Medical Professionals Who Ignore the Science on COVID

"I find it absolutely fascinating [that a medical professional with years of science-based training could align with evidence-defying ideas]."

"It's tremendously problematic because they're leveraging the legitimacy they have with the general public to push misinformation."

"It just confuses and clouds the public perception of what the evidence actually says."

"Misinformation kills people. That's how serious this topic is."

Dr.Timothy Caulfield, Medical ethicist, health law and policy professor, University of Alberta 

"When someone certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine [ABIM], says something like ... 'vaccines don't prevent COVID deaths or hospitalizations', we are not dealing with valid professional disagreement."

"We are dealing with wrong answers."

Dr.Richard Baron, New England Journal of Medicine

Throughout the pandemic, complaints have poured into colleges of physicians and surgeons accusing doctors of flouting public-health rules, promoting conspiracy theories, and issuing bogus vaccine-exemption letters. Photo by Ernest Doroszuk/Postmedia/

During the endless time the pandemic has been bedeviling the globe, medical science has had to deal with vectors of misinformation, doubters about the science, those who sneer at governments' and medical bodies' reactions to the pathogen, and attempts to shield society from its worst effects. Colleges of physicians and surgeons in Canada have seen complaints flooding in with accusations of doctors flouting public-health rules, promoting conspiracy theories, prescribing unproven treatments, and issuing bogus vaccine-exemption letters.

One example can be taken by Toronto-area physician Dr.Jeff Matheson who refused to wear a mask, instructed patients not to wear them claiming they were harmful and informing his patients that the pandemic was a hoax driven by the media whose purpose was to bring profit to people like Bill Gates. COVID test results, he stated with a certainty, were being sold to China for DNA sequencing. Parents whose children's schools insist on students wearing masks should sue those schools, he urged.

His licence to practice was suspended for a nine-month period by Ontario's medical regulator which spoke of his actions as "disgraceful dishonourable and unprofessional". Six MDs in Alberta have seen their practice restricted, resulting from similar actions. A doctor in British Columbia was suspended, another cited, as numerous investigations are taking place across Canada by medical licensing bodies against some of their members.

Another Ontario MD, Kulvinder Kaur Gill, pediatrician and physical activist in Brampton, early in the pandemic received three cautions from the college of physicians and surgeons. She expressed her opinion in the public sphere that vaccines were unneeded to combat the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The response by some of these doctors, chided by regulators, was to challenge their disciplinary action with the argument they violate their right to free expression.

In the U.S., Republican politicians introduced legislation prohibiting state medical boards from disciplining doctors who spread COVID misinformation or prescribe unproven treatments. A warning was removed from the  website of the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners in response to such legislation. Just 55 percent of the Tennessee population has been double-vaccinated. The state suffered over four times the COVID deaths per 100,000 compared to Ontario.

Another Dread Zoonotic Surfacing in Africa

"Marburg is a highly infectious viral hemorrhagic fever in the same family as the more well-known Ebola virus disease."

"In 2008, two independent cases were reported in travellers who visited a cave inhabited by Rousettus bat colonies in Uganda."

World Health Organization

"WHO is on the ground supporting health authorities [in Ghana where the latest outbreak has occurred] and now that the outbreak is declared, we are marshalling more resources for the response."

Dr.Matshidiso Moeti, Regional Director for Africa, World Health Organization

Rousettus aegyptiacus or Egyptian fruit bats. Prolonged exposure to mines or caves where they live can result in human infection of the deadly Marburg virus disease. Photo by Peace River Refuge and Ranch

In 1967 two cases of the disease occurred, one in Marburg and Frankfurt, Germany, the other in Belgrade, Serbia. This is the origin of the naming of the virus; Marburg. The cases were traced back to a laboratory working with African green monkeys that had been imported from Uganda. The WHO reports that prolonged exposure to mines or caves where colonies of bats live can result in human infection.

The Ghana Health Service's Disease Surveillance Department recommends certain steps in avoidance of contracting the virus; abstaining from consuming bush meat; washing hands frequently with soap and water, and taking care not to handle dead bodies of those who may have had the Marburg virus. Timely and sterling recommendations for Africa, should outbreaks continue to be confined to that continent.

The suspected causes and such exposure leading to a virus leaping the species barrier from wild animals to humans has a familiar ring to it for most people; it was at the live animal market in Wuhan, China, that transmission from animal [bats infecting commonly consumed mammals] to human took place; bush animals sold for human consumption, infected with SARS-CoV-2 transmitted it to people at large through contact in the Huanan market. 

 

Police in Wuhan, China, shut down the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market on 1 January, 2020. Credit: Noel Celis/AFP via Getty

Marburg virus is more vindictively fatal than COVID-19; an estimated 88 percent of those infected may never recover. It has an incubation period between two to 14 days. Infection can spread from person to person through direct contact with bodily fluids. Clothing which has been worn by someone infected with Marburg can also become a source of infection. No cure exists for the virus, though treatment for its symptoms is available.

Symptoms of infection include high fever and severe headaches, muscle aches and pains. Severe diarrhea, stomach pain, nausea and vomiting may begin on the infection's third day. Those infected become extremely lethargic. In cases that become fatal, a patient generally bleeds from the nose and gums.

Marburg virus cases and outbreaks have been reported in Angola, Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, South Africa and Uganda with links to Zimbabwe. In 2021 an outbreak was declared in Guinea, lasting for five weeks following a single case of the virus.

Out of the 590 people who contracted the disease since 1957, 478 died of it, according to the World Health Organization's data on major outbreaks. Two deaths occurred in June in Ghana when two unrelated people died in hospital following their hospitalization because they were suffering from diarrhea, fever, nausea and vomiting.

