The woman who championed the revitalization of downtown Halifax as head of its business commission has died.
Kate Carmichael died Wednesday night after a long battle with cancer. She was 51.
Ms. Carmichael gained national attention with her public struggle against the disease and blunt talk about her eventual death.
She was diagnosed with a virulent form of leukemia in November, 1999, and continued to keep a busy work schedule while undergoing treatments that included regular blood transfusions.
Ms. Carmichael used her public profile to promote leukemia research and blood donations. And she became a champion of medicare, praising the compassionate care she received.
In interviews last year, she talked freely about death and argued it shouldn't be a taboo subject.
The fear of dying, she said, is like the fear of giving birth. You wonder how it will happen.
"And as you get closer and closer to giving birth, you mellow," she said. "You realize that hundreds of thousands of women have gone before you and it's just fine and it's just a rite of passage."
Ms. Carmichael was a former Halifax councillor who also ran in the 1997 provincial election.
"She was a special person in many, many ways," her husband, Alan Parish said. "The last year was a real gift."
Mr. Parish said her death this week was expected because she decided to stop taking blood products about 10 days ago.
"Her health was dependent upon getting blood transfusions," Mr. Parish said. "She fought so publicly to impress upon people the importance of giving blood, and it just shows how important those blood donations were to her over the past two years."
Karin McCaskill, chairwoman of the business commission, said Ms. Carmichael had planned to stop the transfusions if she became unable to work as well as she wanted.
"It would have really prolonged a miserable lingering that often comes at the end of the lives of people who are suffering from leukemia and [other]cancers," Ms. McCaskill said.
"Her injection and her involvement in the downtown and throughout Halifax has been, and will be, felt for years to come," said Halifax Mayor Peter Kelly.
"When she was still going strong, I was amazed. It was unbelievable," said former Halifax mayor Walter Fitzgerald.