Екатерина Бартко и Дмитрий Шишов. Фото из личного архива.
Thirty-three-year-old Belarusian Katsiaryna Bartko, who applied for political asylum in the United States, has been held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody for more than 12 weeks. Her relatives and doctors fear that inadequate treatment could cause her to fall into a coma, The Kansas City Star reported.
Bartko survived cancer when she was young. Her thyroid and parathyroid glands were removed, meaning she must take hormone medication and calcium for the rest of her life at strictly prescribed doses.
According to her partner, Dmitry Shyshov, Bartko did not receive the necessary medication after being detained in Florida and was hospitalized three times in four days. On June 18, she was transferred to an immigration detention center in Leavenworth, Kansas. She has not been examined by an endocrinologist since then.
Tests conducted on August 11 showed that Bartko’s thyroid-stimulating hormone level had reached 148.77 mIU/L — about 30 times the upper limit of normal.
Sarah Raza, a physician with Physicians for Human Rights, said the level indicated severe hypothyroidism and increased the risk of myxedema coma, which can be fatal.
ICE and CoreCivic, the company operating the detention center, said the Belarusian woman was under constant medical supervision and receiving necessary care.
Bartko came to the United States on a student visa in March 2022 and subsequently applied for asylum. According to Shyshov, she took part in protests in Belarus and publicly spoke out against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. After she left the country, Belarusian security forces visited her parents and asked where she was.