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Big Oil Faces Mounting Legal Battles Over Climate Threats to its New England Oil Terminals
Posted August 13, 2020 by Anonymous
Read time: 5 mins
A New England-based environmental law group is taking major oil companies to court, claiming the firms have failed to adapt some of their petroleum storage terminals to withstand increasingly severe storm and flooding events worsened by the climate crisis.
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Saturday Stories: Herd Immunity Is Up To Us, #SchoolsBeforeBars, Another Pandemic, And The American Dumpster Fire
Posted July 18, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
James Hamblin, in The Atlantic, with an explainer on how herd immunity might only require 20% of us to be immune (whether by vaccine or infection) if we are diligent with our behaviours.
Paul Krugman, in The New York Times, on how the rush to open bars before schools threatens our kids’ education.
Ed Yong, in The Atlantic, considers what might happen were we to be facing another pandemic before we’ve figured out how to deal with COVID
Helen Branswell, in STAT, on how to fix the American dumpster fire that is their response to COVID to date.
U.S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Levi Riendeau / Public domain
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- Saturday Stories: No Heroes In Science, Selflessness, School Reopening, And Vaccine Developments
- Saturday Stories: Peer Review, #Masks4All, Talking To Kids, And The Public Health Of Protests
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How Canadian is this scandal, really?
Posted July 13, 2020 by Anonymous
So I guess the Globe and Mail thinks we’re supposed to be outraged now that prominent Canadians have raised money for an outstanding charity?
What a typically Canadian scandal this is.
I guess only non-entities like me are ever supposed to raise money for charities – over the years I have given a few bucks to the Saskatoon Food Bank and the Canadian Wildlife Federation, and I went door-to-door for the Heart and Stroke Foundation, and for Diabetes Canada.
So as far as the Globe and Mail is concerned, that’s OK as long as I never achieve any public prominence or get active in politics years after.
Because hey, how dare people like Katie Telford and Seamus O’Regan, back in 2010, years before they were involved in politics, volunteer to work on creating artworks in developing countries, to support a charity then called Free The Children which later morphed into WE Charity and then later still got money from the feds to run a gigantic volunteer effort to give Canadian university students some support during COVID summer.
Can’t have that. This corruption must be STOPPED I tell you! And The Globe and Mail is ON IT!
I guess if I ever do become a cabinet minister or something, I’ll have to make very very sure that I never never have anything to do with any decisions around funding for, say, the Heart and Stroke Foundation. After all, I could be charged with having an awful and corrupt conflict of interest, I guess.
What I learned about Canadian politics this week: charities that administer services to young people bear a level of scrutiny that a pipeline company given billions from the Alberta taxpayer for Keystone (which will never be built) doesn’t have to face#cdnpoli
— DJ Chocolate Milk (@DJChocolateMLK) July 11, 2020
I would think that sometime next week, or maybe the week after, we will start seeing news stories with Conservatives and NDP expressing deep deep concern for the horrible situation of Canadian post-secondary students, with lots of hand wringing about what in the world they are going to do for money to pay tuition this fall. Somehow, its all going to be Trudeau’s fault again of course.
Oh gag me with a spoon.
Trudeau’s Canada Student Service Grant idea was a good one, innovative and useful, another Trudeau success.
Oh, can’t have that. Not during a Conservative leadership campaign, when they were all just desperate to knock the Liberals off their perch at a time when Trudeau is so popular across Canada and around the world. It had to be trashed, and trashed it has been.
Of course they had to trash an outstanding Canadian children’s charity while they were at it, but can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs.
So what can be done now? Well, nothing. I might be wrong but I think its too late to fix it this summer.
Trudeau should just expand CERB eligibility to anyone who intends to go to school in the fall. Move the Student Service Grant funds into the CERB budget, and let students claim the benefit for July and August, and just be done with it. I think they would each get about $4,000, which would be something.
And he can urge them to volunteer somewhere, too. Maybe the service grant program can continue in the fall and winter, when government staff will have the time to run it.
Ending this post on a more cheerful note, here’s some funny:
REASONS TO NOT WEAR A FACE MASK pic.twitter.com/Ah75mzSF24
— Brittlestar (@brittlestar) July 10, 2020
This is how the evolution of the desk works pic.twitter.com/1NcmZ17epV
— I Didn’t Know That (@lDidNotKnowThat) July 12, 2020
— NotHereForYourBS🇨🇦🇬🇧🏴🦄🌈📚🎧☕️ (@1peculiarchik) July 13, 2020
You need this. We all need this. #LoveWins#FreshTweets @thegoodgodabove TY
— Southern Sister Resister (@ResisterSis20) July 10, 2020
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Saturday Stories: Is It Airborne?, Exhausted Experts, Sweden, Cancer During COVID, And Schools
Posted July 11, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Apoorva Mandavilli, in The New York Times, with a discussion on whether or not SARS-CoV2 is airborne and what that actually means.
Ed Yong, in The Atlantic, covers the toll COVID19 has had on the “not ok” experts covering, studying, and managing it.
Peter S. Goodman, in The New York Times, with the cautionary lesson from Sweden that it’s the virus, not quarantines, that devastate the economy.
Bill Gardner, in the Incidental Economist, with his (first on this topic) blog post highlighting the realities he’s facing after being diagnosed with cancer, in Canada, during the time of COVID.
Jennifer Couzin-Frankel, Gretchen Vogel, and Meagan Weiland, in Science, summarize the a bit all over the place data on reopening schools around the globe
Photo by Alex Valavanis / CC BY-SA
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- Saturday Stories: Peer Review, #Masks4All, Talking To Kids, And The Public Health Of Protests
- Saturday Stories: COVID And Kids With Disabilities, Racist Statues, COVID Death Mysteries, And Virus Hunters
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Celebrate
Posted July 5, 2020 by Anonymous
Trudeau’s uplifting message on Canada Day:
Canada is an amazing place to call home, and its people make it even better. We’re always there for each other – in good times and bad – and we always will be. And that’s worth celebrating. Happy Canada Day, everyone! https://t.co/SDC41cWOY0 pic.twitter.com/2OKNyxGEqe
— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) July 1, 2020
Biden’s inspiring message on Independence Day:
Our nation was founded on a simple idea: We’re all created equal. We’ve never lived up to it — but we’ve never stopped trying. This Independence Day, let’s not just celebrate those words, let’s commit to finally fulfill them. Happy #FourthOfJuly! pic.twitter.com/1WrATlx8Xl
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) July 4, 2020
Here’s another good one, from Arnold Schwarzenegger:
Happy birthday, America. Thank you for letting me live the American Dream. We must fight every day to make sure that dream is as true for a Black child born in Minneapolis as it was for a white bodybuilder born in Austria. via @attn pic.twitter.com/rM95vb3twC
— Arnold (@Schwarzenegger) July 4, 2020
And nothing in either of Trump’s speeches is worth repeating. But here’s a summary, in case you missed them both:
As Frederick Douglass delivered a swiff and swippy victory in Operation Desert Storm in Vietnam, protected against the oranges of totalittotalitotarianism, with super duper missiles and stock rocket records. God bless the United Schates and rid us of Obamanacare.#TrumpIsUnwell
— Trent Capelli 🇨🇦 (@TrentCapelli) July 5, 2020
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Saturday Stories: No Heroes In Science, Selflessness, School Reopening, And Vaccine Developments
Posted July 4, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Stuart Richie, in Unherd, reminds us why there should be no such thing as science heroes.
