TRURO, Nova Scotia (LifeSiteNews) — Two Canadian doctors who were fired for speaking publicly about the harms they saw occurring in patients as a result of lockdowns and mandate policies, and a veteran obstetrical nurse who is no longer working because she refused COVID injections, were among witnesses before the National Citizen’s Inquiry last Thursday on its first day of hearings in Nova Scotia.
Undiagnosed cancer
Patrick Phillips, who was working as an emergency physician in Ontario during most of the pandemic, described to a panel of four commissioners in Truro the “devastation to physical and mental health of patients” that resulted from extended lockdowns.
One woman had been prescribed opioid painkillers for severe back pain by doctors who were treating over the phone rather than in-person, for example, and when she finally went to the emergency room, Phillips recognized a “gigantic” undiagnosed tumour of late-stage cancer that would have been treatable had she been permitted to see her doctor in person sooner, but it had metastasized.
While public health was describing hospitals as overrun with COVID patients, “our emergency rooms were empty and there was very little COVID in our communities,” Phillips told the inquiry, an independent, citizen-led and citizen-funded initiative chaired by former Reform Party leader Preston Manning.
“Nevertheless, because of the media, the people in our communities were still afraid to come in,” Phillips said.
Suicidal children
Phillips also testified that he became concerned about the numbers of depressed and suicidal patients he was seeing, as well as an uptick in drug overdoses in adults, but “what was most striking was the children. I’d never seen so many suicidal children – as young as eight. It’s very rare for that to happen.”
“During the height of lockdown, the schools were closed, parents were told by public health to keep their kids at home, no playdates, no play, no sports, nothing. And so, these children were essentially locked up at home with no friends, no socialization, and that I believe was the leading cause of this suicidality in children. And no one was talking about it,” Phillips testified.
Following the roll-out of experimental COVID injections, Phillips said he filed 10 Adverse Events Following Immunization (AEFI) Reporting forms for patients including some suffering stroke, nervous system disorders, and blood clots in their lungs, but the only report that was accepted by health authorities was one for a minor skin rash.
Informed consent is patients’ right
After reading studies about the efficacy of the widely used anti-parasitic drug ivermectin for reducing COVID mortality, Phillips prescribed the drug for a 60-year-old patient suffering from COVID. The pharmacist reported him, however, and he was ordered to cancel the prescription.
When he wrote another prescription for ivermectin for a patient with a post-vaccine illness, a pharmacist reported him again and his license was temporarily restricted.
On May 3, 2022, Ontario’s College of Physicians and Surgeons (CPSO) suspended Phillips’ medical license for “holding a medical opinion that is contrary to the public health directives” and for “disgraceful, dishonourable or unprofessional conduct.”
Among the charges against him are those for writing mask and vaccine exemptions, for voicing his concerns publicly, and for filing adverse event reports on the fast-tracked, experimental mRNA injections – something that would ordinarily be a duty of physicians.
“If doctors are muzzled, patients don’t get informed consent and that is their right,” Phillips told the inquiry commissioners via video interview in a packed hotel conference room.
“I would totally do that again, even knowing I would lose my license,” Phillips said to rousing applause.
Fired emergency doctor
Dr. Chris Milburn, who was department head of emergency medicine for the eastern zone of the province of Nova Scotia, and who was positioned to implement pandemic health policy in the region, testified that he was initially concerned by reports of high mortality due to COVID-19. A few months into the pandemic, however, during which he saw just six deaths among very elderly patients with serious underlying illnesses, it became clear to him that the danger for young people was “extremely low.”
Millburn, who had 22 years’ experience in medicine, said that he saw other effects of public health restrictions on people in the region that were worse than the virus.
“Because of hospital shutdowns, for instance, I can rhyme off several patients who died of cancer – who I believe didn’t need to die – because their care was delayed. I had patients who were scheduled for joint replacements who suddenly saw the waitlist stretch out over the horizon.”
