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WATERFORD, Ireland (LifeSiteNews) — Residents of a southern Irish city turned out to protest the experimental COVID-19 jabs after a young athlete died soon after receiving one.

Saturday’s demonstration in Waterford, which began at a vaccination center and grew as it moved through the city center, was attended by several hundred people. 

Roy Butler, 23, who once played professionally with the Waterford United association football club, is said to have taken the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine, otherwise known as the Janssen shot, on Friday, August 13. According to reports online, he was later rushed to hospital after suffering headaches, vomiting, and fits. He died the following Tuesday, August 17.

A cousin of the well-known Waterford native told followers that Roy had developed a bleed on his brain due to the vaccine, which eventually saw the 23-year-old footballer tragically pass away just four days after being injected. 

With news of Butler’s death spreading on social media, there was widespread criticism of the perceived attempt by mainstream media outlets to ignore claims by people close to the victim, including his aunt, that the injection had caused the young man’s demise. 

On Saturday, seven days after Butler’s funeral, hundreds of protestors from the area stood peacefully with signs outside the vaccination center at Waterford Institute of Technology to voice their opposition to the injections, with some warning that “people are hiding the truth.” 

“It can’t be coincidental that a healthy young man who played football to a high standard could suddenly die like that,” protestor Padraic Walsh told one cameraman at the event. 

 “…[I]t couldn’t have been that he died from a ‘short illness’, which is what the local papers are saying.”    

“There’s poor Roy now…” another protestor lamented. “It’s so, so sad really, you know, when I see what’s happening in the country.” 

After several speeches and reciting the Our Father together, the group then travelled three miles from the vaccination center to the city center, where they were followed by members of An Garda Síochána, the Irish police force. 

Banging bodhráns (Irish drums) as they marched through the streets, demonstrators shouted “No to the vaccines” and “Freedom” as more and more people joined the rally.  

Signs read “No more lies!”, “Why inject children?”, “It’s causing deaths”, and “Are you risking your fertility?” with other homemade posters simply saying “Stop V”. 

Ireland had seen several significant demonstrations earlier in the summer against lockdowns and the use of vaccine passports, which are now required for access to pubs and restaurants, but the weekend’s gathering represents the first large protest in the country against Covid-19 vaccines in particular.  

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