Wency Leung, in The Globe and Mail, discusses her decision to donate one of her kidneys to a stranger and reflects on selflessness in the time of COVID
Carl Zimmer, in The New York Times, on the phenomenon of COVID19 super spreaders.
Hilda Bastian, in her blog Absolutely Maybe, brings us up to date on all the developments in the race to the first COVID19 vaccine.
Sarah Cohodes, on Twitter (and you don’t need an account to read), with a terrific thread on considerations around school reopening.
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Public Health has failed us all
Posted June 28, 2020 by Anonymous
Over the last week, I have come to understand that the COVID 19 pandemic will be known as the worst North American public health failure ever.
Here’s why:
Remember five months ago, way back in February, when COVID cases first began showing up in North America?
That is also when doctors in Europe, who were already dealing with dozens of cases, started reporting that, unlike other recent viruses, transmission of COVID 19 appeared to be happening from people who didn’t know they were sick and who did not display any symptoms.
It is impossible to find and quarantine such people, because nobody knows who they are. They themselves don’t even know they are carrying the virus.
The only way that someone without symptoms can be stopped from transmitting a respiratory infection is for everyone to wear a mask, so that the infected people are prevented from spraying infectious droplets every time they speak, cough, sneeze, etc.
So if, back in February, we had all been told to wear homemade masks whenever we were out and about (like many people already do in Asia, by the way) this simple act would have protected the friends and families and coworkers and clients of the hundreds of people across North America who were already infected but didn’t know it – the dentists, the doctors, the choir members, the conference attendees, the nursing home staff, the teachers, the social workers, the waitresses, etc etc
And thus, COVID 19 virus would not have infected hundreds of thousands. And thousands of the people who died would have lived instead.
But what happened when, back in February, European doctors started reporting that symptom-less people were infectious?
Well, nothing.
Faced with these early reports of symptom-less transmission, public health authorities like the World Health Organization, and the CDC and Canada Public Health did not leap into action.
They squabbled. They denied the evidence. They quibbled about terminology. The New York Times report goes on:
Interviews with doctors and public health officials in more than a dozen countries show that for two crucial months — and in the face of mounting genetic evidence — Western health officials and political leaders played down or denied the risk of symptomless spreading.Leading health agencies including the World Health Organization and the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control provided contradictory and sometimes misleading advice. A crucial public health discussion devolved into a semantic debate over what to call infected people without clear symptoms.The two-month delay was a product of faulty scientific assumptions, academic rivalries and, perhaps most important, a reluctance to accept that containing the virus would take drastic measures.The resistance to emerging evidence was one part of the world’s sluggish response to the virus. It is impossible to calculate the human toll of that delay, but models suggest that earlier, aggressive action might have saved tens of thousands of lives.Countries like Singapore and Australia, which used testing and contact-tracing and moved swiftly to quarantine seemingly healthy travelers, fared far better than those that did not.
And another thing happened too, at the same time.
Even without a lot of evidence, even without contract tracing and quarantining travelers and other government measures, there was one crucial step that everyone could have taken without any government program at all – wearing a homemade mask.
It seems like at least some of those who work in public health in North America also believed that the situation with COVID 19 was so urgent that wearing masks couldn’t hurt and might help.
But they decided not tell us.
While public health officials hesitated, some doctors acted. At a conference in Seattle in mid-February, Jeffrey Shaman, a Columbia University professor, said his research suggested that Covid-19’s rapid spread could only be explained if there were infectious patients with unremarkable symptoms or no symptoms at all.In the audience that day was Steven Chu, the Nobel-winning physicist and former U.S. energy secretary. “If left to its own devices, this disease will spread through the whole population,” he remembers Professor Shaman warning.Afterward, Dr. Chu began insisting that healthy colleagues at his Stanford University laboratory wear masks.Doctors in Cambridge, England, concluded that asymptomatic transmission was a big source of infection and advised local health workers and patients to wear masks, well before the British government acknowledged the risk of silent spreaders.
But back in February, there wasn’t enough PPE to go around and all the medical masks we had were desperately needed by medical staff.
So Public Health authorities had a choice — they could have been truthful, and told us that masks might help but the general public had to use homemade masks to save the medical ones for the health profession.
But this message was too complicated and people were already hoarding toilet paper, and homemade masks might “give us a false sense of security” because we’re all just so stupid that we wouldn’t stay home anymore and besides, we likely wouldn’t wear then correctly anyway. So it was just so much easier to us not to bother with masks at all, that they weren’t necessary for anyone who wasn’t already sick.
The American authorities, faced with a shortage, actively discouraged the public from buying masks. “Seriously people — STOP BUYING MASKS!” Surgeon General Jerome M. Adams tweeted on Feb. 29.
Seriously people- STOP BUYING MASKS!
They are NOT effective in preventing general public from catching #Coronavirus, but if healthcare providers can’t get them to care for sick patients, it puts them and our communities at risk!
https://t.co/UxZRwxxKL9— U.S. Surgeon General (@Surgeon_General) February 29, 2020
In other words, they lied to us.
And the politicians those public health authorities were advising — the governors and premiers and presidents and prime ministers – ended up passing on those lies because they didn’t know any better.
So now here we are in June.
And now the public health authorities say, “Oopsie!! Hey, you guys, we tell you now that you really should wear masks after all, because everyone would be just so much safer.”
Only its too late. Hundreds of thousands have already died. And millions are confused by the changing stories and the untruths and the squabbling and now they don’t believe anything that public health authorities are telling them. And the people who own stores and manage events and work in offices and teach in schools are just as confused. So they don’t know whether to require masks or not.
Back during the Spanish Flu, public health failed because they just didn’t know how to organize public health administration and do the scientific studies and analyze policy options and communicate widely with the public.
Now, we have all that. We have a huge public health infrastructure with thousands of experts worldwide whose whole purpose in life is to keep people safe.
But in North America, they failed us.
“Why doesn’t the public trust us” sob the people who sold a cynical lie about masks being innefective to the press
— Kurt, myself today (@Freidland2) June 28, 2020
So first they didn’t recognize the truth, and then they didn’t trust us enough to tell us the truth when we needed it.
And now they’re going to blame that on us too:
[CDC head] Azar also pushed back on the idea that the new surge in cases is a result of reopening the country too fast, arguing, “That’s not so much about what the law says on the reopening than what our behaviors are within that. If we act irresponsibly, if we don’t social distance, if we don’t use face coverings … we’re going to see spread of disease.”
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Saturday Stories: Peer Review, #Masks4All, Talking To Kids, And The Public Health Of Protests
Posted June 27, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Simine Vazire, in Wired, on the failings of scientific peer review
Kimberly A. Prather, Chia C. Wang, and Robert T. Schooley, in Science, on how to reduce transmission of SARS-CoV2 (tl;dr – wear a mask)
Kate Julian, in The Atlantic, on how to talk to kids about the sad, scary, and unjust issues permeating society today.
Tara Haelle, in Forbes, on why public health experts support Black lives matter protests.
Photo By Mike Shaheen – https://www.flickr.com/photos/63015897@N02/49979513917/, CC BY 2.0, Link
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Sports will be back, sort of
Posted June 25, 2020 by Anonymous
I think the realities of getting back to sports are becoming clearer as we begin to understand that Corona Virus is not going away any time soon.
Yes, we are going to be able to play and watch sports again!
But no, we won’t actually be able to watch the games in person — though maybe eventually we can as long as absolutely everyone wears a mask absolutely all the time. And no shouting!
Hmm — would that even work?
Or would the silence just be too creepy, like those bizarre photos of a chamber orchestra playing to a theatre full of plants?
