Hi,
This week I learned that the meaning of the word Manitoba, the Canadian Prairie province in the middle of the country, is the place where the Creator rests in the narrows of great Lake Manitoba. How appropriate for such a place to be in the heart of Canada. Hopefully, it means that the Creator is still resting there, despite cruel and inhumane treatment of its First Nations and our poor response to seeing Earth lose its life sustaining features, at least for we humans and much of the life around us. It’s definitely hard to imagine the Creator being happy with what’s going on here, despite calls for reconciliation and a just green energy transition, including from those claiming to represent the Creator, though their voices are hard to hear.
We continually read of continuing scandalous subsidies to the oil and gas sector (in the billions of dollars annually), even a global increase of 1% in the use of coal over the last year, conflict with First Nations peoples over their loss of decision making on their lands, how the world is still 80% dependent of fossil fuels to run our $100 trillion economy, the on-going climate disasters, even the on-going and record setting murder sprees in the USA and, we can't forget, the illegal insane war against Ukraine. At the same time there is news about positive actions people and businesses are taking to deal with these calamities to give us some hope, but as I realize now at the end of my sixth decade, time passes far too quickly, often outpacing good intentions.
How much longer we can keep tolerating these injustices to life and planet we’ll only know in the long run, despite the present being full of signals and warnings affecting billions. Signals and warnings about our environment and health are what the Planetary Health Weekly (now #4 of 2023) is mostly about, the bad and the good; and we hope you’ll enjoy today's not so minor changes to the layout. Do keep reading.
Best, david David Zakus, Editor and Publisher
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January 24, 2023 - 4:48PM |
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IN COMPLETE SOLIDARITY WITH UKRAINE SEEKING PEACE AND VICTORY |
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V. Karavaev (1811-1892). The first dean of the medical department of Kiev University and founder of the surgery chair. Artist: S. Odaynik in "The Way (Ukrainian) Artists See It" (1994) by A. Grando, founder and director of the Central Museum of Medicine of Ukraine in Kyiv. ISBN
5-7707-6698-0
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AND WITH THE BRAVE PROTESTERS IN IRAN |
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According to HRANA, the news agency of Human Rights Activists, Bita Haghani Nasimi, arrested at protests, was sentenced to 18 years in prison. According to this verdict, Haghani has been acquitted of “spreading corruption on earth.” However, she received 18 years for other counts. Since the outbreak of nationwide protests, about 19400 people, including journalists, lawyers, teachers, students and civil rights activists, have been arrested. For more details and statistics on the nationwide protest across Iran, read HRANA’s comprehensive report here.
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CLIMATE AND BIODIVERSITY CRISES UPDATES
- Will Brazil’s President Lula keep his climate promises?
- Scientists calculate how much CO2 is being removed from the atmosphere for the first time
- 2022 Canadian Pension Climate Report Card,
- Third of Gen Z workers reject job offers based on company’s green record
ADDITIONAL READS:
- Find out why three funds earned greenwashing awards,
- The newest crop found on the farm - solar panels,
- These reporters tried to goad Greta Thunberg – she wasn’t having any of it,
- New York City is about to set a snow-free record: is climate change to blame?
- Grassland conservation and restoration in India: a governance crisis
GLOBAL HEALTH NEWS
- The right to flee - looking after the wellbeing of people who are forcibly displaced
- New study finds gas stoves a key cause of U.S. childhood asthma
- Peak genetics body apologizes for eugenics, scientific racism in the U.S.
- Researchers announce breakthrough in brain cancer vaccine trial
COVID-19 UPDATES
- Covid-19 misinformation in Canada cost at least 2800 lives and $300m, new report says
- ADDITIONAL READS
- Is vaccine status associated with the severity of Omicron SARS-CoV-2 infrection in hospitalized patients?
- What is the association between regular physical activity and vaccination against Covid-19 among healthcare workers?
- What was the prevalence of adverse events following first and second dose Covid-19 vaccinations in England?