Doctor Mark Katz, a member of the World Health Organisation (WHO), taking an oral sample from patient Feliciana suspected of having Marburg haemorrhagic fever in Kinguangua, near Uige. Feliciana’s grandmother, sister and ex-husband died of Marburg haemorrhagic fever. The young woman tested negative after being transported to the Uige Provincial Hospital for observation. Photo by CHRISTOPHER BLACK/AFP/Getty Images

Nature Has Made Them Indiscriminate Predators

"[The criteria for including the cat among alien invasive species] are one hundred percent met by the cat." 

"I have a dog, but I don't have anything against cats [outside of a scientific biological lens]."

Wojciech Solarz, biologist, Polish Academy of Sciences

One of seven cats that keep the company of the visitors at a new "Miau Cafe" finishes a cake in Warsaw, Poland, Jan. 13, 2018. \Czarek Sokolowski - staff, AP

It was a strictly scientific classification of a known predator whose natural hunting endowment is known to be inimical to small mammals and particularly birds. Felines are adept at hunting, and domestic cats for all their domestication, are still feral hunters. Unlike other household animal companions most cats are permitted to exit a house at will, and unobserved can prowl wherever they like, whenever they have a mind to. Their activities are not monitored, but those who have cats in their homes are often gifted by the cat with a freshly caught mouse or a bird.

There is no mystery anywhere in the world about cats' inborn impulse to hunt. Their highly developed skills in seeking out, tracking and capturing prey are second to none others. They do this, relentlessly. There are some people with whom cats live who understand the havoc cats are responsible for in the natural world and as responsible animal lovers keep their cats indoors at all times. Others air their cats using a leash. But most people feel this is unnatural and fails to answer to the cats' need to roam at will.

And as they do, they are an existential threat to other animals. Appeals to cat owners to restrain their cats' activities, explaining the carnage that results by allowing cats to freely roam generally fall on deaf ears. But the reality is that the world becomes a quieter place, devoid of the wide variety of birdsong when species are hunted out of existence. 

Humanity's manipulation of the natural environment is also at fault, with the use of pesticides and the seeming inevitability of narrowing bird habitat. Yet the cat's instinctive predation remains responsible for a massive annual kill.

That was all taken into consideration when Dr.Solarz placed cats on a list of "invasive alien species". It's hard to argue for their 'alien' classification, since even in  ancient Egypt they were venerated and valued for their distinct qualities as one of nature's gifts to the world. Dr.Solarz's cat classification has raised the ire of his nation's cat lovers, forcing the scientist to defend his decisive classification of cats.

He explained that of the list compiled inclusive of invasive alien species none of the 1,786 animals listed elicited much of a public response, until the 1,787th inclusion, that of cats. He does feel that media reports may have created the impression that his institute might be recommending the euthanizing of feral and other cats to remedy the problem. The intention, however, was to highlight the reality of harm mounted by domestic cat populations on other creatures of the wild.

The Polish Academy institute early in the month published a post on its website responding to the controversy with the intention of clarifying its position, stressing it was "opposed to any cruelty toward animals", arguing its classification synchronized with European Union guidelines. Its alien status from its possible origins in the Middle East to Europe latterly, explains its 'alien' status.

It would be ideal, according to the Institute, if cat owners could be persuaded to limit the amount of freedom they allow their felines in the great out-of-doors, in the interests of preserving other species and most particularly the avian community of animals. It is also often pointed out that cats themselves would be far less prone to accidents, to exposure to harmful chemicals or environmental pathogens, to injury in fights with other cats, and to coming to harm or death in collisions with street traffic.

Natasha Ukrainec shelters her cat Bonja in Medyka, Poland, after fleeing Kharkiv, Ukraine, on March 8, 2022. (Visar Kryeziu / AP)

 

Russia -- At War With Ukraine -- and Europe

"Now the geography is different, it's far from being just the DPR and LPR  [Donetsk Peoples Republic/Luhansk Peoples Republic], it's also Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions and a number of other territories [beyond he Donbas which the Russian military has wholly or partially sized]."

"This process is continuing logically and persistently."

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov

 

"[Moscow is using a similar] playbook [to its takeover of Crimea, when it annexed the Ukrainian peninsula by organizing a sham referendum in 2014]."

"[I am] exposing [the Russian plans] so the world knows that any purported annexation is premeditated, illegal and illegitimate. [There will be a quick response from the U.S. and its allies]."

"[Areas targeted for annexation included Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk and Luhansk; regions Lavrov claims are now Russian objectives]."

US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby 

A Russian soldier stands guard in Kherson, Ukraine. Moscow’s war aims now extend to the southern provinces of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia  AP

 

As fortunes change in Russia's invasion of Ukraine, its original intention to march on Kyiv, occupy Ukraine's capital and decapitate its government failed as a result of Ukraine's lack of cooperation in allowing itself to return to the satellite status of years gone by under the Soviet Union. Ukrainian resistance proved too great, its military prowess too successful in destroying Russian war materiel and servicemen for the Kremlin to sustain, so its troops were withdrawn.

And a face-saving proclamation was made with proper pomp and little ceremony that Moscow's goal, after all, was to secure the entire Donbas, eastern Ukraine's industrial heartland, to be administered by ethnic Russian Ukrainian opponents of an independent Ukraine. Ukrainian resistance to Moscow's plans for its future continue to aggravate the Kremlin with its growing and successful counter-offensive. While all of Luhansk is now in Russian control, the Donetsk region remains elusive.