I’ve been watching the Ultimate Tennis Showdown and its fun to see a newer, quicker version of tennis, though its a little odd to hear the fake crowd noises after each shot.
Likely when sports do get going again, each sport will have to deal with continual interruptions as individual athletes come down with COVID-19 and stop playing until they are well again.
There is one thing about the sports shutdown that I will miss — the #LifeCommentaries on twitter, when sports announcers kept themselves busy by posting videos narrating ordinary life as sporting events:
Dogging.#LifeCommentary #LiveCommentary pic.twitter.com/05A64OcSKP
— Twittbr3 (@Twittbr3) June 18, 2020
1500mm Heat#LifeCommentary #LiveCommentary pic.twitter.com/fmsIWfcfAK
— Nick Heath (@nickheathsport) April 14, 2020
Sooty looking for a clean sweep in the Regional Common Gymnastics pic.twitter.com/ycInWuMVTH
— Ladbrokes (@Ladbrokes) June 15, 2020
Commentators have been turning their hands (and socks) to absolutely anything lately! pic.twitter.com/xj86k27LUI
— Ladbrokes (@Ladbrokes) June 14, 2020
Some sports are slower. More about the strategy. pic.twitter.com/JMBaGJ1tSd
— Andrew Cotter (@MrAndrewCotter) April 9, 2020
International 4×4 Pushchair Formation Final. Live. #LifeCommentary #LiveCommentary pic.twitter.com/BGGh01m1k1
— Nick Heath (@nickheathsport) March 17, 2020
LIVE SPORT!
Today’s episode is based largely on me chasing our dog Yogi round the garden. Enjoy! 😂
Chin up people; hope you have a good weekend. 🐶😊#lifecommentary #goodboy #youbaddog pic.twitter.com/kvcgoYSr3N
— Andrew Coley (@Andrew_Coley) March 20, 2020
It was an honour to be asked to appear on this year’s unique USA @ESPYS show on @espn.
Among some incredibly poignant films, I helped provide a spot of levity as @mPinoe introduced my take on the likes of @rogerfederer @serenawilliams @lindseyvonn and @SebToots in lockdown. 🎙 pic.twitter.com/Jo1bptLV5z
— Nick Heath (@nickheathsport) June 23, 2020
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Messenger of the gods
Posted July 19, 2020 by Anonymous
The last time Comet NEOWISE was visible in our sky, Stonehenge had not yet been built.Comets used to be seen as messengers of the gods, sent to tell us something important. This time, maybe its just “wear a mask and keep your distance!”
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Saturday Stories: COVID Orphans, A Must Read Piece, The Currency of Risk, And COVID19 Vaccine Side Effects
Posted July 25, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
 |
| Dr. Anna DeForest |
John Woodrow Cox, in the Washington Post, with a heartbreaking story about 3 coronavirus orphans.
Anna DeForest, in The New England Journal of Medicine, with what I would describe as an absolutely must read piece highlighting the crushing devastation COVID is wreaking on front-line physicians.
Maggie Koerth, in Five Thirty Eight, explains how every decision is a risk, and how every risk is a decision.
Hilda Bastian, in Wired, explains why there needs to be frank transparency around any possible COVID19 side effects even if they’re minor.
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Campaigners Demand Court Shuts Down Ecuador’s Oil Pipelines After Spill
Posted August 12, 2020 by Anonymous
Read time: 4 mins
Communities in the Ecuadorian Amazon are calling for an end to “violence against Indigenous peoples and nature” as a trial into a devastating oil spill resumes today.
The Kichwa and Shuar tribes launched a lawsuit against the government and state-owned oil company Petroecuador in April after two pipelines ruptured. Around 27,000 Indigenous people already isolated by COVID-19 were left with little or no access to freshwater and fishing after more than 15,000 barrels of crude oil gushed into the Rivers Coca and Napa and downriver to Peru.
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A Plastics Spill on the Mississippi River But No Accountability in Sight
Posted August 11, 2020 by Julie Dermansky
Read time: 7 mins
When I arrived on Sunday, August 9, scores of tiny plastic pellets lined the sandy bank of the Mississippi River downstream from New Orleans, Louisiana, where they glistened in the sun, not far from a War of 1812 battlefield. These precursors of everyday plastic products, also known as nurdles, spilled from a shipping container that fell off a cargo ship at a port in New Orleans the previous Sunday, August 2.
After seeing photographs by New Orleans artist Michael Pajon published on NOLA.com, I went to see if a cleanup of the spilled plastic was underway. A week after the spill, I saw no signs of a cleanup when I arrived in the early afternoon, but I did watch a group of tourists disembark from a riverboat that docked along the plastic-covered riverbank. By most accounts, the translucent plastic pellets are considered pollution, but government bureaucracy and regulatory technicalities are making accountability for removing these bits of plastic from the river’s banks and waters surprisingly challenging.
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School Daze
Posted August 8, 2020 by Anonymous
From Reddit: pic.twitter.com/QNLRl937V8
— Cathie from Canada 🇨🇦 😷🏳️🌈 (@CathieCanada) August 6, 2020
Oh dear, I think we’re in trouble now.
The Sask school plan is based on wishful thinking – it imagines that COVID is symptomatic, that students with symptoms can just stay home or go home, and that nobody else (teachers, parents, staff) will get sick.https://t.co/lh4Je7b64F— Cathie from Canada 🇨🇦 😷🏳️🌈 (@CathieCanada) August 5, 2020
I don’t have any children or grandchildren in school these days, and thank heavens for small mercies.
One thing that really impresses me about Saskatchewan is how consistently we’ve been able to come up with the worst plan in Canada on a broad range of policies, from suicide prevention to school reopening. Truly inspirational.
— glengarry glen busey (@birlios) August 5, 2020
I think this mom has it right:
After a lot of conversations & thinking, we have decided the safest thing we can do for our son is keep him home in Sept. He will be learning via the CBE online hub. I will have to give up my job as they require me back in person as of Sept, but I know this is the right choice.
— Lucy 🇨🇦 (@TheBlueGem3) August 7, 2020
The School Safe “plan” in Saskatchewan is based on wishful thinking:
What I don’t understand is why employers in the business sector are not demanding a better plan for schools. If their employees cannot be at work because they have to stay home with their kids, won’t that cause the economy to shut down again? #skpoli #sasked #covid19sk https://t.co/VOy9q6bhEc
— Maren Beaton (@maren_beaton) August 7, 2020
Parents aren’t happy:
What I am curious on (if it’s been mentioned anywhere, let me know) is what happens if one staff or kid tests positive? Is every single person in school that has come into contact with that one positive case going to be sent for testing and isolation till test results come back?
— Bort (@Kfb28) August 7, 2020
Neither are doctors:
Saskatchewan’s doctors press for safer return-to-school plan – Premier Moe says he’s open to changes: https://t.co/dHuAVThnNO @SMA_docs @keepskkidssafe @GordWyant Dr. Shahab @SaskHealth @CBCSask
— Dennis Kendel (@DennisKendel) August 8, 2020
I am concerned that the Sask Party seems to be reducing the whole School debate to a discussion of whether or not to make masks mandatory, while the Sask Medical Association is asking for a much broader look at school problems:
[SMA says]“Closed spaces with poor ventilation, crowded spaces with many people, and close-contact settings with close-range conversations are not uncommon in schools and these realities need to be front and centre in back to school plans.” Education Minister Gord Wyant said Friday that, in response to the association’s concerns and recommendations from the Public Health Agency of Canada, the province is looking at making masks mandatory.
