Heather Evans nearly died — twice in the same day.
The Calgary resident had two back-to-back heart attacks in 2004, at the age of just 39. One of her sisters had already suffered a heart attack at only 36. Over the next two decades, a devastating pattern became clear: coronary artery disease ran in Evans’s family, and eventually claimed the lives of five of her seven siblings.
“There are always these empty chairs at the table," Evans told CBC News. "We look at each other and it's just … profound sadness and a profound heartache that just never goes away."
A new report on global deaths, published Sunday in The Lancet medical journal , shows that the top causes of mortality around the world are shifting back to familiar threats like heart disease, dislodging COVID-19 as the No. 1 global killer.
Evans's last remaining sister is now in palliative care, while her last remaining brother is experiencing heart failure. At the age of 61, Evans’s own heart is failing, too. But through exercise, a healthy diet and having quadruple bypass open-heart surgery in 2018, she’s doggedly trying to ward off one of the world’s top causes of death.
“It's going to e
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