Yet Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claims it's full steam ahead on the Kremlin's new strategy to widen its ambitions and expand the conflict beyond the Donbas. Russia responding to what Lavrov speaks of as the interference of Western powers who annoyingly continue to provide Kyiv with long-range weaponry like the US.-produced High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS).

US-supplied long range weapons have changed Moscow's calculus, Mr Lavrov says   Getty Images

 

Five months of Russian troops bashing Ukrainian towns and cities, reducing hospitals, schools and apartment buildings as well as military installations to rubble have failed to produce the unequivocal victory that Moscow claims is rightfully theirs as a defender of freedom from fascism of the people of Ukraine. A people that have ungratefully viewed the destruction of their nation's infrastructure with alarm and hatred toward the aggressor.

As punishment for Ukraine's steadfast defence against its neighbour's intentions, Moscow is looking further in preparation of formally annexing seized territory. Russia wanted "blood, not talks", commented Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, commenting on Moscow's intransigence in insisting that fascists ruled Ukraine and it is Russia's duty as a good neighbour intent on securing its own security, to demolish cities, create millions of homeless and refugees and murder thousands of civilians.

This, as Russian President Vladimir Putin warns Europe that gas supplies via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, shuttered for weeks for maintenance, remained at risk of an even more reduced flow; a classic case of turning the screw as a punishment for Europe's response sanctioning Russia over its illegal occupation of a third of Ukraine.

 

For Optimum Health: Balance Good Diet With Habitual Exercise

"We hypothesize that physical activity and diet quality are independently associated with lower mortality risk, and that high levels of physical activity, either in total moderate-to-vigorous physical activity or vigorous physical activity, cannot offset detrimental effects of poor-quality diet."

"Sensationalized headlines and misleading advertisements for exercise regimens to lure consumers into the idea of 'working out to eat whatever they want' have fuelled the circulation of the myth about 'exercise outrunning a bad diet'."

"Our study provided important evidence for health professionals that exercise does not fully compensate for a poor diet and that we should recommend and advocate for both an active lifestyle and a healthy diet."

"[The selection of target foods reflects recommendations from the American Heart Association] These food groups were selected as markers for overall diet quality because other important dietary components and/or nutrient groups, such as whole grains and dairy, were not measured during baseline assessment."

Research conclusion, BMG Sports Medicine

One of very few research projects taking on the pairing of exercise and diet slanted toward the conviction that vigorous exercise regimens are capable of reversing the effects of poor nutrition has reached the conclusion that whatever the type of exercise that is paired with a poor diet, in the final analysis makes little difference. While exercise is beneficial and its effects are credited with healthier outcomes, this is separate and apart from the issue of a diet low in nutritional quality and high in health-harmful substances.

An international team of scientific researchers out of Australia, the U.S., Italy and Norway made use of a large sample of British adults in research to determine what impact diet has on human health that could be counteracted by a good exercise regimen. The multinational research ream reviewed exercise and diets' independent impact and in turn their joint impact on all-cause mortality, cardiovascular disease and a number of cancers.

Self-reported health histories specific to diet and exercise habits of 346,627 study subjects between the ages of 40 and 69 were cross-referenced against data on local death records in the course of a decade. The purpose: to link cause of death to baseline health records gathered a decade earlier so that the impact of diet, exercise or a combination of both on mortality could be gauged. It was the very sparcity of such studies that motivated the study as well as curiosity whether vigorous exercise did in fact offer added protection against early death risk in comparison to more moderate exercise intensity.

Study subjects were fairly representative of most societies with 40.8 percent subscribing to no vigorous exercise weekly, 26.5 percent exercising fewer than 75 minutes of high-intensity workouts each week, and the remainder devoting over 75 minutes weekly to exercising vigorously. Concerning diet, 22 percent held a poor ranking, 53.4 percent a medium rating while 24.5 percent qualified as the healthiest in the diet category.

Separately reviewed, high levels of physical activity -- 211 to 450 minutes of moderate to vigorous weekly exercise along with a high-quality diet each was seen to have a positive influence on longevity. Study participants who excelled at both diet and exercise scored the lowest mortality risk. Leaving those who count on one healthy habit correcting the unhealthy one, extremely disappointed.

Slightly greater protection was provided with vigorous physical activity against cardiovascular disease as opposed to moderate-intensity exercise; only however, for those accumulating ten to 150 minutes of vigorous exercise a week. On the other hand, those who were credited with over 150 minutes a week failed to realize the same benefit boost. 

People with the healthiest diets saw a 14 percent lower risk of cancer mortality, representing a benefit that failed to extend to those with a low- or medium-quality diet. The research results give clarity to the reality that a love of exercise cannot mitigate the negative effects of a love of fast food.

"The study results are no surprise to me. Many people have come to see me in my private practice after suffering a heart attack when training for their fourth or fifth marathon, or right after doing a CrossFit exercise."

"When I do a comprehensive evaluation of their lifestyle, it is apparent that they thought their intense daily exercise regimen would make up for their poor, unbalanced diet, and it simply doesn’t." 

Michelle Routhenstein, cardiology dietitian

Global Monkeypox: MPXV

Public Health Agency of Canada

"Many ... well-intentioned officials appear fearful of saying something homophobic."

"LGBTQ organizers have ample practice with informing their communities about a possible health threat and championing safe-sex practices."

"Public-health officials should activate these resources rather than tiptoeing around the issue."

Jim Downs, professor, historical study of infectious diseases, Gettysburg College

 

Back around 1985, when a terrifyingly mysterious new disease was appearing in gay-centric areas of New York and elsewhere around the United States, it wasn't uncommon to read or hear of dismissive comments that gays brought this dreadful malady on themselves. The immune systems of homosexual men completely broke down with acquired immunity-deficient syndrome. No one knew what to do, how it could be avoided, much less treated, The disease took its dread course and people died horrible deaths, but the straight majority felt fairly complacent, and from pulpits sermons thundered that the supreme one above was punishing gays.

