(from our friends at Children’s Health Defense)
The medical freedom movement mourns the passing of one of its most passionate and beloved advocates, Dr. Sheila Lewis Ealey, who lost a long battle with cancer on July 20.
“Stand with us as Christians, stand with us as agnostics, atheists — but stand on behalf of our children.” — Dr. Sheila Lewis Ealey, May 2016, Compton, California
Sheila was known worldwide to parents of children with autism for her fierce dedication to exposing the truth behind the devastating effects of a decades-long vaccine program promoted as “safe and effective” that in actuality, was neither.
Sheila was the founder and former director of the Creative Learning Center of Louisiana, a therapeutic day school for children who are on the autism spectrum or struggling with other nonverbal intellectual disabilities. The wife of Ron Ealey, a former U.S. Coast Guard Officer, she is also the mother of four children. Her son Temple was diagnosed with severe autism spectrum disorder at 18 months after he regressed following the accidental injection with DTAP, HIB, and two MMR vaccines at the same doctor’s visit, including one intended for Temple and one intended for his twin sister Lucinda. Temple is now a young man and considered moderate and emerging.
Sheila and her twins were featured in the documentary Vaxxed and Medical Racism: The New Apartheid. She has traveled extensively, advocating for medical freedom. She continues to educate disenfranchised parents about their fundamental rights to religious and philosophical exemptions, their ability to live sustainably on a limited budget and the importance of nutrition and biomedical interventions for optimum health with autism.
She also writes individual homeschool curriculums for parents of children with autism or intellectual disorders. Sheila was a trustee for the Autism Trust USA and is on the board of directors of Children’s Health Defense.
Her formal education includes degrees in communication, special education curriculum and instruction and a doctorate in educational leadership in special education. Sheila serves as an assistant content advisor and political analyst for Stand for Health Freedom.
“Sheila was the embodiment of the Warrior Mom,” said Robert F. Kennedy Jr., CHD founder and chairman on leave. “The task of caring for her injured son consumed her life. Yet she somehow managed to find equivalent energies to fight for justice for the vaccine-injured and protect other families from injury.”
Sheila “made herself a brilliant, eloquent advocate for truth and children’s health,” said Kennedy, adding that he’s proud that she was his friend.
Kennedy said:
She was my partner in building CHD into a juggernaut for the cause. Her humor, courage and energy inspired me during the most daunting times. She was a template for the power of pure love. She will continue to be a source of strength to all who care about protecting children.
“Sheila never gave up, never gave in and never lost hope that the world would one day acknowledge the repercussions of allowing private industry to dictate public health policy.”
Many knew Sheila through her appearance in the 2016 documentary “Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe,” in which she told the story of her son Temple’s vaccine injury — but Sheila had been in the trenches long before that.
She was an early board member of the National Autism Association, the Autism Trust, and, more recently, CHD and Stand for Health Freedom. Sheila co-founded the Creative Learning Center of Louisiana, devoting her time and skills to creating individualized homeschool curriculums for parents of children with autism.
“Sheila was a fierce, tireless, decades-long leader and warrior in the medical freedom movement,” said Kay Sullivan, president of the CHD Board of Directors. “While she served she was an active and valued member of the CHD Board. Additionally she was awarded the Children’s Health Defense’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2022. Sheila is already sorely missed.”
CHD CEO Mary Holland said, “Sheila was an extraordinary and inspiring woman who faced great adversity in so many ways, including her cancer, yet she always found the light. She was a special education scholar and she devoted special attention to helping Black families avoid and overcome vaccine injury. CHD was blessed to work with her and we will miss her dearly.”
Those lucky enough to work with Sheila immediately recognized her fierce determination and her deep and abiding faith in God. She was a powerful speaker who rallied parents as they battled against vaccine mandates at state legislatures from coast to coast.
One of her most memorable speeches took place in Compton, California, in May 2016 when she spoke passionately on the need to stand up on behalf of the world’s children, no matter how out-resourced our community may seem to be by government and industry.
Following the release of “Vaxxed” in 2016, Sheila spent a year touring the country with her dear friend Polly Tommey, now CHD.TV program director, as they recorded the stories of parents whose children were injured by vaccines. No matter how grueling the schedule, she always had time to listen to other parents who needed to tell their children’s stories of being plunged from thriving health into autism.
“Sheila was a force of nature who inspired all she spoke with to rise up and fight for our children, for informed consent and for the truth,” said Polly. “In recent years, she was especially concerned about our injured children who are now adults. It broke her heart that adults had nowhere to go. But she never quit searching for viable options on their behalf. Sheila leaves a legacy of unmatched strength and courage in the face of adversity.”
Of all of Sheila’s roles — wife, mother, grandmother, friend — perhaps her greatest role was as a messenger of truth. Sheila’s driving motivation was to spare other children and families from the same devastation that vaccine injury brought upon her own son and her family.
Despite becoming an icon within the medical freedom movement, Sheila always remained approachable and humble. When accepting CHD’s Lifetime Achievement Award, she said, “I do what I do because it’s the right thing to do.”
Sheila had a profound and indelible impact on the lives of all of us at CHD. We will honor her memory by continuing her efforts to expose the truth on behalf of children injured by vaccines.
From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you, Sheila.
To assist Sheila’s family with memorial expenses, please visit the GiveSendGo page established by her longtime friend and colleague, Marcella Piper-Terry.
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