel arrangements. Delays in his flight meant he became too ill to travel. Another child, Baby Miracle Cross, died in March 2016 while funds were still being processed.
Chaitan-Maharaj noted that while Canada’s Children’s Hospital Foundation and the UK’s NHS Rare Disease Fund typically take between seven and 14 days to process emergency approvals, the CLFA takes between two and four months.
“Never again, Mr President, must a child die because he or she was denied life-saving medical attention or must suffer because of the inability to access life-improving medical treatment,” Chaitan-Maharaj said.
The CLFA was introduced in 2010 by the People’s Partnership government to support children with life-threatening medical conditions, particularly those for whom treatment was unavailable locally or financially out of reach. Between 2010 and 2025, the fund received 472 applications.
While piloting the Children’s Life Fund (Amendment) Bill, 2025, Chaitan-Maharaj said the proposed changes aim to extend eligibility to children with life-limiting conditions, not just life-threatening ones.
She referenced the case of five-year-old Haleema Mohammed, who was denied assistance because her condition, beta-thalassemia major, was not considered immediately life-threatening in 2018.
Chaitan-Maharaj argued that while not immediately fatal, it severely diminished her quality of life.
She accused the PNM of neglecting the fund over the past nine and a half years.
]In response, Senator Browne said that some applications had been rejected because the conditions were not life-threatening, and in certain cases, the children had a poor prognosis. He explained that decisions had to consider the likelihood of survival and success of treatment.
He added that these were difficult determinations entrusted to the CLFA and acknowledged that part of being a parent was believing one’s child would survive.
Browne criticised the absence of demographic data and epidemiological insight in bringing the proposed amendments, questioning how many children would actually benefit and what budgetary provisions would be required.
He further recommended compensating local private specialists for treatments currently sought abroad and questioned the Bill’s provision allowing the Minister of Health to assume certain powers from the CLFA. In emergency situations, he said, authority should instead be granted to the CLFA chairman.
Independent Senator Dr Desirée Murray, also delivering her maiden speech, said the fund’s success should not be measured solely by the number of children sent abroad, but by the quality of life they enjoy upon returning—and ideally, in reducing the need to leave at all.
She emphasised that the CLFA’s evolution should be guided by sustainability, equity, and investment in local healthcare.
She called for a redirection of priorities, arguing that foreign medical expenses should be matched—or surpassed—by investment in domestic healthcare capacity.