- Covid infects almost entire Chinese province (of 100 million) after curbs scrapped
FOCUS ON FOOD SECURITY IN LATIN AMERICA WITH CARLOS JIMENEZ
- Factors associated with food insecurity in Latin America and the Caribbean countries: a cross-sectional analysis of 13 countries
SPOTLIGHT ON INDIGENOUS WELLNESS
- First Nations investigators allege genocide at Blue Quills residential school
SPOTLIGHT ON POLICY
- British Columbia heatlh-care workers fear retribution if they speak up
SPOTLIGHT ON MEDIA
SPOTLIGHT ON EDUCATION
- How Socrates can help your students (and others) question information
LAST JANUARY READING - NEW BOOK
- "How the World Really Works: The Science Behind How We Got Here and Where We're Going" by Vaclav Smil
QUOTE OF THE WEEK from the Governor of California on gun violence
UPCOMING EVENTS
FYI 1
- The double-edged sword of deep sea mining
- Nevada lithium site that could support production of 370,000 electric vehicles annually for decades gets boost with $700M government loan
- First lithium mining project launched in France
FYI 2
- Simon Fraser University Student Society council protests student facing deportation
ENDSHOTS of "MORE WINTER BEAUTY"
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CLIMATE & BIODIVERSITY CRISES UPDATES |
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Will Brazil’s President Lula Keep His Climate Promises? |
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President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took office on 1 January in Brazil. Credit: Evaristo Sa/AFP via Getty
Expectations were high this earlier this month as Brazil’s new president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, took office. Lula campaigned on promises to help the world fight climate change by protecting the Amazon rainforest, which sequesters a large portion of global carbon emissions. Under his predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon reached its highest level since 2008, threatening efforts to reduce worldwide emissions and preserve one of Earth’s richest biodiversity hotspots.
Global leaders and scientists are waiting to see whether Lula will be able to fulfil his pledges. In November 2022, at the COP27 international climate summit in Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt, he was greeted with cheers as he proclaimed that “Brazil is back” and committed to reaching net-zero deforestation by 2030.
He will be fighting an uphill battle, say analysts and researchers who spoke to Nature. Several of Bolsonaro’s allies were elected to the Brazilian Congress last year, so Lula will need to forge his own alliances to pass climate legislation. He will also have to contend with Bolsonaro’s legacy, finding ways to reverse actions the former leader took against environmental protection.
“Bolsonaro weakened monitoring systems for protected areas, reduced budgets for environmental institutions” and replaced researchers at those organizations with military staff who had no scientific expertise, says Marina Silva, Brazil’s new environment minister. She had the same role from 2003 to 2008, during Lula’s first and second terms as president. Under the Bolsonaro administration, there was an “overall policy blackout”, says Silva, who was also part of an advisory group that helped Lula to transition into office after winning the presidency in late October 2022.
Silva is optimistic that the Lula administration will turn things around. As challenging as the current situation is, she says, the new government has a roadmap it can follow: during her stint in the 2000s as environment minister, she created the Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Deforestation in the Legal Amazon, which helped to slash deforestation by 83% in the region between 2004 and 2012. The challenges are different this time, but “Brazil knows what to do and how to do it”, Silva says. “We’ll build on that success.”
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Scientists Calculate How Much CO2 Is Being Removed from the Atmosphere for the First Time |
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Trees - like these in a Gabonese rainforest - are largely to thank for current levels of carbon dioxide removal. Credit: REUTERS/Christophe Van Der Perre
About two billion tonnes of carbon dioxide are being removed from the atmosphere every year, scientists have calculated for the first time.
But nearly all of it is down to forests, despite growing investments in new technologies.
The University of Oxford led report is the first to assess how much CO2 removal the world is already achieving - and how much more is needed.
Writing in CarbonBrief today, the authors describe the 2bn GtCO2 estimate as “small” relative to current CO2 emissions of 36.6 GtCO2 per year from fossil fuels and cement. But add the figure is “perhaps larger than many might expect.”
The report finds that roughly 1,300 times more carbon dioxide removal from new technologies - and twice as much from trees and soils - are needed by 2050 to limit global heating to well below 2C, as set out in the Paris Agreement.
CO2 removal (CDR) involves capturing the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere and storing it for a long period of time either on land, in the ocean, in geological formations or in products.
To date, 99.9 per cent of successful CO2 removal has been achieved through what the scientists call “conventional CDR on land.” This includes creating new forests, restoring previously deforested ones, better managing soils and using more durable wood products.