And it is, of course, not just the schools themselves that are problematic. Its also the impact that COVID increases in schools would have on the rest of us.
I spent four months staying away from people, stores, restaurants, everything. So will I have to go back to that kind of life if there is community COVID spread here again? Yes, I’m afraid so.
I spent my evening sobbing in the park with my husband and mother-in-law about how it will now be unsafe to see our families as soon as schools reopen.
There is no plan.
Our province has failed.
— Amy (Lawson) Empringham (@lawsonames) August 5, 2020
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Saturday Story: Just One This Week. A Must Read If You Haven’t Yet
Posted August 8, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Ed Yong, in the Atlantic, with the sadly all too believable (yet still unbelievable) story of how SARS-CoV2 defeated America
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Canada’s Obesity In Adults: A Clinical Practice Guideline, Released Today, A Huge Step Forward
Posted August 4, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
I’m proud to have played a small part in the release of today’s Obesity In Adults: A Clinical Practice Guideline as it is the first (I think, though I’m biased) to truly take a patient-centred approach while simultaneously treating obesity like a chronic disease
Not a small endeavour, this years long effort includes chapters never before seen in any other obesity treatment guideline including those on weight bias and stigma, virtual medicine, commercial weight loss programs, living with obesity, as well as issues specific to indigenous peoples.
It explicitly steers away from diet culture (but does speak to the need for individualized medical nutrition therapy), teaches readers that neither BMI nor weight measures the presence or absence of health and introduces them to the concept that obesity should be considered a chronic disease only when excess adiposity impairs health, and it recognizes that obesity is anything but a choice.
While going through the entirety of the guideline isn’t doable in a short blog post, here are the guideline’s overarching summary points:
- Obesity is a prevalent, complex, progressive and relapsing chronic disease, characterized by abnormal or excessive body fat (adiposity), that impairs health.
- People living with obesity face substantial bias and stigma, which contribute to increased morbidity and mortality independent of weight or body mass index.
- This guideline update reflects substantial advances in the epidemiology, determinants, pathophysiology, assessment, prevention and treatment of obesity, and shifts the focus of obesity management toward improving patient-centred health outcomes, rather than weight loss alone.
- Obesity care should be based on evidence-based principles of chronic disease management, must validate patients’ lived experiences, move beyond simplistic approaches of “eat less, move more,” and address the root drivers of obesity.
- People living with obesity should have access to evidence-informed interventions, including medical nutrition therapy, physical activity, psychological interventions, pharmacotherapy and surgery.
Kudos to all of my fellow authors and especially to Dr. Sean Wharton the project’s chief cat wrangler.
To have a peek at the CMAJ’s published guideline summary, click here.
To access the guideline in its 19 chapter entirety, click here.
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- Year Long 5:2 Intermittent Fasting Study Reports It’s No Better Or Worse Than A Horribly Restrictive Diet
- Study Published Stating The Daily Mile Doesn’t Improve Childhood Obesity Speaks To Risks Of Tying Weight To Exercise
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August funny
Posted August 2, 2020 by Anonymous
OK, its been one of those weeks, so here’s some funny stuff:
My son is wearing a MAGMA cap and a Vote Trump 2020 button. He’s been spat on, punched and verbally abused. I hate to think what will happen when he leaves the house.
— Humanist. (@kennuck) August 1, 2020
I sunburn easily. https://t.co/k9APKRxFn9
— Brent Butt (@BrentButt) August 2, 2020
Republican politician Louie Gohmert, who claims to have caught COVID-19 from wearing a mask, is now claiming he got pregnant after several people told him to go fuck himself.
— Middle Age Riot (@middleageriot) July 30, 2020
If you are not wearing a mask because you are afraid your brain won’t get enough oxygen, I’m sorry to tell you, that ship has sailed.
— Chip Franklin (@chipfranklin) July 29, 2020
“Jesus Christ, what’s Trump done NOW?” https://t.co/5ZhOGjnKWr
— Harry Turtledove (@HNTurtledove) July 24, 2020
#MeanwhileInCanada pic.twitter.com/tY1gFbE1f6
— Meanwhile in Canada (@MeanwhileinCana) July 30, 2020
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Saturday Stories: Vaccine Reality Check, Early Warning Failure, And Maybe We Should Talk About Ventilation
Posted August 1, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Sarah Zhang, in The Atlantic, with a vaccine reality check.
Grant Robertson, in The Globe and Mail, on how Canada’s pandemic early warning system failed with COVID19.
Zeynep Tufecki, in The Atlantic, wonders why we’re not talking more about ventilation
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Button, button, who’s got the button?
Posted July 26, 2020 by Anonymous
Well, this is a little strange.
Today the Globe and Mail published a story about how Canada’s pandemic early warning system within the Public Health Agency of Canada has been muzzled under the Harper Conservatives in 2014, and how the Liberals had said they would change this but then they never did. So as a result, the epidemiologists in the early warning system, called the Global Public Health Intelligence Network (GPHIN), were silenced just when Canada needed them the most.
Other than not actually telling us which the individuals or offices are responsible for the muzzling, its an explosive article:
Early detection is as much an art as it is a science.The disease is hiding, but the signals are detectable.Acting quickly can have a big impact on the outcome. With COVID-19, the signals began small, but grew louder.“We all had enough warning,” she said. “We saw what happened in China, in Italy,” Dr. St. John agrees. “The signal was there,” he said.However, few people outside GPHIN knew Canada’s early warning alert system had effectively stopped working, just when it was needed most.When Ms. Thornton, the vice-president in charge of the alerts, appeared before a House of Commons committee in May to face questions about Canada’s handling of the pandemic, she was asked how the government had tracked the spread of the virus.Ms. Thornton referenced GPHIN and the work it did. Though she made no mention that GPHIN had not issued a single alert in the previous 12 months. Nor did she mention that analysts had been assigned to other work, or that GPHIN had not sounded any further alarms on COVID-19 developments after the outbreak became known – even though the department’s own guidelines required as much.As far as the committee knew, Canada’s surveillance system had been operating as it always had.It’s not easy to know the consequences of such decisions, but Mr. Garner, the former senior science adviser at Public Health, says he believes Canada’s early response to the outbreak – which has been criticized for being slow and disorganized – was a product of the many changes he saw made to the department.Those changes helped move Public Health’s focus away from science, he said, which slowed down its ability to react effectively – and with maximum urgency.“All of these things have tragically come home to roost,” Mr. Garner said.“Not to be overdramatic, but Canadians have died because of this.”
A pretty damning indictment of the Public Health Agency of Canada, and of the Canadian government.
But then I also found this: in April, the CBC published a story that said GPHIN had been undergoing a technical upgrade in 2019, and that’s why it hadn’t issued alerts about COVID19 until the end of December.
CBC News has obtained a series of internal public health agency documents and slide-presentation decks — including one given by a senior epidemiologist from the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) last November on the eve of a pandemic that has since killed tens of thousands and crippled the world economy.
The documents bring into sharper focus the kind of information key decision-makers had at their fingertips as the outbreak started in China and raise questions about how seriously global pandemic preparedness was being taken within the federal government.The records show GPHIN was in the middle of a long-overdue technology upgrade as the virus was spreading.Despite almost four years of work with the National Research Council of Canada, the early warning system was — as of last fall — still in need of “improvement in the geographical and time tagging algorithm,” according to a Nov 12, 2019 presentation to a WHO conference in Seoul, South Korea by senior epidemiologist Florence Tanguay.That algorithm is crucial to the system’s ability to sort through as many as 7,000 online articles per day to spot disease outbreaks around the globe.The network also was awaiting an “expansion to new data sources,” such as social media feeds.From its inception in the late 1990s, GPHIN had relied on news wire services and later local media articles posted online.