 

Fast forward to 2022 and no one but the most die-hard homophobic-committed will break a sneer over just desserts at the sudden appearance globally of yet another disease linked to sex acts shared between men with other men. The saving grace, is that this new disease is relatively mild in comparison to HIV-AIDS. With monkeypox suddenly taking centre-stage, nudging SARS-CoV-2 out of the way temporarily, the development of another gay-sex punishment is being  handled by public health somewhat differently.

No one wants to overtly call attention to the fact that the vast majority of those contracting monkeypox are males. And they are males of a specific group. Society at present is well and truly chastened, a far cry from when 'gay' was just another epithet to be tossed off in contempt against a swath of society that kept a low profile in avoidance of the backlash that was usually forthcoming at mention of gay sex, a bull's red flag for straight men who thought mocking and demeaning their gay brothers was fun.

The New England Journal of Medicine recently published the results of their study of the surprise outbreak of monkeypox outside of Africa, where the disease, while endemic, is still relatively unusual. It can have devastating effects on pregnant women and young children if infected. Yet another 'invasive species' from one corner of the world to another. The large study used a sample of 528 cases on four continents. Of the total, 13 percent saw hospitalization, the majority suffering "no serious complications", and no deaths.

For starters, HIV/AIDS was initially occurring exclusively within the gay population. Before eventually spreading to women and straight men, albeit not in overwhelming numbers. As with AIDS, monkeypox has been seen to afflict 98 percent men of the 528 cases studied. Furthermore 95 percent of the cases, according to the study, were transmitted sexually. In the first news coming out of clinics worldwide, those statistics were verified by diagnosis and observation.

Leaving government agencies and health authorities with a dilemma; how to transmit the information to the public clearly and honestly without risking a backlash against the gay community? The fear was that frank admissions of the disease's spread through same-sex physical intimacy would engender and "fuel hate" and risk spurring "unintended consequences".

The disease continues to spread, and to be treated. Its symptoms are not particularly worrisome. And it now has a global presence. The World Health Organization identifies monkeypox as a specific problem for gay men, advising that audience "for gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men", mincing no words in addressing the concerned audience. 

A letter was issued a month ago, co-signed by 29 medical experts recommending to the WHO that the word 'monkeypox' brings undue attention to Africa where it has a historical presence. First identified in monkeys, the disease crossed the species barrier in Africa. Which explains why photographs used by Western media so often depict African men whose skin shows monkeypox's effects.

New, replacement names for monkeypox to reduce the possibility of identifying the disease with a specific world region now that it has become a global health phenomenon are being considered. Such as MPXV-1, MPXV-2 or MPXV-a, as descriptives of the type. "MPXV", an acronym for monkeypox, too clever by half.

 

"The symptoms of monkeypox virus are milder than, but similar to those of smallpox. One key difference is that monkeypox causes swollen lymph nodes (lymphadenopathy) while smallpox does not. The swelling can occur in many different locations on the body, or be localized, including lymph nodes of the neck and armpit. The incubation period (time from infection to onset of symptoms) for monkeypox is usually 7−14 days but can range from 5−21 days. In addition to swollen lymph nodes, early signs and symptoms may include fever, headache, muscle aches, exhaustion, backache, and chills. A rash develops on the body within 1 to 3 days (sometimes longer) after the appearance of fever, usually first on the face, then spreading to other parts of the body. The lesions progresses through the stages of macules, papules, vesicles, pustules, and finally scabs before falling off."

National Collaborating Centre for Infectious Diseases, Public Health Agency of Canada

Omicron's Endless Mutations to Sub-Variants

"What is happening is you have this large population now that has some significant amount of immune response to the virus, either through previous infections or vaccinations and boosting, or a combination of both."

"The virus is mutating in populations that have a fair amount of resistance to earlier forms."

"The virus is finding a new niche in humans -- a niche in highly vaccinated, boosted and previously infected people. These are very specific mutations."

"[Hospitalizations in Canada are increasing], but again we're not seeing a huge increase in requirement for ventilators or a significant increase in death. Knock on wood that continues."

"[A catastrophic variant can't be ruled out] but the way the virus is going, it has spent a lot of ammunition already in mutating its spike protein. I'm not an evolutionary biologist, but it may have gone down that path as far as it can go."

Dr.Terrance Snutch, professor, Michael Smith Laboratories, University of British Columbia/ chair, Canadian COVID-19 Genomics Network

 

"[We've treated COVID as the most important health issue of the day for the past two years], and maybe rightly so for a chunk of that. But we can't really be too focused on COVID at the expense of so many other things that we've just ignored over the years. [Delays in cancer surgery, a] humongous [wait list for medical care for just about anything]."

"None of us, in our lifetimes, have seen any virus that behaves this way. I don't think anybody can predict what we'll be facing in the future."

Dr. Sameer Elsayed, infectious diseases specialist, Western University

Long queue at the St Thomas’s Hospital Vaccination Center in London. The U.K. Government is urging all eligible people to get a booster vaccine as the Omicron variant spreads. Credit: Vuk Valcic/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

 

Coronavirus cases are on a runaway upward trajectory across parts of Europe in the past two weeks. A "stunning" summer wave is slamming California, while Australians are urged to work from home while hospitals in the country are being swamped with COVID cases. Medical scientists have been stumped by a virus that has failed to reflect the predictable pattern of other viruses, in neat winter-centric waves like the flu. Instead multiple waves keep rolling in, each new variant entering before the previous one has completed its run; no lulls -- with peaks rising within months, one after another.

