All Linda Kayfish wants from the B.C. Ministry of Health is an apology and answers to a few basic questions.

“I’m not calling for anything else,” she said in a telephone interview. “An explanation would be nice.”

Kayfish’s brother, Roderick MacIsaac, was fired by the ministry in August 2012. He committed suicide four months later.

When the 46-year-old drug researcher was relieved of his position he was a co-op student, only three days away from completing research required for his PhD.

The B.C. Coroners Service investigated the matter. While that office legally cannot assign blame, an October 2013 report comes close. It states: “Mr. MacIsaac had been experiencing significant personal stress commencing the end of August 2012 related to occupational and academic matters that had arisen in his life.”

MacIsaac was one of eight ministry employees or contractors who lost their jobs in relation to alleged privacy breaches involving pharmaceutical data.

All of those individuals filed claims of wrongful dismissal. Some remain outstanding while at least three have been rehired by the ministry.

Kayfish said she’s happy that some researchers are working again. “But I still have no answer,” she added. “Why were these people so publicly humiliated?

“The government has been looking into this matter for two years,” she continued. “I’ve been waiting for the government to have its day in court…but it seems there is no day in court. Just closed-door settlements.”

A June 2013 report by the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner for British Columbia provides some details about the data breaches that sparked the ministry’s investigation. However, it also downplays the seriousness of those breaches. It states that the ministry “might have been authorized to disclose the personal information to the contracted researcher and employer” but failed to do so.

Furthermore, in June 2013, the Straight reported that similar incidents are not uncommon, noting that Vancouver reporter Bob Mackin obtained a government list of 350 data breaches recorded between January 2, 2010, and December 31, 2012.

Kayfish was joined on the call by John Horgan, leader of the B.C. NDP and MLA for Juan de Fuca.

“What we ask for today in support of Linda and [her husband] Doug and all of the individuals involved is a direct and unequivocal apology from the government for using power in such an abusive way,” he said.

The B.C. Ministry of Health did not respond to a request for an interview, or to requests for a copy of a written statement that was emailed to other media outlets after Kayfish made a public plea for an apology on September 30.

Since August 2013, the ministry has refused at least a dozen interview requests filed by the Straight in relation to the firings.

Horgan argued that the individuals ultimately responsible for the flawed investigation and subsequent firings are mostly still in government.

Mike de Jong, health minister at the time, is now the province’s minister of finance.

John Dyble, then deputy minister of health services, today holds the position of deputy minister to the premier.

Graham Whitmarsh, another former deputy health minister who, according to Horgan, is understood to have initiated proceedings against the drug researchers, was removed from that position after the provincial election last fall. He was given a severance of $250,000.

“Why did they do this?” Horgan asked.

Update: B.C. Health Ministry apologizes to family of deceased drug researcher