Christina Derksen-Unrau and her husband Arlen Unrau need to raise more than $20,000 in order for her to receive a life-saving lung transplant.

Image Credit: Christina Derksen-Unrau's GoFundMe

Unlike the United States, Canada boasts free and accessible healthcare for all of its citizens but money still stands in the way between life and death.

The primary objective of the Canada Health Act is “to protect, promote and restore the physical and mental wellbeing of residents of Canada… without financial or other barriers.”

But for Princeton resident Christina Derksen-Unrau, money is the one thing standing in the way of a life-saving lung transplant.

Derksen-Unrau has suffered from asthma and allergies her whole life, but her health problems came to a head when she was diagnosed with lung cancer five years ago.

“Between asthma, lung cancer and emphysema, it just pushed me over the edge where my lungs can't do it anymore,” she told iNFOnews.ca.

Since her diagnosis, Derksen-Unrau has had to undergo more than 58 different tests in order to get approval to be on a transplant list.

However, just 26 days before Derksen-Unrau was scheduled to have her first in-person meeting with her transplant team, she was informed that if she did not have access to at least $20,000 to cover the costs of living in Vancouver while she received treatment, she would be taken off the transplant waitlist.

“Hi Christina, you need to let us know that you will be able to cover the cost of your housing arrangements and all other living expenses for a minimum of three to six months in Vancouver. This commitment is required for all lung transplant patients," the letter said.

Derksen-Unrau had no way to access that kind of money.

“We were angry. We were distraught. We were just terrified,” she said.

Derksen-Unrau had no other option but to turn to her community and ask for donations. 

“My choices are I either come up with this money to save my life or I die,” she said. “But our little town rallied behind us, and the day before we met with the transplant team we managed to get the twenty grand together.”

Derksen-Unrau had to provide evidence of the donation money she had received on a crowdfunding donation site to doctors before her transplant meeting.

These kind of paywalls in healthcare are usually associated with the United States.

“In the States, they'll just give you a bill and yeah, you spend the rest of your life paying for it, but they don't hold you hostage until you have that money,” she said.

Derksen-Unrau will receive $2,400 from Employment Insurance Benefits, which will not be enough to cover her stay in Vancouver on top of her mortgage and bills in Princeton.

“It's not like I'm asking the government to buy me a new car,” she said. “I'm asking them to help save my life. Is my life not valuable?”

Additionally, Derksen-Unrau’s husband, Arlen Unrau, will sign a contract with the Vancouver General Hospital transplant team and commit to being her 24/7 caregiver.

Arlen is the sole financial provider of the family, but when he becomes his wife’s full-time caretaker he will have no other choice but to quit his job.

“I love my wife and I'm doing everything I can. But it's not enough,” Arlen said. “It makes you feel less of a man, I guess, right? And it's pretty humbling to have to give the nod to say, okay, let's go start a GoFundMe.”

“We shouldn't have to throw all self-respect out the door and ask for help,” Arlen said. “When our government is spending money in every other location, every other cause you can think of, we seem to have millions for that. We don't have enough for this.”

Paul Adams, Executive Director of the non-profit organization BC Rural Health Network, calls Derksen-Unrau a “champion”.

Adams has spoken to multiple people in Derksen-Unrau’s position who have lost their lives without receiving the care they needed.

“It impacts people financially, but really the bigger picture is that it's costing people their lives based on their location and their diagnosis,” Adams told iNFOnews.ca. “That shouldn't happen anywhere. But it definitely shouldn't be happening in B.C. and in Canada.”

“Solid organ transplant recipients are looking at tens of thousands of dollars in post-surgical care to stay in Vancouver. That in itself is a significant inequity. But if you look at it just from the standpoint of travel to care and distance to travel, that happens way before the transplant.”

Derksen-Unrau said that seeing her husband suffer under financial pressure alongside her health issues has broken her heart.

“Me and my husband are soulmates," she said. "We are so connected that what hurts him, hurts me. What hurts me, hurts him.”

The cost of living in Vancouver is only increasing while Derksen-Unrau waits for a donor.

Derksen-Unrau knows of two other women who have had to pay upwards of $40,000 to cover their stay in Vancouver while receiving treatment over seven months.

On top of this, the transplant could happen on any day and at any time, giving Derksen-Unrau and her husband Arlen Unrau just 11 hours to get to Vancouver for the surgery and for Arlen Unrau to find housing.

“Somebody has to die that matches my blood type, my antibodies and my size and then they have 11 hours to transplant those lungs into someone else or they're useless,” Derksen-Unrau said.

To catch a flight, Derksen-Unrau and her husband would have to drive to their nearest airport in Penticton, Kelowna or Kamloops, making the fastest mode of transport a three-and-a-half-hour drive, so long as weather and traffic aren’t an issue. 

“Even after enduring all this, Chris's real battle starts (with the transplant) because this transplant is going to be the toughest thing she's ever faced,” Arlen said. “The number one risk is that I could watch her roll through the operating room doors and never see her again. There's a percentage that don't make it off the surgery table.”

Derksen-Unrau and her husband live a private life and say that the immense outpouring of support through their GoFundMe page has been overwhelming.

“I had one gentleman who donated $5 through the GoFundMe. Then he sent me a message and it just broke my heart,” Derksen-Unrau said, tearing up. “He says, I'm sorry I couldn't send you any more but I'm disabled and I live on a disability pension, but I hope my $5 helps. And it just brought me to tears because I'm thinking, here's this gentleman that most likely gave up a meal to help me. How incredible is that?”

Once she recovers from her treatment, Derksen-Unrau is committed to making sure no one else has the same experience as her.

“Once I get my new lungs and I'm back healthy, I'm going to spend the rest of my life advocating for change so that nobody ever has to sit where I'm sitting right now,” she said. “Because one person dying is one person too many. It shouldn't be happening in Canada.”

More information about Derksen-Unrau's GoFundMe page can be found here.

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