Only 0.1 percent of current CDR comes from “novel” CDR methods such as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, biochar and direct air carbon capture and storage.
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2022 Canadian Pension Climate Report Card |
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Credit: Shift Action
Shift’s inaugural Canadian Pension Climate Report Card, released January 18, 2023, analyses the climate policies and strategies of Canadian pension funds based on public information disclosed to December 31, 2022.
The fossil fuel entanglement of some pension boards is a growing concern, as it creates the potential for conflicts of interest in climate-related decision-making. Ongoing pension board entanglement with fossil fuel companies could delay or impede important decisions required to protect the fund from climate-related f inancial risks. Fossil fuel entanglements should be avoided for new director appointments.
Adopting credible climate plans is not easy. The climate crisis presents an unprecedented challenge for pensions. No pension fund climate plan will ever be perfect, but all funds must get started with Paris-aligned plans now. Institutions that develop internal expertise, capacity, experience and a culture of experimentation are likely to be rewarded in the long-term.
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Third of Gen Z Workers Reject Job Offers Based on Company’s Green Record |
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Young people are more interested in companies with ESG values. CREDIT: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images
A third of Gen Z workers (i.e., those
born between 1997 and 2012) claim to have rejected a job offer because of a company’s
poor green credentials, according to new research.
A survey of 6,000 adults found that one in five claim to have
turned down a job offer when the employer’s environmental, social and
governance (ESG) commitments were not in line with their values.
This rose to one in three for people aged between 18 and 24
years old.
The survey, conducted by KPMG, highlights how social and
environmental factors are becoming increasingly important for workers,
particularly among the younger generation.
It found that almost half of people want the company they work
for to demonstrate a commitment to ESG, while more than 80pc placed importance
on being able to link values and purpose with the
organisation they
work for.
One in three have researched a company’s ESG credentials while
looking for a job, rising to almost half for those starting out in their
career.
The environmental impact of the work the company does was among
the key areas sought out as part of the recruitment process, alongside living
wage policies.
Gen Z workers were the most likely to be actively seeking a job
linked to ESG, while two-thirds of office workers said there were certain
industries they refused to work with for ethical reasons.
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ADDITIONAL CLIMATE RELATED NEWS |
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The Right to Flee – Looking After the Wellbeing of People Who are Forcibly Displaced |
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Every day, people choose to move within countries and across borders for many reasons: to follow careers, to adventure, or for a new start. However, millions are also forcibly displaced from their homes to escape risks of persecution, conflict and violence, food insecurity and humanitarian disasters. They leave their country, environment, and family and friends in pursuit of safety, often to a place previously unknown to them.
Forced displacement is on the increase. While recent high profile acute conflicts such as those in Ukraine and Afghanistan have brought discussions of displacement to the fore, we must not forget those forcibly displaced from protracted conflicts such as in Syria, Myanmar, Ethiopia and South Sudan. These chronic and complex settings have caused entire generations to grow up in instability, not knowing the security of peaceful times. The UNHCR estimates that at the end of 2021, 89.3 million people were forced to leave their homes, of whom 2 in 5 are children.
Although we live in an increasingly interconnected world, achieving global health remains a huge challenge. The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated again the need for equitable access to health promotion, vaccination, healthcare and therapeutics to protect public health. There is a strong public health case – as well as an ethical one – for ensuring access to care of refugees and migrants to safeguard the whole population of any country. However, significant inequalities remain both within and between countries, often driven by politics and economics and underpinned by neo-colonial histories and practices; this adversely affects access to diagnostics, treatments and care and health outcomes for individuals and populations. Through addressing the needs of those who are forcefully displaced, we are offered opportunities to reduce health inequalities and support state and international commitments to universal health coverage (UHC).
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New Study Finds Gas Stoves a Key Cause of U.S. Childhood Asthma |
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Credit: Getty
About one in eight cases of asthma in children in the United States is due to the pollution given off by cooking on gas stoves, new research has found, amid moves by Joe Biden’s administration to consider the regulation, or even banning, of gas cookers sales to Americans.
Around a third of US households have gas stoves in their kitchens, with the gas industry long touting the method as the cleanest and most efficient way to cook food.