Even where populations have been vaccinated, boosted, and/or infected in one way or another, including combinations of all three, those surges keep rolling in. Still, scientists demur, it could be worse; given that our "immunity wall" has been useful in responding to each successive variant. BA.5-driven hospitalizations while rising, continue to remain below previous waves, with fewer ICU admissions and deaths.

And now, another sub-variant of Omicron has entered the scene known as BA.2.75 with its own wealth of mutations extending past the mutations first seen in the original version of Omicron BA.1 that lost no time ripping through global populations. According to Dr.Snutch, however, the virus remains essentially the same: "which is to be mutating at a certain rate in populations that are susceptible"; the mutation rate has not if at all, changed much, he contends.

No evidence has yet arisen that BA.4 and BA.5 are the source of more damaging disease outcomes. A study in hamsters, however, suggested that BA.5 can lodge deeper n the lungs. Antibodies neutralizing SARS-CoV-2, preventing infection wear out, but it has been found that the body's T-cells provide longer-lasting memory protection against the virus. Published in March, a study found COVID infection or vaccination produces sustained levels of T cells that can recognize the SARS-Cov-2 spike protein, lasting over a year.

"Even though some parts of the immune response wane, we can now see that T cells recognizing the virus are quite stable over time", explained the study's senior author, Dr.Jennifer Juno, immunologist at University of Melbourne. Following 15 months of monitoring, "they were still roughly ten-fold higher than someone who had never been exposed to the spike protein through infection of vaccination [which might explain why we're not seeing as many severe infections]."

People with Omicron frequently have reported relatively mild symptoms of sore throat, hoarse voice, cough and headache. "If that's the case moving forward, it's endemic as a nuisance more than anything", said Dr.Snutch. "Though a nuisance in older people can be deadly, just like the flu is deadly."

A pedestrian walks through Pitt Street Mall on July 8 in Sydney, Australia. Residents in NSW are being encouraged to update their COVID-19 vaccinations, wear masks in enclosed spaces, and practice good COVID-safe behaviors, as COVID-19 infections continue to rise across the state, driven by Omicron subvarians. The Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) announced an expansion in eligibility for a fourth dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, with people aged 30 and over able to access the additional booster shots from July 11

"What is the  core strategy that will allow Canadians to live as full a life as possible while protecting the things we value, including our elderly and most vulnerable?"

"The compromise may be that we accept that we have to invest in air quality, and we have to wear masks during periods of high viral spread and keep updated with vaccines to the best extent possible."

"People were saying this will be like a seasonal respiratory virus. 'We'll have a great summer and in the fall it will come back'. It's not acting like that. It has these cyclical waves. We're now in July!" 

Dr. Catherine Hankins, co-chair COVID-19 immunity task force, professor of public and population health, McGill University

The Young Universe and Its Offspring

"We found two very compelling candidates for extremely distant galaxies."

"If these galaxies are at the distance we think they are, the universe is only a few hundred million years old at that point."

Rohan Naidu, graduate student, astronomy department, Harvard and Smithsonian Centre of Astrophysics, Massachusetts

 

"It was dark for a long time until you started to get an accretion and what they call the age of ionization. And, then the first stars started to form."

"So we don't know exactly when that happened, the models show somewhere between 150 million and 300 million years after the Big Bang."

"So we think that looking about 300 million years after the origin of the universe, what we will be seeing is the first stars and the first galaxies forming."

Pam Melroy deputy administrator, NASA/former shuttle commander

Dr.James O'Donoughue, Twitter

In just the first week of its operation in sending back extraordinary images of the far reaches of the university the James Webb telescope has revealed undreamt-of leaps of visual acuity from distant space; much further than its predecessor which itself had ushered the world of astronomy and astrophysics into a new era revealing nature's time-distant origins of the universe. The revelations just keep rolling in, astonishing in their breadth, filling knowledge gaps and prompting new questions as scientific enquiry struggles to comprehend the full meaning of the revealing images.

In the initial images, themselves revelations of unimaginable time and space, fainter distant light sources even more intriguing than the closer aspects of those distant stars and their presumed worlds -- unseen specks of probability in the formation of the minute details of the universe where ongoing investigation may yet answer that eternal question: is there anyone out there? -- the suspense of discovery and the analytical minds of scientists are grinding overtime in excited hypotheses.

Now, NASA's James Webb Telescope has captured images of the assumed earliest formation of a galaxy brim with stars -- named GLASS-z13 -- that may date back as far as 13.5 billion years. The hard-working Hubble Space telescope's earliest image was seen to date 100 million years later. "We're potentially looking at the most distant starlight that anyone has ever seen," Rohan Naidu of the Harvard Centre for Astrophysics stated.

 When the universe formed 13.5 billion years ago everything was dark before matter began to clump in dense formations sufficiently so, to allow stars to burst into life. GLASS-z13's actual age of formation cannot yet be known with confidence, but it is hypothesized by the Harvard team analyzing the data received that it could have formed at any time within the first 300 million years of the existence of the universe.

When the early telescope data was released a week ago from the James Webb Observatory scanning the universe from about a million miles from Earth, its presence was identified. The James Webb telescope incorporates instruments designed to capture light in the infrared spectrum which, since the universe is expanding, sees light emitted by faraway objects as it stretches distantly, increasing in wavelength and becoming more red until finally reaching the infrared spectrum human eyes can no longer discern.

This is known as a cosmological redshift, similar to the Doppler effect where sounds, as they move further away, are heard differently.

Planning to Holiday in Costa Rica? Beware!

"The greatest fear is not to come back alive. I'm hoping for this nightmare to end as soon as possible."

