She could have died from meningitis. Now this student wants more people to get vaccinated

When varsity athlete Megan Plamondon started feeling sick last November, she thought she'd pushed herself too hard on a twohour run.

The student at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., started feeling tired toward the end of her Sunday long run with her triathlon team‐ mates, but that wasn't un‐ usual - it was 17 kilometres, after all. She lay down to rest afterward, like she often would, but then she started feeling nauseated, and her head hurt.

By Sunday night, Plamon‐ don, 19, was still in bed with a cracking headache, stiff neck, and sensitivity to light. By the next morning, after a restless, painful night, she says she knew something was very wrong.

"I just wanted it to stop. It was the worst pain I'd ever felt in my life," Plamondon told CBC News. "I couldn't even keep water down. I would throw up water, throw up Advil, throw up every‐ thing."

After a series of phone calls with her mother, who pushed her to go to the hos‐ pital, Plamondon was eventu‐ ally diagnosed with a rare but life-threatening form of bac‐ terial meningitis, one of three cases that prompted Kingston health officials to warn of an increase in inva‐ sive meningococcal disease type B activity in the region.

She was the first case. Now she wants other people to know what she didn't: there is a vaccine specifically for meningococcal disease type B, but it's not offered routinely to the general pop‐ ulation.

Plamondon says she's grateful that, as she spent 10 days being treated with IV antibiotics in the hospital, she didn't really understand how serious meningitis can be. She didn't yet know that up to 10 per cent of people infected with IMD die, ac‐ cording to Health Canada, and complications include deafness, limb amputations and permanent brain dam‐ age.

"I would have been freak‐ ing out. I didn't think there was a remote possibility that I would die."

'We almost lost her' Invasive meningococcal disease (IMD) is a rare but life-threatening bacterial in‐ fection that can infect the brain and spinal cord, caus‐ ing meningitis, and the bloodstream, causing sep‐ ticemia. There are almost 200 cases in Canada per year on average.

Most IMD cases are caused by five types of bac‐ teria: A, B, C, Y and W-135, though in Canada, group B causes most illness, ac‐ cording to the Public Health Agency of Canada. The vac‐ cine for meningococcal B is‐ n't a routine vaccine like meningococcal C, typically given to babies at age one, or meningococcal ACYW-135, typically administered in Grade 7 in Ontario.

On Feb. 29, Kingston, Frontenac and Lennox & Addington Public Health (KFL&A) Public Health warned of an increase in in‐ vasive meningococcal dis‐ ease type B activity in the re‐ gion - three cases in recent months, including one pedi‐ atric case, Dr. Piotr Oglaza, medical officer of health at KFL&A Public Health, previ‐ ously told CBC News.

Lisa Farun's daughter, Carly, is the second case. Car‐ ly, 21, is another student at Queen's University.

"We almost lost her," Lisa Farun, who lives in Toronto, told CBC News. "It could have been different. And that is something that is devastating to me."

In December, Carly called her mother to say she was feeling unwell. Lisa says it sounded like she had a mi‐ graine; she offered to bring her daughter soup, but she said no, it wasn't that bad. By the next day, though, Carly was having difficulty speak‐ ing and was barely aware of what was going on around her.

Then, she fainted twice, Lisa said. Her roommates found her in her room in a confused state and called 911.

WATCH | Kids are behind on vaccines:

She was diagnosed with meningitis at the hospital, Lisa said, and it progressed quickly. Her daughter also had septicemia and her sys‐ tems were shutting down. She spent eight days in the hospital, seven of them in the ICU.

"It was an absolute night‐ mare," Farun said.

Now that Carly is fully re‐ covered, Farun wants to raise awareness, not only that this is a high-risk age group, but that there's a vaccine avail‐ able for this particular strain.

"This is something that is easily preventable."

In Kingston, they're rec‐ ommending the meningococ‐ cal B vaccine for people un‐ der age 25. The cost for the general population is about $160 per dose, with two doses required.

Currently, no provinces or territories cover the cost of the meningococcal B vaccine for all children, according to the Canadian Paediatric Soci‐ ety. But it is generally avail‐ able for people who have certain high-risk medical con‐ ditions, and it's also used for outbreak control.

In May 2023, Nova Scotia began offering the meningo‐ coccal B vaccine for free to people aged 25 and under living in group settings, such as university residences. In January, Prince Edward Island expanded its free vaccine eli‐ gibility to all post-secondary students.

Rare but deadly

While IMD cases in Cana‐ da are rare, outbreaks do oc‐ cur across the country, says a 2023 report from the Nation‐ al Advisory Committee on Im‐ munization.

Most cases came from children under age five and adolescents aged 15 to 19, the report said. University campuses in Atlantic Canada have had outbreaks in the last few years, including stu‐ dent deaths.

One of them, Acadia Uni‐ versity student Kai Matthews, 19, died of meningitis in June 2021. His family and friends formed the organization for Kai to support and pro‐ mote awareness of the meningococcal B vaccine.

"Kai left an ever-lasting mark on everyone who had the pleasure of knowing him," the family notes on the B for Kai website.

"If it only takes one per‐

B

son to make a difference, let Kai's death be the reason for change."

It's only because of stories like Matthews', and coverage of another student who died at Dalhousie University in 2022, that Plamondon's mother Marian Coke says she pushed her to go to the hos‐ pital.

The stories resonated with her because the Dal‐ housie student was the same age group as her daughter, Coke told CBC News from Ot‐ tawa. So she recognized the symptoms when she spoke with Plamondon.

"If I hadn't read that arti‐ cle about the girl at Dal‐ housie, I'm certain my daugh‐ ter wouldn't be alive," Coke said.

"It's like lightning. You can be dead in 24 hours."

Today, both Plamondon and Farun are back in class at Queen's University. The two don't know each other, and their cases were never con‐ nected, public health previ‐ ously confirmed with CBC News.

Plamondon says she's "pretty much" back to nor‐ mal, but racing still gives her a headache. She's sharing her story to raise awareness that the shot for meningo‐ coccal B isn't a routine vac‐ cine, but that there's an op‐ tion to protect yourself.

"The biggest issue is peo‐ ple don't know how serious it is. Everyone gets their menin‐ gitis shot in Grade 7 or Grade 8, and they assume they're good for life."