By Canadian Press

Duvernay-Tardif joins front-line workers at Quebec long-term care facility

Apr 27, 2020 | 2:51 PM

MONTREAL — A Quebec-born Super Bowl champion is making the move from the offensive line to the medical front line.

Kansas City Chiefs offensive guard Laurent Duvernay-Tardif is working at a long-term care facility in Quebec to help fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

Duvernay-Tardif’s agent Sasha Ghavami confirmed the news but declined to share which residence his client is working in.

“It was very important for Laurent to help,” Ghavami said. “He’s very happy to be able to put his services to use to help out with what’s needed right now in our society in terms of being able to help in nursing homes.”

The St-Jean-Baptiste, Que., native, who holds a medical degree, told Sports Illustrated he was assigned to a facility on Montreal’s South Shore near his hometown.

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“It’s wild to think that just 10 weeks earlier I played in the biggest game in sports,” Duvernay-Tardif said in the Sports Illustrated piece published Monday morning.

“I was reminded of that even at the facility, when one of the people training me turned and said, ‘You’re the football player, right?’ When I answered yes, he said, ‘Bro, you just won the Super Bowl.’ Indeed, I told him, and now I just want to help.”

Premier Francois Legault thanked the 29-year old Duvernay-Tardif, and Olympic medal-winning figure skater Joannie Rochette, for joining hundreds of other health-care workers who have signed up to help in understaffed long-term care facilities.

“I have to tell you, it’s like a weight that has been lifted from my shoulders, to see that at last, we are filling all the positions and regaining control in our seniors residences,” Legault said in Quebec City Monday.

“It really touches me, all these people with courage, because it takes a certain courage to come work in our (long-term care centres.) Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Duvernay-Tardif graduated from McGill University’s faculty of medicine in 2018.

Rochette, 34, who won bronze at the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games, received her medical degree from McGill last week and said she expects to be deployed to a care home soon.

This report was first published by The Canadian Press on April 27, 2020.

Julian McKenzie, The Canadian Press