"[It was] very shocking [last week to be confronted by the prison inmate boss at the public prosecutor's office waiting room]."

Pivot Airlines Flight Attendant Alex Rozov

"We have no doubt that this deliberate and staged act of intimidation was a direct and implicit threat against our crew."

"The obvious concern for the crew members is they can't verify that the contents [of the contraband bags carried off then returned by police] that were returned were the same as when they left."

Pivot Airlines CEO Eric Edmondson

The crew of Pivot Airlines was detained in the Dominican Republic in April after millions of dollars worth of cocaine was found aboard their plane. The crew posted a video pleading with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to help them. (Unifor/YouTube)

 

Costa Rica is a popular island resort destination for many Canadians. So popular that almost a million vacationers leave Canada annually to visit the country. In the face of reports detailing widespread corruption and human rights abuses rife within its legal and corrections systems. But a country known for its pristine beaches and resorts that lure visitors and create tourism wealth for the destination, usually treats those tourists with kid gloves.

Which makes it rather strange that a professional Canadian flight crew and its passengers attached to a small Canadian airline have had an involuntary extended stay in the country with a number of court dates following incarceration on charges of drug smuggling. The chartered plane was scheduled to fly out of the Punta Cana resort town on April 5 with seven passengers, potential investors and their guests entertained by an Alberta company when it was detained.

One of the bags in the CRJ-100's avionics bay was discovered by a Pivot mechanic who thought it might be a bomb. It was in fact, found to contain a suspect substance. Leading the airline to take steps immediately alerting the RCMP as well as Dominican Republic authorities. Local drug police investigating discovered yet another seven bags with prohibited drugs. Which led them to take the Canadian crew and passengers into custody.

They were imprisoned for nine days in crowded conditions and while there an individual who portrayed himself as an incarcerant 'boss' threatened the crew members. The prisoner 'boss' made it clear that unless money was wired to local inmates the crew members would be met with violence. To emphasize the serious nature of their demand, at one point a corpse was placed in front of the prison cell. And then the Pivot Airlines crew was released on bail.

The sinister drama, however, was not yet over. Bail conditions included regular check-ins at the courthouse while an investigation was proceeding. And it was at one of those courthouse check-ins that the same prison inmate boss approached them again. "Pilot, I'll be seeing you very soon", one of the
Canadians was told, while waiting in the prosecutor's office.

Another appeal hearing is scheduled to be held where prosecutors plan to pursue the argument the Canadians should be denied bail and returned to the prison cell. The Canadians' passports are being withheld, they were confiscated when police reported the bags had contained 210 kilograms of cocaine. The airline owners have been in contact with consular officials from Canada; given the situation they are questioning the security of Canadians travelling to the Dominican Republic.

Awaiting Canada's Department of External Affairs and the Canadian government's responses with Dominican counterparts there is no word yet whether any concrete steps have been taken for the release of the Canadians who have been unwilling guests of the justice system in Costa Rica for three months. "The problem", said Pivot's CEO "is that there doesn't seem to be action. They don't seem to be doing anything."

The Pivot captain, Rob DiVenanzo, described in an interview the inmate making constant violent threats through his mobile phone's translation app; even holding the Canadians by force of threat to the toilet area of the tiny cell for three days where they were deprived of food and water. When the judge, after nine days in the prison freed them on bail, he cited a lack of evidence that they were involved in the storage of the bags of illicit drugs.

Bricks of cocaine were found on the plane. (National Drug Control Directorate)

Coffee: Clean Bill of Health

"Based on this study, clinicians can tell their patients that there is no need for most coffee drinkers to eliminate the beverage from their diet but to be cautious about higher calorie specialty coffees."

Lead study author Dr. Dan Liu, department of epidemiology, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China

 

"Researchers from Southern Medical University in Guangzhou, China used data from the U.K. Biobank study health behavior questionnaire to evaluate the associations of consumption of sugar-sweetened, artificially sweetened, and unsweetened coffee with all-cause and cause-specific mortality. More than 171,000 participants from the U.K. without known heart disease or cancer were asked several dietary and health behavior questions to determine coffee consumption habits. The authors found that during the 7-year follow up period, participants who drank any amount of unsweetened coffee were 16 to 21 percent less likely to die than participants who did not drink coffee. They also found that participants who drank 1.5 to 3.5 daily cups of coffee sweetened with sugar were 29 to 31 percent less likely to die than participants who did not drink coffee. The authors noted that adults who drank sugar-sweetened coffee added only about 1 teaspoon of sugar per cup of coffee on average. Results were inconclusive for participants who used artificial sweeteners in their coffee."

Summary, Annals of Internal Medicine

Results of a recent survey showed that for people who drank a moderate amount of coffee, had about a 30 per cent lower death risk compared with non-coffee drinkers. (Adobe Stock/CNN)

According to yet another published study on the health benefits of coffee consumption out of Guangzhou, China published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, people who consume moderate amounts of coffee -- up to three and a half cups daily -- might gain improved chances at achieving a longer life span. This, whether or not the coffee taken is lightly sweetened with sugar.

 

Study researhers tracked coffee consumption and health of 171,616 study participants for a period of seven years. The average age of the participants was around 56 years. All were free of cancer and cardiovascular disease a the beginning of the study. The researchers discovered that people who had a regular habit of drinking one and  a half to three and a half cups of coffee daily either plain or sweetened with a teaspoon of sugar were up to 30 percent less likely to die in the time frame studied from any cause, inclusive of cancer and cardiovascular disease, as opposed to those who drank no coffee at all. 

