Mum of sick child can stay in US

“It’s a relief. I thank God.”With those words, Petra Gooding, a 30-year-old Bajan mother, greeted the news that United States immigration authorities had lifted an order that would have forced her to return to Barbados on September 2 without her gravely-ill daughter, Niamh Stoute, 7. The child, a student of Charles F. Broome Primary School, is in Atlanta receiving some of the world’s most sophisticated treatment for Stage 4 of neuroblastoma, a rare form of cancer.Gooding said that the lifting of the order, relayed to her by an immigration lawyer “has taken a considerable load off my shoulders”. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials had rejected Stoute’s plea for an extension of her stay in the US with her daughter, a patient of the Children’s Healthcare Aflac Care Centre.Gooding said the reversal came as a result of the intervention of a lot of people and institutions.Among them were parents of children in the cancer unit at the hospital; Barbados’ honorary consul-general in Georgia, Dr Edward Layne; his wife, Barbara Layne, an immigration attorney; people in Barbados and Atlanta, and relatives, all of whom in different ways offered assistance and advice, Gooding said.Gooding and her sick child have been in Atlanta since last November when they were given permission to remain in the US for about nine months. But when Gooding applied for an extension of time, the immigration agency ruled that the child could stay but the mother had to leave by September 2.Gooding said: “I was at a loss to understand why they would approve an extension for my daughter and not for me, her mother, who is taking care of her while she receives the kind of treatment she so urgently needs.”The case attracted national media attention with major newspapers and prominent cable and broadcast television news channels, such as CNN, Fox, ABC and NBC covering the story.Niamh is receiving state-of-the-art chemotherapy and stem cell surgery that are keeping her alive. The treatment is expected to continue for at least six more months in the first instance, but may last longer.