Meritorious Service Medal

• Awarded on: November 25, 2004
• Invested on: May 30, 2005

Pierre Lavoie, M.S.M., La Baie, Quebec
Meritorious Service Medal (civil division)

Following the death of his children, aged four years and 20 months respectively, triathlete Pierre Lavoie created the Pierre Lavoie Challenge in 1999, which consists of a 650-km bicycling tour over a 24-hour period. Through this annual initiative, Mr. Lavoie aims at heightening the regional communities’ awareness of the gravity of a fatal hereditary disease known as lactic acidosis. Since their beginning, the Pierre Lavoie Challenge events have raised some $500 000 to help finance research on this illness, which is prevalent in the Saguenay region of Quebec, affecting one child in every 2 000 in that area.