New Brunswick’s child and youth advocate believes the child death review committee should publicly reveal the findings when a child in care dies of unnatural causes.
An investigative report by CBC has revealed that over the past two decades more than 50 children under the care of the province have died from unnatural causes.
Norm Bosse says child and youth advocates in many other provinces produce public child death reports where they don’t identify the child.
“They try not to in any way identify the communities where these deaths happen but they do report on them publicly. I have not heard any backlash, I have not heard any negative feedback as to why that shouldn’t happen in those provinces,” says Bosse.
The committee’s mission statement involves working to prevent further deaths and improve conditions for children and youth.
“I don’t know how a seven or eight person committee can do that if that report never gets to the light of day…so that’s the challenge that’s ahead of us, my office will certainly engage government in this discussion as a result of this report but we have already been talking about this, in any event.”