So now I’m not sure what was going on in Canada last January and February.
Maybe GPHIN was issuing timely and accurate reports on the emerging virus but Public Health Canada was minimizing their analysis and not sending the reports up the ladder to government.
Or maybe because GPHIN was basing its alerts on wire services, its reports were no longer regarded as reliable enough for PHAC and government to count on.
Either way, it does sound like somebody maybe dropped the ball, doesn’t it?
And I hope there might now be some attempt to figure out what really happened.
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Funny stuff
Posted June 21, 2020 by Anonymous
OK, here’s some funny stuff I collected over the last while — particularly enjoyed the last one:
My spouse is “attending” a virtual conference for the next few days. To help simulate the real thing, I’ll set out a picked-over tray of mini-muffins, soggy cut fruit, and some weak coffee, and then whisk them away just as he approaches the table.
— Erin Conwell (@erconwell) June 19, 2020
Had a bit more #LifeCommentary fun with my friend’s dog, Sooty. He’s fabulously bonkers. https://t.co/iLwRCv76xZ
— Nick Heath (@nickheathsport) June 15, 2020
This talented pupper doing an amazing obstacle run pic.twitter.com/3l4bYkgp0e
— Back To Nature (@backt0nature) June 20, 2020
Even bears have their Felix Ungers. https://t.co/36E68JPeMJ
— Neil (@NPSusa) June 20, 2020
— Fátima Ma. Alvarado.💙💛🇻🇦🇳🇮📿 (@Falvarado1974) June 19, 2020
This is quite possibly the greatest commercial I’ve ever seen… pic.twitter.com/t3oxiJrUr3
— Rex Chapman🏇🏼 (@RexChapman) June 17, 2020
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Saturday Stories: COVID And Kids With Disabilities, Racist Statues, COVID Death Mysteries, And Virus Hunters
Posted June 20, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Hallie Levine, in The New York Times, on how children with disabilities are being left behind while the rest of country slowly reopens.
James Stout, in Popular Mechanics, explains how to use science to topple a racist statue.
Joel Achenbach, Karin Brulliard and Ariana Eunjung Cha, in The Washington Post, on what we do and don’t understand about who lives and dies with COVID.
Maryn McKenna, in Smithsonian Magazine, on some of the world’s foremost virus hunters.
Photo By Quidster4040 at English Wikipedia, CC BY 4.0, Link
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Trump is unwell
Posted June 14, 2020 by Anonymous
After yesterday’s West Point debacle – the water glass, the inability to say “McArthur”, the ramp, the tweet ABOUT the ramp – #TrumpIsUnwell is trending this morning on twitter.
Along with all the jokes, there is this:
The media’s failure to meaningfully cover Trump’s cognitive and physical decline after obsessing about Hillary’s health is evidence of open misogyny at this point.
— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) June 14, 2020
Personally, I believe that Trump has a minor stroke last November – remember the fast and unscheduled “tour” of Walter Reed? – and he still has impairments on his right side.
On a lighter note, #ObamaDay is also trending twitter:
You’d think Republicans would be more worried about protecting the Constitution.
It’s the only thing preventing Barack Obama from being president again.#ObamaDayJune14th
— Middle Age Riot (@middleageriot) June 14, 2020
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Saturday Stories: This week in COVID19
Posted May 16, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Mary Agyeiwaa Agyapong, UK RN, 28 years old, died from COVID April 12th. May her memory be a blessing. |
Peter Piot, one of the scientists who discovered Ebola, in Science, with his thoughts on COVID, both as an expert and as a survivor.
Erin Bromage, on her own blog, gives you some advice about your risks in various locations once your location’s physical distancing rules are relaxed.
Lois Parshley, in Vox, on the long term complications COVID confers to some of its survivors.
Helen Branswell, in STAT, on how yes, cats can catch SARS-CoV2 and that while infected, spew piles of virus and infect other cats. Unclear right now if they can infect people
Kevin Roose, in The New York Times, wonders what happens if we get a COVID19 vaccine but 50% of the population refuses to take it?
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Lost years
Posted May 12, 2020 by Anonymous
Well, I think we have all realized now there is not going to be any “normal” anymore.
The hysterical “reopen, damn it!” marches across the continent were a cry of despair against the inevitable, but now I think the truth is sinking in.
There is going to be a new Depression across North America.
Here’s a thread about what we are facing:
Because they’re competing with the other shop across the street, they cut prices to keep their share of the market. And they often operate while servicing debt. Most businesses need to keep all of the balls in the air just to survive. That time is over.— Paul Doroshenko, Q.C. (@PaulDoroshenko) May 11, 2020
The entrepreneurs have no capital. Their capital is gone. They can’t start new businesses. A handful will survive but with drastically reduced ability to invest. They will suffer in survival mode.
So will there be any jobs?— Paul Doroshenko, Q.C. (@PaulDoroshenko) May 11, 2020
In 25 years the businesses on the street will be completely different. Many of those once apparently solid companies will fail within the next 12 months. Expect nothing but grim news.
If you have a job, cherish it. If you have a secure government job, keep it.— Paul Doroshenko, Q.C. (@PaulDoroshenko) May 11, 2020
We must (this is an imperative) pick ourselves up and keep going. We owe that to ourselves, our families and our fellow occupant of planet earth.
Hold on. Stay strong. Better days will come and they’re worth living for.— Paul Doroshenko, Q.C. (@PaulDoroshenko) May 11, 2020
Trump’s mismanagement – his ignorance about testing, plus his inept and corrupt support programs –will result in successive waves of Covid outbreaks across the US all summer and fall, each one killing thousands more. Everyone will just try to stay home as much as possible, so the US economy will continue to decline. Meanwhile the US government will bankrupt itself as it fights a losing battle to try to shore up the stock markets, the only economic measure Trump thinks is important.
In nine months, Biden will take over, but by then it will be too late for the thousands of businesses and bars and restaurants that will go bankrupt by next fall, after a few miserable months of trying to reopen. The companies that survive will be the ones that continue to have their employees work from home. So the downtown office towers will be empty and the owners of commercial real estate will be going bankrupt too, not to mention everyone from window washers to the people who water office plants. Farmers across the US will be watching their restaurant markets disappear, and they won’t be able to find immigrant workers to pick their crops.
Canada’s economy won’t crash as badly, I don’t think — our more effective and better run federal support programs will cushion the blow a little better for us – but still, its not going to be pretty. The US border won’t be reopening for a long time yet, and our biggest trading partner won’t be buying nearly as much as they used to. Tourism will be a disaster, our oil and gas industries are in free fall, and we don’t know who will be buying all our agricultural exports anymore either.
If we can avoid another Great Depression, we will be lucky, I think.
Back in 1973, journalist Barry Broadfood published Ten Lost Years – he interviewed hundreds of people about their experiences during the Great Depression and put it all into a book, and for many Canadians, it was the first time we had ever really heard about what happened to ordinary people in Canada during the 1930s, that awful time.
I have been thinking about that book a lot lately.
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Cast your bread upon the waters
Posted May 10, 2020 by Anonymous
Ecclesiastes 11 1
Cast your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will find it again.
150 years ago, the Choctaw people collected what was then a grand sum of $170 to send to the people of Ireland, who were starving because of the Potato Famine. CNN reports that the Choctaw understood starvation because they had experienced it themselves on the Trail of Tears.