However, research has repeatedly found the emission of toxic chemicals and carcinogens from gas stoves, even when they are turned off, is creating a miasma of indoor pollution that can be several times worse than the pollution experienced outdoors from car traffic and heavy industry.
A new study has now sketched out the risk being posed to children exposed to pollutants such as nitrogen dioxide that spew from the stoves, finding that 12.7 percent of all current cases of childhood asthma in the US are due to the use of gas stoves.
Researchers said that this means that with around 5 million children in the US experiencing asthma, around 650,000 people aged under 18 could be suffering asthma attacks and having to use inhalers because of the presence of gas stoves in their homes.
Brady Seals, manager of the carbon free buildings program at RMI who undertook the research with epidemiologists in the US and Australia, said the prevalence of asthma due to gas stoves is similar to the amount of asthma caused by second hand smoking, which she called “eye popping.” Seals added: “We knew this was a problem but we didn’t know how bad. This study shows that if we got rid of gas stoves we would prevent 12.7 percent of childhood asthma cases, which I think most people would want to do.”
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Peak Genetics Body Apologizes for Eugenics, Scientific Racism in U.S. |
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Credit: TAI11/Shutterstock
“How do you build trust if you don’t express remorse and decry what has really gone on inappropriately in the past?” said head of the American Society of Human Genetics, Brendan Lee. The apology follows the release of a 27-page report into the field’s historic support of eugenics and scientific racism. An investigation was launched during the groundswell of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. The organization found many instances of member and leadership support of forced sterilization and the weaponization of genetics to discriminate against Black Americans. Erik Peterson called for the findings to be included in undergraduate science education.
The American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) apologized for the participation of some of its early leaders in the eugenics movement, as well as the group’s failure to acknowledge and oppose other past harms and injustices in the field of genetics.
The findings are “painful” but need to be shared widely, says Brendan Lee, a pediatrician and a geneticist at Baylor College of Medicine and president of ASHG, which has some 8000 members. “How do you build trust if you don’t express remorse and decry what has really gone on inappropriately in the past?”
“It’s been a long time coming,” adds Sarah Tishkoff, a geneticist at the University of Pennsylvania and member of an expert panel that helped guide the report. “And much needed.”
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Researchers Announce Breakthrough in Brain Cancer Vaccine Trial |
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Credit: Cleveland Clinic
Lifespan researchers say they have made a major breakthrough in fighting brain cancer. The Lifespan Cancer Institute held a news conference at Rhode Island Hospital to present results from a vaccine trial for glioblastoma, the most common and lethal form of brain cancer.
According to researchers, the Phase III clinical trial of the DCVax-L cancer vaccine shows that it can expand the life of patients with both newly diagnosed and recurrent glioblastoma.
“The nice thing about it is it’s non-toxic. Just like getting a vaccine for the flu or COVID that we are all familiar with,” said Dr. Steven Toms, director of the Brain Tumor and Stereotactic Radiosurgery Program.
“You get an injection a few times a month to start and then monthly for a few months and it seems to activate the patient’s neuroimmune cells to attack the cancer and reduce the chances of this malignancy coming back and killing the person,” he continued.
During the trial, researchers said the median survival rate for newly diagnosed patients increased to 22.4 months, and the five-year survival rate was 13%.
Patients normally survive for 15 to 17 months after they are diagnosed, with a five-year survival rate of only 5%, researchers noted.
Researchers say this is the first time in nearly 20 years that a Phase III trial of a systemic treatment has shown such survival extension in newly diagnosed glioblastoma. The study was lead by Dr. Linda Liau, an internationally renowned neurosurgeon-scientist and Northwest Biotherapeutics lead investigator of its DCVax-L drug.
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SARS-CoV-2 & COVID-19 UPDATES |
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The pandemic surely continues. However, information about Covid-19's presence in our communities and outcomes is increasingly hard to find, and many erroneously feel it's over. Clearly, though, in Canada it does seem over. But Covid is still a life threatening disease associated with many complications and it's still infecting and killing many. Collective action, data reporting and leadership have all but disappeared.
Over the last week, reported cases are down by about 33% to 230,000/day; deaths are up sharply by over 300% to about 9400/day; and vaccinations are down from about 6 to 5 million/day.
