Witness Testimony

Dr. Misha Susoeff, a dentist practicing in Alberta for 17 years, testified that voluntary informed consent is foundational under the Health Professions Act and that consent is invalidated when external pressures influence a patient’s medical decision. He described observing what he termed a “post-consent world,” where mandates, employment requirements, and social pressures functioned as third-party influences in clinical decision-making. He stated that healthcare practitioners are responsible for ensuring consent remains voluntary and expressed concern that this principle was not upheld during the pandemic.
He recounted making social media posts comparing vaccine passport policies to historical internal passport systems imposed on Indigenous peoples in Canada, noting private support but public silence from colleagues, which he interpreted as professional self-censorship. Economically, he testified that one of his family’s seasonal businesses closed due to repeated lockdowns and that he and his wife considered relocating outside Canada. Within his dental practice, he described heightened patient fear, enhanced protective protocols, and no documented in-office COVID transmission.
Dr. Susoeff further testified that prior to the pandemic he did not recall any patient deaths occurring mid-treatment, but reported 17 such instances in the three years following vaccine rollout, while acknowledging limitations in drawing causal conclusions. He stated that patients frequently volunteered associations between new medical conditions and vaccination, including reports of pacemakers, diabetes, tinnitus, and aggressive cancer in a staff member’s spouse, though he emphasized temporal correlation rather than causation. He concluded by expressing disappointment in professional regulatory bodies and asserting that complaints should be filed where consent was compromised.