Blue Bombers legend Milt Stegall is one of our co-spokespeople for the the 2020 HSC Millionaire Lottery – and he stopped by Global Winnipeg to tell Kahla Evans about why he’s giving back to the community and province that embraced him.
“The first thing I saw when I got to Winnipeg was Friendly Manitoba,” he said of our province’s famous, accurate slogan. “And it’s been that way ever since – everyone giving back, providing for each other.”
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Christopher Greenfield, an active 42-year-old whose pastimes include biking in the Rockies, rock climbing, days-long canoe trips, and 18 kilometre runs, never thought one of his biggest hurdles would be walking 75 feet.
Last July, Greenfield, a carpenter for 12 years, fell three storeys down an elevator shaft on a job site.
Miraculously, Greenfield landed on his feet. “All I remember was seeing floors whiz by me—I didn’t even have a chance to look down,” says Greenfield. “If I landed on my head—or if I fell from higher up—I likely wouldn’t be here.”
A 1.2 litre bone marrow transplant from Tasha, Nick’s sister, saved his life.
“Does your son work around chemicals?”
The doctor’s question rang through Wanda’s mind as she recounted the life of Nick, her 21-year-old son. “No, he doesn’t work around chemicals. He’s a healthy young man who has played hockey his whole life, including on the competitive St. Paul’s High School team. He has never been to a hospital or needed to see a doctor for anything aside from a croup cough when he was two.”
Nineteen years, 228 months, 6,935 days, 166,440 hours—but who’s counting? Health Sciences Centre kidney transplant patient Kathy Urban is. Since receiving her kidney in the fall of 2001, every second is a gift.
Beausejour-born, Winnipeg-raised Urban is no stranger to the health care system. A retired health information services supervisor of 35 years, Urban was diagnosed in her early twenties with bilateral polycystic kidney disease, a chronic disease where cysts grow inside the kidneys, causing them to fail.
For the next 22 years, Urban dealt with many appointments, followed by anxiously waiting for results, until the dreaded day came in December of 1999. “At my routine check-up, I was informed that I’d be on dialysis within the year. I don’t even remember how I got home that day—I just cried and cried and cried,” says Urban.
“I wouldn’t be alive without HSC”
John Buchanan Bond Jr. has counted on the expertise of HSC Winnipeg many times since moving from Indiana in 1974. Forty years ago, HSC brought Bond ’s son into the world; 15 years ago, HSC began supporting Bond through kidney disease; and 11 years ago, HSC was there when his wife Sharon was diagnosed with leukemia and passed away only 10 days later.