Now Irish Times reporter Naomi O’Leary is returning the favour:
Native Americans raised a huge amount in famine relief for Ireland at a time when they had very little. It’s time for is to come through for them now. https://t.co/ONl9UXmwdH— Naomi O’Leary (@NaomiOhReally) May 2, 2020
Half a million dollars has been raised in Ireland. This isn’t the only time that Ireland and the American indigenous people have connected.
The act of kindness was never forgotten, and the solidarity between the Irish and Native Americans has continued over the years.
In 1992, 22 Irish men and women walked the Trail of Tears to raise money for famine relief efforts in Somalia, according to Bunbury. They raised $170,000 — $1,000 for each dollar the Choctaw gave in 1847. A Choctaw citizen reciprocated by leading a famine walk in Ireland seven years later.
In 2017, the town of Midleton in Ireland unveiled a sculpture commemorating the Choctaw’s 1847 gift. In 2018, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar announced a scholarship program for Choctaw people to study in Ireland while he was visiting the tribal nation in Oklahoma.
The GoFundMe donations are just the latest example of the longstanding relationship. As one Irish donor on the fundraising page wrote:
“You helped us in our darkest hour. Honoured to return the kindness. Ireland remembers, with thanks.”
It reminded me of the Nova Scotia Christmas Tree that is send each year to Boston in gratitude for the help that came from Boston after the Halifax explosion:
100 years ago today, the Halifax Explosion occurred in Halifax, Nova Scotia killing 1000 people. Boston immediately sent doctors & medical supplies to assist in relief efforts – this is why Nova Scotia sends Boston a Christmas tree every year. https://t.co/HYHi6xbqm3 pic.twitter.com/MdhQa3r4Zg— BostonTweet (@BostonTweet) December 6, 2017
People will never forget those who helped when they needed it the most.
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Saturday Stories: The COVID Roundup
Posted May 9, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Dr. Bredy Pierre-Louis, Family Physician, Brooklyn, Died From COVID19. May his memory be a blessing |
Caitlin Flanagan, in The Atlantic, on having stage IV colon cancer during the time of COVID19 (if you only read one piece this week, make it this one)
Orac, in Respectful Insolence, discusses Plandemic.
Tomas Pueyo, in Medium, on testing and contact tracing.
Ed Yong, in The Atlantic, covers whether or not we should be currently worried about coronavirus mutations
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Fiddling while America burns
Posted May 5, 2020 by Anonymous
People in the United States are realizing that Trump and his administration have spent the last two months tweeting and twiddling their thumbs.
Silly. The plan is to pretend that the problem had been solved (because it’s been a while and staying at home is boring) and start opening up the country. What could go wrong?— Your Friend & Sabre ⚔️ (@xiphodaimon) May 4, 2020
And why did they expect anything different?
Trump is utterly incompetent at everything, and the only people he hires are people who won’t show him up. So of course he is clueless now and so is everyone else around him.
If America survives this, it will be because of its governors, who are rapidly forming their own regional associations. But they don’t have the authority to deficit spend so we are going to be stuck for the next 9 months watching the US economy implode, until Biden can take over. It isn’t going to be pleasant.
Still, its a tricky go, isn’t it? I’m uncertain about our future is, too, but I do have some confidence that the Trudeau government and most of the provinces are on the same page. Though Saskatchewan is reporting new cases, the Maritimes are doing better.
Vox had a big article today comparing Canada and the US:
The American response has become infected by partisan politics and shot through with federal incompetence. Meanwhile, Canada’s policies have been efficiently implemented with support from leaders across the political spectrum. The comparison is a case study in how a dysfunctional political system can quite literally cost lives.
The Canadian approach has not been perfect. Its death rate is currently much higher than best-in-class performers like Germany and South Korea; Canadian officials have fallen down, in particular, when it comes to long-term senior care and the indigenous population. But given the interdependence between these two large neighboring economies, Canadians are not only vulnerable as a result of their own government’s choices but also because of their southern neighbors’ failures.
“The biggest public health threat to Canada right now is importing cases from the United States,” says Steven Hoffman, a political scientist who studies global health at York University.
Yes, its going to be a long time before that border reopens.
I am beginning to worry seriously about Canadian food supplies — so much of our food is from vegetable and fruit growers in the US, and further south too, and these all depend on an established and predictable supply chain where crops get planted, harvested, processed and transported in an orderly progression. Canada can produce its own flour and beef and apples, but not oranges. Or bananas.
“Let me tell you about the olden days, children. Why, there used to be a time when we could get bananas any time we went to the store. Any time at all!”
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FREE Help From My New Venture For Ontarians With Newly Diagnosed Type 2 Diabetes Or Prediabetes But Stranded By COVID19
Posted May 4, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
Are you an Ontario resident recently diagnosed with either type 2 diabetes or pre-diabetes where COVID19 has prevented you from receiving comprehensive support to help manage and understand your new condition? If so, my new venture may can help, and better still, for FREE. Built initially to support weight management, Constant Health, our new digital behavioural intervention, is being re-positioned to help people with newly diagnosed diabetes and pre-diabetes who in turn have been left stranded by COVID19.
Constant Health’s iOS app (note, this opportunity is currently only available for those with iPhones or iPads as the Android app is still in development), will provide you with 12 weeks of private and secure (PHIPA compliant) access to both a Mayo clinic certified health coach as well as a registered dietitian who together, by way of text messaging and video chats, will work collaboratively with you on your diet and lifestyle to help improve your blood sugar control and teach you about your new condition.
Constant Health’s technology includes a robust, open-ended collaborative goal setting engine, a built-in food diary, a searchable and filterable database of millions of the web’s most popular recipe sites, along with a proprietary real-time dashboard which will allow our team to applaud and encourage your success as well as to help troubleshoot your struggles.
As with my office’s practice (the Bariatric Medical Institute), Constant Health’s services aren’t limited to any particular dietary strategy, but instead work with you on whatever approach you feel would best suit your life and preferences. From low-fat, to keto, to vegan and everything in between Constant Health can help.
Rest assured, there are no strings whatsoever. Currently, thanks to an unrestricted grant from Novo Nordisk, we have a limited number of spots available to freely offer and plainly, we are not currently accepting paid patients. However due to provincial medical licensing regulations for both MDs and RDs, and the need for physician screening, we can currently only extend this offer to Ontarians.
If you’re interested, live in Ontario, and have an iPhone, simply fill out this quick survey and if eligible, our office will contact you to book a consultation with me so that I can explore your medical history and have a peek at your lab results for us to mutually determine if the program is for you.
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Saturday Stories: This Week in #COVID19
Posted May 2, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Arlene Reid, 51, mother of 5 and PSW in Ontario working in LTC, died from COVID19 on April 27th. May her memory be a blessing. |
Gid MK, in Medium, with his meta-analysis of reported infection fatality rates for COVID19
Jeanne Lenzer and Shannon Brownlee, in Inside, on the out of control “science” of this pandemic.
Joss Fong, in Vox, with a great explainer on how to understand that graph of all the countries’ COVID cases you keep seeing.
Ed Yong, in The Atlantic, with a spectacular guide on how to make sense of the all over the place that is COVID19.
Caitlin Flanagan, in The Atlantic, with the 2020 commencement speech you’re never hear (but you should so read).
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Saturday Stories: The Week in #COVID19 And Some Stories Worth Reading
Posted April 25, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Angeline Bernadel, LPN at West River Healthcare in Milford, died of COVID19 on April 4th, 2020, may her memory be a blessing |
Achal Prabhala and Ellen ‘t Hoen, in The Guardian, on our eventual COVID19 treatment and cure and its inevitable control by the pharmaceutical industry.