In addition it made no difference to the outcome, whether the type of coffee consumed was instant, ground or decaffeinated. The study results were noted to be inconclusive for the use of artificial sweeteners. The research does not prove coffee alone to be responsible for lowered mortality risk in participants, but over the years research revealed a variety of health benefits attributed to coffee consumption.

As for xample, a reduced risk for succumbing to Type 2 diabetes, or Parkinson's disease, depression and other chronic life-changing medical conditions. The benefits of coffee has often been attribued by nutritionists to the richness of antioxidants in coffee beans. Believed to help reduce internal inflammation and cell damage as well as protect against disease.

Consuming caffeinated coffee provides as well, an energy boast and is known to increase alertness. At the other end of the spectrum, caffeine is known to have a role in sleep disruption, as well as becoming a risky habit during pregnancy.

 

Coffee drinkers who consumed 2.5 to 4.5 cups a day, without sugar, had a 29% lower risk of death than non-coffee drinkers, in a seven-year study. Photograph: Anthony Devlin/PA

"The observational nature of this new study means these conclusions are far from definitive."

"This is because coffee drinkers are in general more affluent and have healthier lives than non-drinkers and I remain unconvinced whether these factors can be overcome in observational studies."

"I would suggest people stick to coffee or tea, preferably without sugar, which most people can adapt to, and try to do all the other things we know keep you healthy – move more, eat and sleep better."

Dr. Naveed Sattar, professor of metabolic medicine, University of Glasgow

Exposure to Irreparable Harm

"In light of the evidence reviewed above, I have no difficulty finding that Mr. Chol's removal to South Sudan would expose him to irreparable harm." 

"[There is a] public interest in the timely removal of foreign nationals who have lost their right to remain in Canada, [but] that interest must be balanced by the need to ensure that foreign nationals not be removed to countries where they are at risk of inhumane treatment or death."

"The public interest is not served by short-circuiting the safeguards aimed at ensuring everyone's right to life, liberty and security of the person."

"The removal officer unreasonably failed to take into consideration evidence of a risk of death or inhumane treatment."

Justice Sebastien Grammand, Federal Court of Canada

Ottawa police say Vuyo Kashe was killed in a shooting on Clarence Street Friday night. (Colton Praill/CTV News Ottawa)

 

Yohanna David Chol, 36, born in South Sudan, arrived as a refugee to Canada in 2003. He amassed a lengthy criminal record of violence and criminality throughout his period of living in Canada. Records reflect his conviction of many offences, among them assault, drug trafficking and obstructing a peace officer. Now, he has also been charged with murder. This is a man who suffers from mental health problems, diagnosed with schizophrenia, anxiety and depression. Eleven medications have been prescribed for him.

Because of his criminal record, Mr. Chol was considered unsuitable material for Canadian citizenship. In situations such as his it is fairly routine that he be escorted from Canada, and returned to the country of his birth, and just such proceedings were initiated. Yet individuals in the position that Mr. Chol finds himself have resort to a number of appeals at various levels in the Canadian justice system.

He lost his status as a permanent resident, the cause directly related to his criminal convictions, which made him inadmissible to Canada, leading the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration to order his removal to South Sudan once it was firmly established that he represented a danger to the Canadian public. In 2017 Chol argued that mental health care n South Sudan was non-existent, leaving him at risk of harm should he be forced to return.

Finally, in November 2021 he was notified that he was scheduled to be sent to South Sudan on December 13, 2021. Since his request for reconsideration was turned down, he took his case to Federal Court. Which led to his being granted a stay, permission to remain in Canada and for his case to be further analyzed. 

Evidence presented to Justice Grammond included reports from the International Medical Corps and Amnesty International detailing the miserable state of mental health care in South Sudan, a poor country that had broken away from Sudan to become an independent country. In a population of over ten million people, the reports pointed out, three psychiatrists were available to serve the entire population of individuals suffering from mental health conditions.

Authorities in South Sudan addressed the situation by detaining people with mental health conditions and keeping them incarcerated. The Juba Central Prison is an institution that is used to keep these potential threats to the larger society out of circulation. It is where the incarcerated have access to insufficient food and where treatable illnesses like malaria and diarrhea, left untreated, can lead to death.

Now, Chol has been charged with homicide and second degree murder for an episode on the weekend where Vuyo Kashe, 36, was shot to death on a residential street in an Ottawa neighbourhood. Chol's next court appearance is to take place the first week of August, and he remains in police custody. The man he shot to death was addicted to drugs, and to raise the funds to obtain his street drugs he was found guilty of robberies in Western Canada, armed with a knife. After which he served a prison sentence.

Two men representing the underbelly of society, where criminal activity is routine and lives can be readily lost when two such lost souls skirmish and one dies. The decision to empathize with the plight of a violent man whose mental equilibrium is flawed and who represents an obvious danger to anyone caught in the crossfire of his blighted life is obviously seen by the judge who sat on the appeal and found for the complainant as a humanitarian response.

 

He so very obviously failed to take into account the paramount need of the public to be spared the possibility of being confronted by someone like this man who uses deadly force in confrontations.

In protecting the future prospects of Mr. Chol, Justice Grammond gave  him the benefit of the doubt and decided he was worthy of protection under the law. On the other hand, that decision effectively meant that other people who are citizens or permanent residents of the country are not protected under the law from random acts of violence executed by a man who reacts violently and is not in full possession of his emotions due to mental illness.

A failing grade for Justice Grammond, and a boot out of the country for Mr. Chol appears a suitable remedy for a miscarriage of justice. Life, liberty and security of the person as interpreted by Justice Grammond, referred solely to the accused in the murder. It failed to include the victim, much less other members of the public all of them vulnerable to the injustice of saving a violent criminal from the possibility of harsh treatment, but not ordinary people who have no wish but to go about their business unmolested.

