A pair of coroner’s reports are shedding light on two women who were discovered dead after the Montreal power outage in January.
One of the women, the Coroner’s office said, died as a direct result of having no power or heat in her apartment, while the other died before the electricity went out from Jan. 24 to 27.
Paulina Abarca-Cantin is the executive director at Seniors Action Quebec, and would like the tragic news to be taken much more seriously.
“We will likely see more of that again,” she said.
She said seniors suffering through the cold months is a constant concern, with some cutting back on heating costs to make ends meet.
“We’ve been really shocked about the number of people who have had to cut back on hydro and medication, whether the hydropower is being cut off itself, or they are simply living in very cold environments,” she said.
Abarca-Cantin said Meals on Wheels staff and care workers often arrive at seniors’ homes to find them bundled up under multiple layers.
Sheila Padmore, 87, was found confused, unable to get up from the floor, with cold hands on Jan. 25, the day after power went out in her Notre-Dame-de-Grâce (NDG) neighbourhood, the coroner’s report found.
She had been waiting for the electricity to come back with her 91-year-old husband when a neighbour called police for a wellness check.
Padmore arrived at the hospital suffering from hypothermia and a core temperature of 24.5 degrees Celsius, unable to stand and suffering repeated cardiac arrests.
She died on Jan. 26.
“Sheila Padmore died of severe hypothermia resulting from prolonged exposure to the cold in a home without heat following a power outage,” stated Coroner Marie-Claude Boutin’s report.
A second coroner’s report, also written by Boutin, found that Miriam Foox, 66, died alone on Jan. 23 in her Montreal West home, likely before the power outage occurred.
Foox was found face down near her bed in her apartment on Jan. 25 with a CPAP mask on.
The temperature in her apartment was around 10 degrees Celsius, according to the report.
The report said that her medical records showed that she suffered from severe, chronic pulmonary and cardiovascular conditions, including sleep apnea, hypertension and diabetes.
She also did not use her CPAP or oxygen therapy machine properly.
On the day she died, the report stated that a nurse visited her apartment and noted that she was confused, with low oxygen saturation and other symptoms.
She refused transport to a hospital after agreeing to wear her CPAP machine without interruption.
“The death of Ms. Miriam Foox was due to acute decompensation of chronic mixed respiratory failure,” the report said. “It was a natural death.”
Outage affected around 15K customers
Hydro-Quebec offered condolences and said the outage was caused by a failure at the Hamstead substation, and affected around 15,000 customers.
“In the context of this event, which was as unpredictable as it was exceptional, Hydro-Quebec took every measure at its disposal to restore service as quickly as possible, while working closely with the municipal authorities responsible for civil protection,” spokesperson Audrey St-Pierre said. “Throughout the outage, communication was maintained with affected customers. Warming centres and door-to-door outreach were also set up by civil protection partners to support the most vulnerable individuals.”
Abarca-Cantin said her organization often hears about situations like both Foox and Padmore, where seniors are too proud to let family know they are struggling or ashamed to ask for help.
“There is a lot of isolation within the seniors’ community,” she said. “Considering that this generation or those two generations, depending on how long the lifespan, built our societies, built our communities, it’s extraordinary that they feel they don’t want to be a burden to their families or to other people.”
Seniors Action Quebec says the province has the highest number of older residents than any province in Canada, which will reach 25 per cent by 2031.
“We’re not hearing any of the party leaders address these issues in through the lens of older adults,” said Abarca-Cantin.
Quebec says there are 2,020,924 people over 65 years old of the 9,067,114, which is 22 per cent of the population.
Seniors Action Quebec would like to see better palliative care, better care for older adults and more conversation about their issues.
“We do wish that the five party leaders were seeing and hearing Quebec’s English-speaking seniors and seniors from all cultural backgrounds seeing their issues in this election, because whether you see them or not, they’re here, and we will be seeing it more and more,” said Abarca-Cantin.
