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B.C. man in hospital on 24th day of hunger strike against old-growth logging

Click to play video: 'Anti-old growth logging group’s actions under scrutiny'
Anti-old growth logging group’s actions under scrutiny
An activist with 'Save Old Growth' was briefly hospitalized on day 24 of a hunger strike while members of the same group have stopped traffic across the Lower Mainland in recent weeks. As Paul Johnson reports, some say their actions are only alienating people from their cause – Apr 24, 2022

A British Columbia man says he was briefly hospitalized on the 24th day of a hunger strike to protest old-growth logging but that he plans to go without food until the end of the month.

Sixty-eight-year-old Howard Breen says he spent three hours in a Nanaimo hospital after what he calls a death watch team noted he had blurred vision, loss of balance and back pain around the kidneys.

He says a doctor and his daughter, a cardiac nurse, advised medical treatment late last night and that an ambulance took him to hospital early this morning.

Click to play video: 'Save Old Growth protesters stage demonstration on Ironworkers Memorial Bridge Thursday'
Save Old Growth protesters stage demonstration on Ironworkers Memorial Bridge Thursday

Breen, a member of the group Save Old Growth, says Forests Minister Katrine Conroy spoke with him and another man now into his 31st day of a hunger strike.

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But he says the call on Friday ended without the minister agreeing to a Zoom meeting that would be recorded for the public to access.

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Breen says activists will now focus on escalating action against the government and will show up at a Council of Forest Industries conference in Vancouver this week to try and make a so-called citizen’s arrest of Conroy.

The Forests Ministry did not respond to a request for comment from her, but Conroy announced earlier this month that the government will defer more than a million hectares of old-growth forests at risk of permanent loss.

 

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