Police vehicles are stationed near Clarence Street in Ottawa's Lowertown neighbourhood Friday night. On Sunday, a 36-year-old was taken into custody and charged with second-degree murder in relation to the shooting death of Vuyo Kashe. (S.B./Radio-Canada)

Russian Conflict, Russian Disinformation

"It's hard to avoid trafficking or smuggling [of guns and ammunition; military materiel being transferred from one source to another]."

"We didn't achieve it in former Yugoslavia and probably won't avoid it in Ukraine."

Czech defence minister Jana Cernocova

"We are monitoring these developments [reports of donated weapons sent by NATO nations to Ukraine for defence/offence against Russian military attacks ending up in black market sales] with interest and will leave no stone unturned in our work to ensure the safe delivery and use of military aid [from Canada to Ukraine."

Dan Le Bouthillier, spokesperson Cdn.National Defence 

"Information that Ukraine is becoming a major hub for arms smuggling does not correspond to reality."

"[Those claiming as much] could be part of Russia's information war to discourage international partners from providing Ukraine with weaponry that is necessary for our victory."

"[Weapons movement into or out of Ukraine is closely monitored and supervised by Ukraine and its allies]."

Yuriy Sak, adviser to Ukraine's defence minister

Ukrainian servicemen unload a Boeing 747-412 plane with the FGM-148 Javelin, anti-tank missiles provided by US to Ukraine as part of a military support, at Kiev's airport Boryspil on February 11, 2022. Photo: AFP

 

Apparently, not quite. In the prevailing sense of emergency and urgent need by Ukraine to defend itself from Russia's brutal invasion, NATO allies were prevailed upon to help Ukraine by the provision of military materiel to augment the country's aging stock of Soviet-era military machines. Russia's invasion of Ukraine, though it was rumoured by intelligence agencies in the US and Britain to be imminent, still took the international community by surprise. It was no secret this would be an unequal contest.

Leading NATO members to quickly acquiesce to Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's appeal for aid and support. And so, from the date of the February 24 invasion forward, increasing numbers of advanced and powerful weaponry was made available to the Ukraine military by members of NATO in the hope that Ukrainian resolve would succeed in repulsing the Russian advance which has in its fury destroyed critical infrastructure of towns and cities, killed thousands of people, produced millions of displaced and refugees.

Aside from its active military strikes on Ukrainian targets, unrelentingly hitting civilian enclaves including hospitals, schools and government buildings as well as military targets, Moscow has embarked on a slander campaign reminiscent of the kind of scornful dehumanization employed by Nazi Germany against Jews as it prepared its campaign of genocide. And it has also enthusiastically indulged in formulating and dispensing a vast infrastructure of lies, hoping to undermine NATO nations' support of Ukraine.

 

Ukrainian Territorial Defence Forces members train to use an NLAW anti-tank weapon on the outskirts of Kyiv on March 9, 2022. Russia says it will donate captured weapons like these to Moscow-backed militant groups. (Efrem Lukatsky/The Associated Press)

 

Legacy media are now reporting unsubstantiated accusations of actors in Ukraine taking possession of some of the billions of dollars' worth of military equipment and selling it illicitly out of Ukraine into the black market, to other countries and to criminal gangs for profit as illegal goods find willing buyers. The rumours with their sinister implications belittling a nation struggling to defend itself against a daunting enemy, has raised doubts in the minds of Ukraine's defenders within the international community.

The head of Interpol, Jurgen Stock, gave warning that following the conclusion of the conflict whenever that may be, he anticipated that some weapons delivered by allies to Ukraine will be found to have ended up in the hands of European criminals, among others. The European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation noted in April that weapons have been trafficked from Ukraine to organized crime groups.

In all likelihood this is the kind of thing that occurs in all such situations; arms trickle away from their designated recipients through corrupt actions of a number of those involved, and end up on the black market. That these claims are now circulating specifically against Ukraine has a whiff of Kremlin involvement to cast doubt in the minds of the very countries that are attempting to strangle Moscow's economy with biting sanctions.

Motivating, it seems, a number of NATO member states to discuss with Ukraine the issue of tracking the military equipment through a detailed inventory linked to a tracking system specific to weapons supplied by other nations to Ukraine for its defence. Once weapons have been shipped into Ukraine they are distributed without a working record to identify who uses them and what they are used for. Initially they were all tracked, but as the war consumed time and energy, tracking fell by the wayside.

Some questioning the lack of a usefully reliable tracking system, suggest that these weapons forwarded to Ukraine could even fall into Russian hands as well as being sold on the black market. Ukraine's military, on the other hand, signed a declaration when accepting the international communities' military aid that weapons supplied by foreign sources would not be transferred to any organization other than the Ukrainian military. 

 

A viral video shared widely on pro-Kremlin accounts and channels purports to show a black market transaction to sell Javelins and NLAW rocket launchers provided to Ukraine by NATO. But as Newsweek found, there are red flags that put the authenticity of the video in question. Twitter Screenshot

"As the Ukrainian military begins to scale up its deployment of weapons it has received from NATO and its Western partners, in some cases with immediate and devastating effect, pro-Russian social media accounts have ramped up disinformation around the weapons in question."

A video shared on July 13, 2022, by an unverified Twitter account AZmilitary1, claims to be a video recording of a "black market" sale of several weapons provided to Ukraine by NATO."

"The 85-second clip features a black Volksvagen with an AA851EE license plate, which is zoomed-in on at the beginning of the video. Two men are briefly seen shaking hands, before one opens up the trunk of the car and uncovers what appear to be weapon cases....."

Newsweek