Vaccination, despite ongoing concerns about waning immunity and much misinformation, along with other proven public health measures, remain the best ways to keep yourself and others safe from serious consequences. Get all the shots/boosters you can (see chart below), and practise other public health measures (like masking) especially indoors with crowds.
See below too for a few global stats and current hotspots:
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"It is the plague in seemingly all sincerity." Bob Woodward |
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COVID-19 Misinformation (in Canada) Cost At Least 2,800 Lives and $300M, New Report Says |
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Paramedics transfer a person from an ambulance into a hospital in Montreal, Tuesday, December 29, 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Credit: Graham Hughes/The Canadian Press
The spread of COVID-19 misinformation in Canada cost at least 2,800 lives and $300 million in hospital expenses over nine months of the pandemic, according to estimates in a new report out today, Thursday January 26, 2023.
The report — released by the Council of Canadian Academies (CCA), an independent research organization that receives federal funding — examined how misinformation affected COVID infections, hospitalizations and deaths between March and November of 2021.
The authors suggest that misinformation contributed to vaccine hesitancy for 2.3 million Canadians. Had more people been willing to roll up their sleeves when a vaccine was first available to them, Canada could have seen roughly 200,000 fewer COVID cases and 13,000 fewer hospitalizations, the report says.
Alex Himelfarb, chair of the expert panel that wrote the report, said that its estimates are very conservative because it only examined a nine-month period of the pandemic.
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ADDITIONAL COVID-19 RELATED NEWS |
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FOOD SECURITY IN CENTRAL AND LATIN AMERICA WITH CARLOS JIMENEZ |
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SPOTLIGHT ON INDIGENOUS WELLNESS |
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First Nations Investigators Allege Genocide at Blue Quills Residential School |
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Leah Redcrow, executive director of Acimowin Opaspiw Society (AOS), speaks to reporters in Saddle Lake, Alta., on January 24, 2023. Credit: Jay Rosove/CTV National News
An organization investigating unmarked graves near a residential school in eastern Alberta says it has uncovered "physical and documented evidence of a genocide." The Acimowin Opaspiw Society (AOS) released details of its preliminary report on January 24 into "missing children and unmarked burials" at Blue Quills Residential School. "The investigation's theory regarding the missing children of the Saddle Lake site, is that they are buried in undocumented mass graves," the report states. "One of the undocumented mass graves was located by accidental excavation, in 2004, at Sacred Heart cemetery. The mass graves will require a second excavation, and repatriation of remains followed by the identification by the coroner once DNA is collected from living descendants."
The report includes allegations that a "disciplinarian" who worked there from 1935 to 1942 was seen killing children. "The investigation has received disclosures from intergenerational survivors, whose parents witnessed homicides at the Saint Paul site," the report states. That staff member is accused of pushing boys down the stairs, killing them. "[He] would then threaten to kill the boys that witnessed if they said anything," it says. The report states the accused died in 1968.
Leah Redcrow, executive director of AOS, also believes that many of the children at the school died after they were forced to drink unpasteurized milk that was contaminated with bovine tuberculosis. "How I know it's deliberate is because the school administrators weren't dying, the children were. And the school administrators didn't eat the same food as the children," Redcrow told reporters. "A lot of what this is, is getting spiritual justice for our family members who are missing. I myself didn't know that my grandfather had 10 siblings die in this school."
Genealogical work is being done to determine how many children disappeared, she said. Last May, the group held a press conference to announce that it was "actively researching and investigating" the deaths of at least 200 residential school children who never came home. At the time, a residential school survivor and researcher with AOS said he found documents for 215 students who died between the ages of 6-11, but whose remains are still unaccounted for. "The amount of missing children is extensive...The institution was strife with violence, illness, starvation, abuse and death," said Eric Large.
If you are a former residential school student in distress, or have been affected by the residential school system and need help, you can contact the 24-hour Indian Residential Schools Crisis Line at 1-866-925-4419, or the Indian Residential School Survivors Society toll-free line at 1-800-721-0066.
Additional mental-health support and resources for Indigenous people are available here.
