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Aftermath: Organ Donation, Isolation and Lost Trust

Day 3 · 0:55:38 · Adam Burgess · Dean Allison

  • 🫁 Christy donated organs; her mother returned alone to the Yukon and was sworn at when requesting a quarantine exemption to hug remaining children.
  • twins Adam’s wife was forced to vaccinate while pregnant with twins or lose her job; the twins were born six weeks premature with lasting speech delay.
  • 🚫 The family now refuses further vaccines for their youngest child solely because institutional trust has been destroyed.

Grief compounded by mandates and the permanent erosion of faith in public-health authorities.

← Christy’s Collapse Days After Second Moderna Dose | Q&A: Why Share Christy’s Story on the Record →

Transcript

Adam Burgess · 0:55:38

She, um, eventually got on the medevac and she went to Vancouver with my mom, who went alone because of COVID restrictions. And my mom laid in the bed with her, and she was there with her the whole time. And the next day we got a call that Christy was not going to wake up, and, uh, they've done everything for her, and they were going to start end-of-life care, basically. And that was completely devastating. I remember standing in my living room and falling to my knees and not being able to stand up. And, uh, I can't imagine what my mom was going through or anyone else. And again, because of COVID restrictions, we're all at home, we're all alone, trying to text each other and speak to each other over the phone.

Adam Burgess · 0:56:40

But that's no way to grieve. You have to grieve with your family. And, uh, my mom stayed with her the whole time. Christy was an organ donor, and she donated her organs. And then my mom had to come back to the Yukon alone. When she returned to the Yukon, she called the, uh, I believe it was the COVID information line where you could get information from, and you could speak to people who are in charge. And she asked them can I have an exemption from this? If you, if you left the Yukon for any reason— I don't, I don't know if a lot of people know this, but the Yukon at that time, we had been under a state of emergency for over a year. It ended up being almost 2 years. And because other provinces have mechanisms that they can impose restrictions and mandates on you, the Yukon didn't have that, so they had to impose a state of emergency where they then could impose a quarantine and, and things of that nature.

Adam Burgess · 0:57:48

And my mom returned, um, from Vancouver and called them and asked them if she could have an exemption so she could go and see her remaining children and just hug her family. And the person that she spoke to swore at her and hung up on her. And this is the level of compassion that we were dealing with at the time.

Dean Allison · 0:58:12

Um, I'm going to ask you one more question, and then the MPs will ask you questions.

Adam Burgess · 0:58:16

Okay.

Dean Allison · 0:58:17

Um, how has this, um, affected you and your family?

Adam Burgess · 0:58:25

This was probably the most devastating, um, experience of my lifetime. Uh, I willingly took the vaccine just like my sister did because I believed in our institutions, and I believed in the people that were— that we've trusted and paid to keep us safe with things like this. And I no longer have that kind of trust, uh, in, in anything that they do. Um, I, I think about this every single day. I think I still carry a lot of PTSD from this experience. Um, it, uh, it's hard to describe how it affects me because it affects the way that I look at everything and the way that I view everything. Um, it was so scary having our children.

Adam Burgess · 0:59:26

We ended up having twins, and my wife's work— my wife's employer at the time, the Yukon government, told her if she didn't get the COVID-19 vaccine while she was pregnant that she would be fired and she would be removed from maternity leave. And she had to get the COVID-19 vaccine while pregnant. Also, we were also being pregnant with twins in the Yukon. We were looking at being medevaced out, which you can do if you're not vaccinated. But then how do you get home if you aren't vaccinated? So then we were looking at driving home to the Yukon, 2,600 kilometers in the dead of winter with premature twins. And so she ended up getting the shot. Uh, my twins were born 6 weeks premature. Uh, one of my sons still has a significant verbal delay. Um, It just, it just seemed like this, this COVID thing and the people that were directing it were just— it was so cruel.

Adam Burgess · 1:00:33

It was just pure cruelty what we experienced. And to this day, I, I— we, we had a child recently and he's never had a single vaccine. And I I'm not an anti-vax person. I've never consumed any anti-vax literature. I don't know about the ingredients of any kind, but the reason that my, my youngest son is not receiving any vaccines is because I don't trust the people that are, that are offering them to us anymore. Adam, thanks for coming. I mean, Well, and sharing your story, obviously to relive it, it's very painful.

Speaker C · 1:01:19

Uh, why did you—.