Two men weep after learning they were switched at birth 41 years ago

Norman Barkman, left, and Luke Monias from Garden Hill First Nation learned in November 2015 they were switched at birth. (Cameron MacIntosh/CBC)

Leon Swanson and David Tait Jr. are both 41 years old and have just learned they're not exactly who they thought they were.

Both wept Friday in Winnipeg as Eric Robinson, a former NDP member of the Manitoba Legislative Assembly for Keewatinook, told media that the two men were switched at birth more than 40 years ago at a hospital in Norway House Cree Nation.

"What happened here is lives were stolen," Robinson said. "You can't describe it as anything less than that."

Swanson and Tait were born three days apart — Swanson on Jan. 31, 1975, and Tait on Feb. 3, 1975 — at Norway House Indian Hospital in 1975, which was then run by the federal government.

Both men know each other and were raised and continue to live in the remote northern community, about 460 kilometres north of Winnipeg.

DNA tests have confirmed that each man was raised by the biological mother of the other.

Tait said everyone affected wants answers as to how such a switch could happen.

"We don't have words," he said. "Forty years gone … just distraught, confused angry."

News of the switch first surfaced Thursday.

This is the second case of infants at the Norway House Indian Hospital being switched at birth in 1975.

Source: cbc.ca