'A good kid': Family mourns son, 32, who died of COVID-19

Jevin Potvin diedjust as his father thought he mightfinally be turning a corner.

For more than half his life, the 32-year-oldhad battledaddictions to opioids and other drugs. He'dbeen using a wheelchair for roughly the past five yearsafter a blood infection from a needle damaged his spine.

Even so, right up until the end, his father, Dan Potvin, remainedguardedly optimistic. His son hadbeenclean formonths, and while he was in hospital for his myriad health problems, he was set to be discharged in late April to the family's farm in rural south Ottawa.

Before that could happen, Jevin came down with a fever. The doctors said it was COVID-19. Given his already compromised immune system, hewas placed in isolation.

They said there was nothing they could do, no surgeries. So the Sunday, they pulled the plugand that was that.- Dan Potvin

On May 3,two weeks after the COVID-19 diagnosis, the hospital called Dan Potvin and said his son wasnon-responsive.

"They did a brain scanand they discovered he had a bleed on his brain from the medication, because I guess he was on heavy blood thinners for the COVID. It's one of the things they do," said Potvinfrom thefarm late last month. "And he never woke up."

"They said there was nothing they could do, no surgeries. So the Sunday, they pulled the plugand that was that."

'Before his time'

Jevin Potvin died "before his time," his father says. And when it comes to COVID-19, the statistics back that up.

As of Sunday, Nov. 8, Ottawa Public Health (OPH) had attributed 341deaths locally to COVID-19.

More than two-thirds of those deaths, 250 in all, have beenpeople 80 and older. Fifty-one people in their 70s have died of COVID-19, 29 people in their 60sand nine people in their 50s.

Among 30-somethings, OPH, which doesn't identifyindividuals who've died fromcoronavirus,has only connected one local death to COVID-19. That's in line withthe national numbers: Health Canada's ongoing tabulation of COVID-19 statistics has confirmed only 17 deaths nationwide amongpeoplein the 30-39 age group, or roughly 0.2 per cent of the country's overall death toll.

Immunocompromised individuals are significantly more likely to develop serious complications from COVID-19,however. Jevin's family doesn't doubt that his bad health he'd had back and heart surgeries since losing the use of his legs, and was in near-constant pain contributed to the complications that caused his death.

Nevertheless, before he died,they still held out hope.

"You could see it in his face. You can just tell, right, when he's not using. The last six months, he was doing really well. So I had hope that ... he'll be able to get on with his life," Dan Potvin said.

"It looked like he was going to beat it."

'A good kid'

While Jevin Potvin's family is up front about his struggles with addictionand the troublethatgot him into, they also remember him in his father's words as a "typical young man."

Jevin would help out on the farm as a youngster, picking stones and driving the tractors. He wentto high school in nearby Kars, and he liked skateboarding and going on fishing trips.

His younger sisterJessica recalled how much he loved the animated television seriesBeavis and Butthead, and how he'd often impersonate the two main characters.

"His spirit was a jokester. And you know, he [always] wanted to have fun,"she said. "His life was very troubled, but that's what I try to hold on [to] as his true memory."

In more recent years, Jevinhadtaken to posting YouTube videosreviewing the variousLego sets he'd completed. Before he died, heexpressed an interest in going back to school to study architecture, his father said.

"He got lost somewhere along the way," Dan Potvin said."He was a good kid."

Over the next few weeks, CBC Ottawa will be telling the stories of some of the people who have died ofCOVID-19. If you've lost someone to the pandemicand want to share more about what they meant to you, please let us know by sending us anemail.