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B.C. Health-care Workers Fear Retribution If They Speak Up |
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The BC Nurses Union has launched a campaign featuring emotional and graphic testimonials from nurses whose identities have been carefully concealed in order to avoid repercussions for speaking out. Credit: BCNU
Many British Columbia medical staffers are frustrated and even angry about what they describe as a culture of fear and silence when it comes to raising questions about the quality of care in the province, as well as other issues.
For months, CTV News has been speaking to health-care staffers on background, meaning they have agreed to provide information on the condition that their names and any identifying details are withheld from publication for fear of reprisal from their employers: hospitals, health authorities and government agencies.
They describe having a duty of care to report issues around patient safety or adequate care, but being labeled as troublemakers or even facing disciplinary action for coming forward to administrators. The idea of speaking publicly was out of the question for most, as they claimed to have been warned and even threatened against doing so by higher-ups.
A pediatric heart surgeon who just stepped down from his role at BC Children’s Hospital after 30 years of life-saving procedures is providing rare insight into how health-care workers are silenced from going public.
“There's no question people are afraid to speak up. They're worried about their jobs, they're worried about providing for their family, and I understand that,” said Dr. Sanjiv Gandhi, who says there’s always been a tight rein on staff, which has only worsened in the last couple of years.
“The health authority model is such that anybody whose paycheque comes from a health authority feels threatened when they speak out.”
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Credit: Karim Sahib/AFP/Getty Images
I should
say right now that Virunga is
not a movie you should watch if you want to feel good about the direction the
world is headed. Virunga wouldn’t
be made in a society that actually valued the natural world in the way it not
only should, but needs, to be valued. The documentary is about a group of
soldiers in Virunga National Park who use lethal force to protect critically
endangered mountain gorillas from poachers. It’s a war correspondent’s look at
the Congo’s national park system as well as forces environmentalists to ask
themselves how militant and absolutist they’re willing to be as stewards of the
natural world. From 2014.
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How Socrates Can Help Your Students (and Others) Question Information |
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Credit: Konstantinos Arfanis
In a world full of answers, we must take time to ask questions, and the approaches favoured by Socrates can still be useful today, explains Konstantinos Arfanis
What do W. B. Yeats, Bertrand Russell and Charles Bukowski have in common? Apart from the fact that all three were influential figures in their time and were what we would call “important thinkers”, they also had a similar view on one of the reasons our time is somehow troubled.
Yeats, in his 1920 poem The Second Coming, concluded that “the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity”. Russell, 13 years later, in his essay The Triumph of Stupidity, wrote: “The fundamental cause of the trouble in the modern world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.”
When these two men wrote the above, there was no internet, no information overload and the “podium”, so to speak, was reserved for those with the status or (in my favourite version) the knowledge necessary to make their opinion heard. Bukowski’s similar views on the issue, half a century later, coincided with the dawn of the digital era – or what we today call “the information age”.
In our “consume and move on” culture, we find ourselves inundated with information, “experts” and ideas that sometimes lack grounding, are built on uncertain credentials and, perhaps unsurprisingly, often expire more quickly than last week’s groceries. So, what can we do to counterbalance misinformation and disinformation and debunk popular myths within our own disciplines?
Sadly, there is no single failsafe way to achieve this, but some useful techniques can help. Get your audience asking themselves questions. I’ve found it effective to engage with my audience through a journey of questions and uncertainties to a conclusion of self-realization.
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LAST JANUARY READING - NEW BOOK |
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"How the World Really Works: The Science Behind How We Got Here and Where We're Going" by Vaclav Smil |
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We have never had so much information at our fingertips and yet most of us don’t know how the world really works. This book explains seven of the most fundamental realities governing our survival and prosperity. From energy and food production, through our material world and its globalization, to risks, our environment and its future, How the World Really Works offers a much-needed reality check—because before we can tackle problems effectively, we must understand the facts. In this ambitious and thought-provoking book we see, for example, that globalization isn’t inevitable—the foolishness of allowing 70 per cent of the world’s rubber gloves to be made in just one factory became glaringly obvious in 2020—and that our societies have been steadily increasing their dependence on fossil fuels, such that any promises of decarbonization by 2050 are a fairy tale. For example, each greenhouse-grown supermarket-bought tomato has the equivalent of five tablespoons of diesel embedded in its production, and we have no way of producing steel, cement or plastics at required scales without huge carbon emissions. Ultimately, Smil answers the most profound question of our age: are we irrevocably doomed or is a brighter utopia ahead? Compelling, data-rich and revisionist, this wonderfully broad, interdisciplinary guide finds faults with both extremes. Looking at the world through this quantitative lens reveals hidden truths that change the way we see our past, present and uncertain future.