James Hamblin, in The Atlantic, on why some people with COVID19 get so much sicker than others.
Ari Feldman, in The Forward, on how Orthodox Jews are flocking by the thousands to donate convalescent plasma in the fight against COVID19.
Tomas Pueyo, in Medium, on what the world has taught us the dance must look like if we want to open things up.
Tomas Pueyo, in Medium, on the COVID19 dance steps that you yourself might be able to take.
Maryn McKenna, in Wired, on the risk that COVID19 will worsen the existing crisis of antibiotic resistance.
Colleen Farrell, in The New York Times, on what to say and not say to those working COVID19’s frontlines.
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#ObamaGreat
Posted May 17, 2020 by Anonymous
Here are Obama’s two addresses tonight to the HBCU and high school 2020 graduating classes.
#ObamaGreat and #ObamaWasBetterAtEverything are now trending around the world.
Congratulations to the HBCU Class of 2020! Michelle and I are so proud of you. As you set out to change the world, we’ll be the wind at your back. Can’t wait to see what you achieve. https://t.co/PCsjkJJTXi— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) May 16, 2020
Congrats to the high school Class of 2020, as well as to the teachers, coaches, and most of all, parents and family who’ve guided you along the way. Thanks for letting me be part of your big day! pic.twitter.com/RjYvHs2BhC— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) May 17, 2020
And here is what people think about the guy America has got instead:
This is brutal— Eleven Films (@Eleven_Films) May 16, 2020
The contrast is enough to break your heart.
I’m all for a Space Force if we use it to launch every fucking member of this criminal administration straight the fuck into the sun— Jeff Tiedrich (@itsJeffTiedrich) May 15, 2020
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Thinking about the future of Canadian food
Posted May 23, 2020 by Anonymous
CNN has a big story tonight about the future of the US food supply – with more questions than answers:
“We don’t know what the food-service sector will look like,” said Jaime Chamberlain, a fresh-produce importer based in Nogales, Arizona. When the pandemic largely shut down the US in mid-March, “I lost about 96 percent of my food-service contracts from one day to the next. That is an incredible hit to my business.”
Now, Chamberlain asks, “Are people going to go back to cruise lines? Will they go to a restaurant that seats 100 people? Will that restaurant be able to operate with the same amount of seating? Maybe there’ll be no more conventions for 1,000 people… I think people are going to be very reluctant.”
Burkett, speaking by phone from his Mississippi farm, shares those and other worries, and not just on his own account.“As a farmer, the dilemma I’ve got right now, is we don’t have a market. I’ve got crops going to be there to harvest, and I don’t know if we’ll have someone to sell to or not.” In a few weeks, Burkett said he will have more than 120,000 ears of sweet corn to harvest — all meant to go to restaurants that may or may not need them. “My biggest fear is the fear of how long this is going to last. I have to decide now what I’m going to plant in the fall. I’ve got to order seeds, get the ground ready,” Burkett said. He’s decided, for example, to go ahead and plant seedless watermelons, so they’ll be ready to sell this fall to the New Orleans school system — and he’ll have to hope the schools are open.
Canada is going to be having similar problems, because nobody knows what is going to happen.
COVID19 has upended the world, and given Trump’s mismanagement in America, which will bleed over into Canada too, we are going to be on our own for a long time, I think.
For us here in the west, the main issue I think is going to be food — growing it, and importing it. The food production and distribution and processing chains are in shambles and its going to get worse.
Yes, we are planting a garden this spring after years of not bothering. And yes, we have arranged for weekly vegetable deliveries from the local market garden. And yes, I am hoarding jars so I can freeze and can vegetables and fruit for the first time in a long time. And yes, we know a guy who knows a guy who can get us a side of beef the next time they are culling their herd.
But its not going to be enough.
Especially if the meat plants keep on having to close down because the virus is running rampant through their facilities. Wait till it gets into the fish plants, and into the fruit and vegetable processing lines.
Has anybody yet figured out the safest ways to seed, fertilize, harvest, and process our Canadian crops this summer? Will we also have to figure out how to get our Saskatchewan grain to flour mills in Ontario, and move BC apples to the food processors in Quebec, instead of following the usual north-south shipping lanes, selling our food south while eating food imported from the US?
And hey, funny thing, hoocouldanoode? – but maybe it would have been a good thing to keep the Canadian Wheat Board around for just such an emergency, because the Canadian government could tell them what to do and they sorta had to do it – unlike the grain companies who will happily make a pile of money shipping all our grain production to China or wherever even if Canadians need the bread.
Our remaining other marketing boards might well turn out to be useful for the next few years, too – we will need the eggs, and the milk.
Basically, in the long term, I think Canada will have to get more self-sufficient, both in terms of what we produce, and how we sell it. It won’t be as “efficient” as the globalized food production and distribution system our food producers have spent the last 50 years developing. But at least in a Canada-focused national system, Canadians would be the first in line.
But its going to be a painful time while we sort it out.
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Saturday Stories: COVID files
Posted June 13, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Dr. Stephan Kamholz – Chair of Medicine at Maimonides Medical Center, died of COVID19 on June 11th, 2020. May his memory be a blessing |
Sharon Begley and Helen Branswell, in STAT, spoke with 11 epidemiologists to explore what we need to ensure such that we don’t screw up dealing with COVID’s inevitable second wave.
Tomas Pueyo, in Medium, on whether we should all be striving to respond more like Sweden?
Jonathan Corum and Carl Zimmer, in The New York Times, with a coronavirus vaccine tracker.
Siddhartha Mukherjee, in The New York Times, moderates a discussion about whether or not a coronavirus vaccine can be produced in record time
Rachel R. Hardeman, Eduardo M. Medina, and Rhea W. Boyd, in The New England Journal of Medicine, discuss stolen breaths and racial inequities in medicine.
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Saturday Stories: Some Anti-Racism Resources #BlackLivesMatter
Posted June 6, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| May his memory be a blessing |
Corrine Shutak, in Medium, with 75 Things White People Can Do for Racial Justice.
A non-bylined Google Doc of anti-racism resources for white people.
Quakelabs’ collection of Canadian specific anti-racist resource.
Farrah Penn, in Buzzfeed, with 23 Phenomenal Young Adult Books By Black Authors From The First Half Of 2020
The University of Toronto’s Office of Inclusion and Diversity with their collection of recent stories and resources on anti-racism.
@antisocialbritt, on Twitter, with her thread of children’s books that discuss racism.
@bronze_bae, on Twitter, with her thread of young adult books that discuss racism.
Photo By Lorie Shaull – https://www.flickr.com/photos/number7cloud/49959004213/, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link
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We are the world
Posted June 6, 2020 by Anonymous
Its been quite a week, hasn’t it? Even here in Saskatoon, the George Floyd rally on Thursday was attended by hundreds of people, all races and colours.
And its been like this all around the world. Yes, we have seen Black Lives Matter and police abuse protests before, but this time it feels different. I am amazed that protests about the Floyd homicide have been continuing day after day, and that they have spread so far, so fast.
So now I am wondering if our shared COVID-19 pandemic experience has changed us in ways we could not have predicted.
For the first time in history, all of the peoples of the world shared the same experience – a two-month shutdown that was virtually unique in our human experience.
Yes, we were forced to be alone and isolated. We couldn’t go out, we couldn’t see our family and friends. But everyone around the world was, for the first time ever, dealing with the same emotions, the same fears, the same questions and concerns, the same depths of despair, the same glimmers of hope.
