WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is still in need of a new tooth, but the United Kingdom won’t let him get one.
After a "domiciliary dental emergency appointment" in July of last year, Assange, locked up in the Ecuadorean embassy in London for fear of extradition to the U.S., the dentist recommended that Assange be allowed to leave the complex for a more serious operation of his premolar tooth.
Fifteen months later, Assange is still in pain since “the UK continues to deny him medical treatment,” WikiLeaks told teleSUR.
The dental records were part of a package of his medical and psycho-social assessments published by WikiLeaks ahead of a ruling in Sweden on his arrest warrant to show that his arrest is arbitrary and a violation of his rights, as the United Nations ruled in February. Sweden decided last month to uphold the arrest warrant for allegations of rape, prolonging the legal standoff that has kept him in the London embassy for over four years.
A rotting tooth is just one of the side effects of his isolation and testament to the UK’s refusal to deliver appropriate treatment without arresting him.
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According to the dental record, signed by an unnamed dental surgeon, the lack of surgery “could carry a risk of creating a communication between the mouth and the sinus,” resulting in “a dental abscess and pain” if untreated. Even a temporary sedative that the dentist applied to the tooth showed "a high risk of this falling out given the lack of available tooth for the temporary material to bond to."
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Because of the dentist’s need for “specialised equipment and radiographic requirements,” which are only available outside the walls of the embassy, he could not fully operate.
Assange had said in 2010—the same year then-U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said there was "an active, ongoing criminal investigation" against him—that he had broken a tooth from a piece of metal in his food while held in a London jail.
The rest of the report on his medical health quoted one of Assange's colleagues saying that it had been difficult to find doctors willing to examine him at the embassy.
It also said that Assange often goes up to 22 hours without sleeping and that “his physical condition has deteriorated due to a limited range of movement, inability to exercise normally and constant pain."
WikiLeaks has published a historic number of leaks revealing grave human rights abuses and wrongdoing in the U.S. and has been publishing emails from Hillary Clinton all election cycle to expose the secrets of both the candidate and the Democratic Party.