Witness Testimony

Louise MacDonald, a former retail manager with extensive experience reconciling financial data, testified regarding her independent review of Government of Canada COVID-19 reporting. After experiencing medication-induced kidney failure in 2015, she developed an interest in researching pharmaceutical data. During the pandemic, she collected and archived federal Health InfoBase reports, NACI statements, and vaccine safety publications, focusing primarily on case-by-vaccination-status reports and serious adverse event reporting.
She testified that early federal case reports compared long periods of unvaccinated data with shorter periods of fully vaccinated data, and that subsequent changes to vaccination categories altered how results appeared. She stated that the government later subdivided vaccination groups while discontinuing visible reporting of certain partially vaccinated categories, although those figures were still counted in cumulative totals. She expressed concern that comparisons across unequal timeframes and changing classifications could misrepresent proportional outcomes.
MacDonald also described tracking weekly and monthly serious adverse event reports, stating that cumulative historical figures were repeatedly revised. She testified that adverse event totals were added retroactively for up to one year and 44 weeks after initial reporting and, after August 19, 2022, cumulative totals began declining without explanation. Based on reporting rates per 100,000 doses administered, she questioned how safety determinations and booster authorizations were made while reporting delays and revisions were ongoing.