Millburn said that he witnessed nursing homes residents “stop eating and die because they were essentially prisoners and couldn’t see their family.”
When he e-mailed public officials, including the provincial Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Robert Strang, to express his concerns, Millburn said he “either got no response, or they said, ‘our committee decided during private meetings,’ but they didn’t give any justifications.”
After discussing his concerns on a local radio station in Cape Breton, Millburn received hundreds of supportive e-mails from the public but was also attacked on social media. Within a week, he was fired from his position in June, 2021. Millburn now practices family medicine in Cape Breton.
Nova Scotia has been faced with overwhelmed hospital emergency departments recently, and on New Year’s Eve a 37-year-old woman died in a provincial ER after waiting for more than seven hours to be seen.
‘It’s not safe anymore’
Among the 11 witnesses presenting to the four commissioners of the National Citizen’s Inquiry was Vonnie Allan, a registered nurse in obstetrics and gynecology with nearly 34 years’ practice whose leadership role at a hospital in Amherst, Nova Scotia, was terminated when she was put on unpaid leave on December 1, 2021 “for standing up for my rights and declining to take an experimental medication.”
Despite the shortage of healthcare workers in the province, particularly in obstetrics, and despite her experience and critical role in teaching less experienced nurses, Allan has not since been returned to her position. One of her co-workers messaged her last week, Allan testified, saying “Vonnie, I’m still grieving the loss of you from our unit. It’s not been the same since you left. I feel it was the beginning of the end for us. It’s not a good place to work anymore. It’s not safe.”
Heart conditions
Artur Anselm, a 26-year-old railway maintenance worker for Canadian National Railway, said he did not want to receive a COVID vaccine, but his employer set a November 15, 2021, deadline for doing so and told employees they would be put on unpaid leave if they did not take the injections that are currently still in clinical trials.
Anselm developed severe chest pains within days of receiving a first dose of mRNA COVID vaccine on November 13, 2021, and was told by his family doctors that it was not significant. Later, a New Brunswick cardiologist diagnosed the inflammatory heart conditions pericarditis and myocarditis, and confirmed in a letter that they were due to Anselm receiving the mRNA vaccination.
Another witness, former paramedic Chet Chisholm, said he was on disability leave for post-traumatic stress disorder from his job and was due to begin therapy on the first day of lockdowns, so he could return to work. Due to public health policies, he never received his therapy and the timeline for returning to work expired and he lost his job.
Chisholm said that he received his vaccinations for COVID believing he would make it back to work and said he believed the vaccine “did what it said on the tin” at the time. However, he developed severe chest pains, fatigue, and shortness of breath for which he visited ERs repeatedly but never received a diagnosis.
‘The mechanism is sudden cardiac death’
“There’s over 200 peer-reviewed papers published on cardiovascular syndromes directly attributed to COVID-19 vaccination and agreed to by regulatory authorities,” testified Dr. Peter McCullough, an internist and cardiologist practicing in Texas. “One of those is myocarditis, or heart inflammation. Two studies have indicated that 2.5 percent of people who take a vaccine suffer heart damage, about half of them it’s symptomatic, half of them, it’s not.”
“The peak age is 18 to 24 years, 90 percent are men, 10 percent women,” McCullough told the commission. “It’s a skewed distribution with a tail up into the 60s and 70s.” McCullough pointed to published “autopsy-proven” fatal cases and said that “it is conclusive that in a fraction of those who receive the COVID-19 vaccine that heart inflammation or myocarditis is fatal and the mechanism of death is sudden cardiac death.”
McCullough noted that COVID vaccines are tied to a slew of other cardiovascular manifestations including vascular inflammation and said they are “proven to cause blood clots both in arteries and in veins.” He cited medical literature referring to thousands of blood clot cases in Americans post-vaccine, 11 percent of which were fatal.
Hearings continue
The National Citizen’s Inquiry commissioners will be listening to witnesses and taking submissions from the public next in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Calgary, Edmonton, and Vancouver. They expect to release a final report this June.