After this experience, I think the peoples of the world understand each other in a more profound way than we ever did before.
And perhaps this is why now millions of us are on the same side of these protests. We get it.
People are standing up in solidarity for Black Lives Matter and against police brutality, in numbers I have never seen before – generals are apologizing for ever working with Trump, sports leaders like Sydney Crosby are speaking up, Harry and Meghan are too, bike manufactures are suspending sales to police, corporations are making statements, even the NFL is apologizing for the way they treated Kaepernick.
Wow. Its truly remarkable. This is the way the world changes.
I’ve been watching politics closely for a long time, and I’ve never seen any entity get its ass kicked as badly in a PR/political battle as the country’s metro police are right now.
Only rival is the Catholic Church, and both relied on their wide popularity for their power.
— Martin Longman (@BooMan23) June 5, 2020
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Journalists under attack
Posted June 1, 2020 by Anonymous
In his daily CNN newsletter, Brian Stelter gives a summary of some of the attacks made on journalists over the last few days in the George Lloyd protests across the US:
[there have been a] shocking number of cases of reporters being assaulted and arrested while covering the unrest. This wasn’t just a stray rubber bullet here or there — it seemed, to a lot of people, like targeting of journalists, by both police and in some cases by unruly protesters.
Bellingcat identified “at least 50 separate incidents where journalists have been attacked by law enforcement. In these examples journalists have been shot with rubber bullets, targeted with stun grenades, tear gassed, physically attacked, pepper sprayed and arrested.”
>> CBS’ Michael George tweeted: “I’ve covered protests for 15 years across the US. This is the first time I’ve ever seen police actively and intentionally target the press with rubber bullets, tear gas, and arrests. Scenes reminiscent of China, Iran. We remain determined to show the country what’s happening here…”
>> On Sunday morning I interviewed LA Times reporter Molly Hennessy-Fiske, who described the moment when Minneapolis police fired rubber bullets Saturday night: “We were shouting ‘press’ and I was waving my notebook at them. They just kept following us and firing at us…“
…
As Baltimore Sun media critic David Zurawik wrote in this column, “the question that remains is why we are seeing more physical attacks on the press than we did, say, in 2015 in the uprising in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray.” Echoing what he said on CNN, Zurawik wrote, “There are a lot of reasons for the rise, but here’s the one I think making the greatest difference: almost four years of the president of the United States demonizing the press, calling reporters ‘enemies of the people’ and ‘scum,’ and encouraging rallygoers at his events to intimidate them…”
I am wondering if some police are also blaming the media for what is happening, in a “shoot the messenger” reaction — maybe they have the idea that they could beat people up any time they wanted, if it weren’t for cell phone cameras and reporters publicizing it when they do.
The actual problem, of course, is that police are beating people up.
And journalists keep on reporting it when it happens.
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Take off, eh!
Posted May 30, 2020 by Anonymous
Dear Bob and Doug,Please take off, eh!
— Canadian Forces in 🇺🇸 (@CAFinUS) May 30, 2020
Not sure if anyone in the States will appreciate this but it’s AWESOME the #LaunchAmerica astronauts are BOB & DOUG 👊🤘#CanadaIcons in Canada from SCTV fame !! 🇨🇦🌏🪐🌙🚀🛰@Astro_Doug #Nasa #SpaceX
Take Off !! Eh. #LiftOff #TakeOff pic.twitter.com/nyZc6i39yi
— Kevin Smith (@Global_Smith) May 28, 2020
Dear SpaceX,Can you launch Trump into space instead?
Asking for America.
Thanks!#LaunchAmerica #SpaceLaunchLIVE #SpaceX Cape Canaveral International Space Station #LaunchDay #TrumpMeltdown #HadEnough #TwitterFactCheck #spacexlaunch #CarolynGombell Bob & Doug Challenger pic.twitter.com/3aPDEbN0TP
— Steve Rustad (@SteveRustad1) May 27, 2020
General
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Saturday Stories: This Week’s COVID Selections
Posted May 30, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Dr. Earline Austin, 63 yo NYC Physician, died on 4/3. Originally from Guyana, she lived in Fresh Meadows and was affiliated with Staten Island University Hospital. Attended Ross University for Medical School. May her memory be a blessing |
Emily Chung, in the CBC, with everything you need to know to understand R-naught values.
Andy Larsen, in the Salt Lake City Tribune, with a breakdown of different locations and events and what we know of their risks in terms of spreading COVID.
Kimberly A. Prather, Chia C. Wang, and Robert T. Schooley, in Science, on how if you want life to return to some remote semblance of before’s normal, if you’re not already doing so, you need to start wearing a damn mask
Clayton Dalton, in The New Yorker, on what we lose when we become numb to mass death.
General
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Say goodbye to choirs for a while
Posted May 26, 2020 by Anonymous
When I grew up, of course we were all in the Children’s Choir at church, and every school grade had its own choir every year to perform at the school Christmas concert. Its how I learned all my carols and Christmas songs
Of course its been years now since I was in a choir, but I do remember once, about 40 years ago, when I participated with hundreds of others in a Sing-Along Messiah at the McPherson Playhouse in Victoria — what a great experience that was.
Now we are finding out that the recent COVID research says choirs are a prime mode of virus transmission:
It may be the single most famous outbreak in the U.S.: the Skagit County, Wash., choir practice.
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention compiled the results of its contact tracing. The choir met every Tuesday evening until March 10. At that last meeting, 61 members were present and chairs were arranged close together in six rows of 20 with many empty chairs. They practiced for 40 minutes together, for 50 minutes separated into two smaller groups, and then for 45 minutes sang together again. There was a 15-minute break between the second and third session for oranges and cookies, but many didn’t eat. No one reported physical contact between members and most everyone left immediately after practice. Hand sanitizer was distributed. But, in the end, 53 of the 61 contracted the coronavirus. Three were hospitalized, two died.
This seems to happen repeatedly. The Amsterdam Mixed Choir gave a performance March 8; 102 out of 130 singers tested positive. Fifty members of the Berlin Cathedral Choir tested positive as well.
I’ll bet it has something to do with the act of singing – maybe the forceful expelling of breath from deep in the lungs spreads the virus droplets further. Who knows?
Whatever the reason, I think singing together in public is likely not going to be happening anymore, not until a vaccine is available.
So I guess there are going to be no more Choir!Choir!Choir! experiences:
This may be the way choirs will sing together now:
Even the Mormon Tabernacle Choir did an online Sing-Along Messiah this Easter.
But for one last time, here’s the real thing:
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Saturday Stories: The COVID files
Posted May 23, 2020 by Yoni Freedhoff
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| Dr.Sudheer Singh Chauhan, Internal Medicine Physician and Associate Program Director IM Residency Program at Jamaica Hospital, New York, died of COVID19 on May 19th. May his memory be a blessing |
Tavis Apramian, in the CBC, on why you must discuss how you want to die with your family.
Ed Yong, in The Atlantic, on how America’s patchwork approach to containing COVID19 is likely to challenge any hope of near term success
Kai Kupferschmidt, in Science, on why only some people are COVID super spreaders
Natalie Kofler and Françoise Baylis, in Nature, on the perils, pitfalls, and disparities of “immunity passports”.
David Fisman, in The Globe and Mail, on what Canada needs to reopen safely and how at least now, it doesn’t appear that we have it.
Ian Sample, in The Guardian, with a rather depressing piece on COVID19 vaccine related challenges and realities.
And if you don’t follow me on Twitter or Facebook, here’s a segment I did with CTV’s The Social on the very real impact these scary times has on our physical and mental well being
