Mom’s hope renewed after burn victim flies to US
Published:Friday | May 28, 2021 | 12:15 AMHopeton Bucknor/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Lolleta Scarlett, the mother of a Hanover woman scorched in an alleged fit of rage by a jealous boyfriend last week, was in tears as she watched Nicola Clarke being wheeled out of the Cornwall Regional Hospital in Montego Bay, St James, on Thursday.
“Thank you, God. Thank you, God,” the elderly woman muttered, raising her hands towards the heavens as her daughter was transferred to the waiting ambulance, which transported her to the Sangster International Airport.
Scarlett told The Gleaner that, while she was worried when she was told that the Mount Salem-based hospital lacked the resources to treat her daughter, she had remained hopeful that something would work out.
“Them say they do not have the resources here to take care of her, so she will have to go overseas so that she can live. Otherwise, she is not going to live,” Scarlett told The Gleaner. “When the doctor tell mi that, mi just seh, ‘In the name of Jesus, she not gonna die!’, and then now God just work it out that we meet that nice young man, who volunteered to help her.”
That young man is Stephen Josephs, the projects manager at the Sanmerna Foundation, which arranged for the trip and via Trinity Air Ambulance for Clarke to be treated at the JMS Burn Unit at the Doctor’s Hospital in Augusta, Georgia.
“I feel very good right now. I can’t even explain how I feel because,at even this morning, I was crying and mi daughter seh, ‘Mommy, don’t cry. Just hold the faith and believe in God’, and I seh, ‘Alright’,” the relieved Scarlett stated.
After a morning punctuated by the team working out last-minute details, Clarke, who sustained serious burns all over her body, left the island Thursday about 4:30 p.m.
Robert Whyte, director of Sanmerna Foundation and manager director for Sanmerna Paper Products Limited, told The Gleaner that the company was moved by the tragedy to help.
“When we saw the article, we jumped into action, and we can say today, that action that we jumped into paid off,” said Whyte. “Today, Nicole is on her way to the United States.”
Whyte used the opportunity to appeal to the nation’s men to stop the vicious and brutal attacks against women amid a wave of gender-based violence in recent weeks. That includes an assault saga that has left a cloud over Westmoreland Central Member of Parliament George Wright.
“I am pleading with all the men out there who believe that this attack on women is the way to solve a domestic problem to please stop this act and find other ways to solve your problem, because it is incidents such as these why Nicola is here today,” said Whyte.
Clarke’s boyfriend, who is now in police custody, is reported to have accused her of being unfaithful before setting her and her business place on fire.