Decades after a paper mill dumped tonnes of mercury into a river system, Grassy Narrows First Nation in Northern Ontario is getting a one-of-a-kind treatment centre to help residents suffering from mercury poisoning — a problem the community has long raised alarms about.
WARNING: This story contains references to suicide.
Robert Williamson says he remembers watching his parents lose their only source of income as his neighbours started to get sick.
Now, he’s sick, too, but his hope is that his grandchildren won’t suffer the same symptoms he does.
Williamson, like roughly 90 per cent of residents in Grassy Narrows First Nation, has been impacted by mercury poisoning that dates back to the 1960s and ’70s, when the Dryden Paper Mill dumped about nine tonnes of the toxin into the English-Wabigoon River System in northwestern Ontario.
On Wednesday, he …