Trade unionist ‘felt like I was just going to collapse’ after taking COVID-19 jab 

A local trade unionist has disclosed that for two weeks after taking the COVID-19 vaccine, he “felt like I was just going to collapse”.

Elroy Boucher, who is president of the Public Service Union, made the disclosure on Boom FM this week.

Boucher was at the time speaking about an experience at Milton Cato Memorial Hospital, where he went last Thursday after waking up around 2:30 a.m. with a pounding headache and elevated blood pressure.

He said that he was not attended to by a doctor at the emergency room as a nurse told him that the doctor was resting.

Boucher said that after getting up from her rest two hours after he arrived at the Accident and Emergency Department of Milton Cato Memorial Hospital, the doctor did not examine him but told him that when he wakes with an elevated blood pressure he should pray and go back to sleep.

If, after doing this, he wakes up again with an elevated blood pressure, he should pray again and go back to sleep, Boucher quoted the doctor as saying.

He said the doctor said he should visit the emergency room if his blood pressure is still high after waking up a third time in a night, having prayed and returned to bed on the first two occasions. 

Boucher said that before the doctor spoke to him ,a nurse had done an EKG and said that she had noticed an abnormality.

The nurse went to the doctor with the EKG, Boucher said, but the doctor did not analyse it.

“I was concerned about this EKG primarily for one reason,” Boucher said. 

He said that he took the COVID-19 vaccine before the government mandated that public sector workers take the jab by December 2021.

 “… when I took the vaccine, … I had some heart issues,” Boucher said.

He said he plays soccer, recreationally. “And like two weeks after taking the second dose, I was playing right in Victoria Park with some of my colleagues who are also doctors. And two weeks straight felt like I was just going to collapse. So during those, I had to just walk off the field,” Boucher said.

Boucher said he asked his friends what was happening and whether it was related to the COVID-19 vaccine.

“… and they say people have been complaining of similar experiences and you need to go to the hospital and check your heart. 

“So I had done an EKG back then and they said it was okay. And I was told to do an echo. But I had gone home and done some research about myocarditis, etc. and what was happening to people during that period, that whole hype in the states.”

Boucher said he learnt that what he was experiencing would resolve itself over a four- to six-week period “and if not, you may have permanent damage”. 

He said that his condition subsided after about four weeks and he never had another issue since then, adding that he had never had a heart issue before the vaccine.

Boucher said this is why he was so concerned when the nurse told her she had seen an abnormality on the EKG.

“… because I couldn’t believe something can be resurfacing since two years ago, when I had no other issues.”

He said he sent to a doctor overseas a photograph of the EKG and the doctor told him he was normal and offered him some medical advice.

Boucher’s union, along with the Teachers’ Union and the Police Welfare Association opposed the mandatory vaccination of public sector workers, under which hundreds of public sector workers lost their jobs.

The unions sued the government over the mandate and the High Court ruled in March that the mandate was unconstitutional and that the workers never ceased to hold their positions and are entitled to all salaries and benefits they would have received had it not been for the mandate.

The government has appealed the ruling and the hearing of the appeal  is pending.