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Outrage and Fear Amid California's Gun Violence |
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“Only in America do we see this kind of carnage”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said January 24, 2023 as his state continues to reel after the double mass shootings. Newsom slammed political colleagues, particularly Republicans, for failing to address gun violence across the country. In the capital, President Joe Biden echoed these words and pleaded with lawmakers to pass Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s bill banning assault weapons. Far from the political hubs, Asian-American communities across California continue to mourn. According to data compiled by UCLA, nearly one-third of Asian immigrants to the U.S. fear becoming a victim of gun violence in their new home. There have been more than 30 mass shootings in the U.S. so far this year. (Sources: NPR, Reuters)
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The Double-Edged Sword of Deep Sea Mining |
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The mining vessel Hidden Gem. Credit: Charles M. Vella/SOPA/LightRocket/Getty
The ocean seafloor is one of the last true frontiers of the unexplored and unexploited. Even as the world above it lurches with the changes of global warming and human displacement, the bottom of the ocean has remained a place so inhospitable and difficult to reach that it is relatively undisturbed. It is by no means guaranteed to stay that way.
Buried underwater are in-demand metals that are needed to scale up the development of batteries, which themselves are crucial to technologies like electric vehicles. EVs, for their part, can help us reduce emissions and move toward a warming scenario that is even close to the realm of 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, as prescribed by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Those EV batteries, however, rely on metals that are proving quite problematic to source. As a result, the international community is vying to complete a set of regulations that will allow for innovation while also protecting one of the world’s last relatively undisturbed ecosystems. It is a race to implement greener systems—and mitigate their effects.
In November, the International Seabed Authority—the UN agency broadly tasked with regulating mineral resources in international waters—held its 27th session to flesh out its developing plan to regulate and approve deep-sea mining operations. While there are already exploratory operations underway to provide proof of concept for the technology used to extract the precious minerals, regulations for commercial mining are slated to go into effect in July. Large-scale mining operations seem likely to follow soon after. In the rush to expedite the process and reap the benefits that a robust supply of the metals would supply to the EV market, regulations and technology are being developed side by side.
See Also:
At Fortune: Nevada lithium site that could support production of 370,000 electric vehicles annually for decades gets boost with $700M government loan
At Le Monde: First lithium mining project launched in France
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Simon Fraser University Student Society (SFSS) Council Protests Student Facing Deportation |
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Environmental protestors face arrests and prison time for their activism Credit: Save Old Growth
The Peak attended the Simon Fraser Student Society (SFSS) Council meeting on January 11. The highlights from the meeting include an SFU student facing deportation and preparation for the students’ federal lobby trip.
Zain Haq is a third-year international student at SFU studying history. Haq is the co-founder of the Save Old Growth campaign and after a series of non-violent highway blockades across the province of BC, Haq is now facing deportation.
Due to his activist work, Haq has been asked to go to the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA). The CBSA has a duty to remove “all foreign nationals and permanent residents who violate the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act,” according to Dawson Creek Mirror. They report, “Some conditions for obtaining a study permit include obeying the law and the absence of a criminal record.” Haq believes his actions should not be considered illegal because the government is failing to act accordingly towards the climate crisis. Previously, several lawyers suggested he go into hiding as CBSA will attempt to detain him. However, he has since been released and will “report to CBSA twice a week,” according to Haq in a follow-up email to The Peak.
The petition to support Zain Haq notes, “Deportation is an undue punishment for someone who has no arrest record other than being engaged in non-violent civil disobedience to raise awareness for the urgent climate emergency.”
Since 2020, Haq has been arrested 10 times for attempts at civil resistance which involves non-violent protest methods such as strikes, boycotts, and protests. He is also “currently facing five charges of mischief.”
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Hawkrigg Lane, Seguin, Ontario |
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Photo Credits: David Zakus |
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