It is a tragedy. That life expectancy is so low for people suffering from the genetic disease affecting multiple body systems, lungs and digestive system so severely affected through cystic fibrosis. Very few sufferers seem to live beyond the age of 34. Those so dreadfully afflicted can hope for a lung transplantation procedure, which can stretch the survival years up to another five years of life.

For Jessica Forsyth of Ottawa, who died on Saturday at age 25, a young woman with a determined, scintillating personality, who when she was able to, acted as a spokesperson for the Cystic Fibrosis Canada Ottawa chapter, and a volunteer at Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, raising awareness and research funding, it was a personal tragedy. For her, for her bereaved parents, for the community which knew her best.

Jessica Forsyth, dead at age 25 on Saturday, 19 July, 2014, of complications from cystic fibrosis: photograph, Facebook

Another young cystic fibrosis sufferer, also a pert and lively 21-year-old young woman by the name of Helene Campbell, had done her part in arousing awareness in the general public about what it is like to live with cystic fibrosis and the agony of impaired breathing and swallowing. She awaited a double lung transplant which finally took place at Toronto General Hospital in April 2012.




She has since been active, both in telling her own story of her battle against this dread disease, and in helping other families cope. A year after her own successful double lung transplant, she partnered with the Toronto General and Western Hospital Foundation in the creation of the Give2Live campaign, whose purpose is to aid thirty patients and their families on the transplant waiting list.


Some 200 families in Ottawa and four thousand across Canada are affected by the disease.

No cure has yet surfaced, although treatments are available. And recently an announcement came forward that a new type of drug meant for those with a specific type of cystic fibrosis has been developed and is being covered by the Province of Ontario through medicare. The drug, Kalydeco, meant to treat people with the G551D variation, a rare strain of cystic fibrosis can cost up to $300,000 annually.