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In this episode, 2020 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Mentor Janice McDonald, 2020 Scholars Laya Behbahani and Allison Furniss examine how they assess risks in their academic research and professional endeavours, and how the fear of failure can sometimes prevent us from taking the necessary steps to achieve our goals.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Valerie Pringle: Failure can be demoralizing, it can impact our perception of self, it can lead us to question our own abilities, even the fear of failure itself can prevent us from taking the risks that are necessary to achieve our goals to flourish. How does failure actually help us grow as individuals. I'm Valerie Pringle and welcome to this episode of Brave Spaces. We will be exploring these issues with three remarkable members of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. So with us today, Laya Behbahani, who is a 2020 Scholar. She is a doctoral student at the School of Communications at Simon Fraser University. Laya's research focuses on forced labor, modern day slavery and human trafficking experiences in the Gulf states of the Middle East. Allison Furniss is also a 2020 scholar and a doctoral candidate in the Department of Sociology at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. Allison's research focuses on women, artisanal coltan miners in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and 2020 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Mentor Janice MacDonald. Janice is an award-winning entrepreneur, a leadership expert, a best-selling author who is the founder of the Beacon Agency, which is a boutique advisory firm. Laya and Alison and Janice. All of you, welcome to Brave Spaces Hi. 

Laya Behbahani: Hi, Valerie. Thank you. 

Valerie Pringle: So today, obviously, you come at this from all different backgrounds and very diverse experiences. As a mentor in the Trudeau Foundation one year, I got to actually select scholars, which was fantastic. And reading the resumes and going through these things, it's just an endless list of accomplishments and achievements and almost seeming superhuman. So obviously, this is what we tend to put forward into the world.  And people in this community are loaded with accomplishments. But I think it is a really interesting thing to flip this around and look at it and talk about it from the opposite approach, which is focusing on failure and what people are able to learn about it. 

So let's start by talking about what is the failure that you are most proud of and how did you use that experience to recover and move forward? Laya will you start? 

Laya Behbahani: For sure Valerie, so I've been thinking about this question. It's a good question. The example that comes to mind for me at least, is not something that perhaps I consider a failure per say, but something that's perhaps unconventional in the work that I do. In my case, I took a long time to complete my academic career. And I know it's not something that's really encouraged in academia to sort of take your time to do your undergraduate degree or your master's degree. But having taken seven years to do my undergraduate degree, I have to say, you know, I look back at it and it's really enriched my experience. It's expanded my outlook on life and more specifically, my area of research, which is human trafficking, as you mentioned. So according to academic standards, I guess it could be perceived as a failure or a mistake to have taken so long as that. But I have to say, from my perspective, I picked an alternative path. I undertook my time to do internships at places like the United Nations Human Trafficking Section in Vienna. I worked at the law school, at UBC and the provincial courts in Canada. So altogether, I look back and I think if I hadn't experienced these things, I'm not sure I'd be who I am today. So I don't I don't know if I consider it a mistake or a failure, but certainly unconventional in academia to have taken such a sort of a long and long path to complete my academic work. 

Valerie Pringle: Is that more typical that people are supposed to know what they want, know where they're going? And it's a straight line upward? 

Laya I would say. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing that we're seeing most commonly. I'd say that most students typically are, you know, finish their doctoral work by the time they're in their late 20s, early 30s. And that's seen as the best sort of way to. To go about doing it, so taking your time is a little bit unconventional, yes. 

Valerie Pringle: Alison, what about you? You and failure, tell a story. Admit it!

Allison Furniss: Yeah. OK, so you guys really aren't going to like my answer to this question, because the truth is, I really don't like this word failure. So for me, rather than looking at things as failure, I see these moments, the jobs we apply for, we don't get, the internships we apply for and don't get, I see as opportunities to build resilience and to recalibrate and just maybe change your direction or your goals. So giving a personal example, I mean, I you know, when I first applied to the University of Cape Town, I applied for a master's in anthropology and I wasn't accepted. They wanted me to do this extra honors year that they have there because I was changing disciplines. And at the time, I had just been working in Tanzania and Namibia for four years in support for development work, which was really soul-wrenching work. And I had just moved home to Whitehorse in the Yukon where I'm born and raised. And at the time, you know, my plan was to be home for six months, apply for grad school, go back to school, because I had done my undergrad and worked for quite a few years. And then I wasn't accepted. So this was really, in my mind, in that moment, that was a huge setback for me. I still don't look at it as a failure, but it was a big setback. But when I think of it now, especially in hindsight, I really see that I am so glad I wasn't accepted to that program because actually I wasn't ready for grad school. I really needed to reconnect with my community, take some time to kind of heal and recover from four years of soul-wrenching development work

Valerie Pringle: That's interesting. So, you know, I Janice to you now, you come at this very differently, not academia. You're a mentor your background as an entrepreneur. What has been your most successful failure? 

Janice McDonald: Thank you. So, yes, if I look at this through my entrepreneurial lens, I'm very comfortable with the word failure because I don't think of it as failure. And I know that that kind of sounds funny, but it builds on the comments both that Laya and Allison have made. In the sense that to me, if I think about the biggest failure for me in any area of my life, it would be about be around not trying, right? So holding myself back. In terms of failure or how I see it through that entrepreneurial lens of "Failure is learning and learning is what leads to the success. "So to me, failure is completely part of success. It's that chance to begin again, to pivot, to adjust. But this time, when you make that the pivot and the adjustment, you're coming at your new challenge with more knowledge and more experience. If I bring it down to a tangible example, from my days in the music industry in the 90s, in retail and then online. Perfect example, making a mistake in hiring the wrong people. Why did that matter, what happened? Well, as an example, you know, some people stole from me and from the business, and so you feel like, "Oh, how could I have made that mistake and not chosen different people?" But really, when putting it back into the "failure is learning, learning is success" framework, I realized, "Hey, I've got to make some changes here. Clearly, I need better processes and need to make some adjustments in how I'm tracking inventory and how things are approached at work." And so, again, you know, like Allison, that notion of reframing is really powerful and positive. It does lead to better outcomes.

Valerie Pringle: You know, in the moment when things don't work out, it does not feel good. No one likes it. I mean, because, you know, you can say, oh, yeah, it was all for the good, but for a little bit for a little while it does sting. And nobody nobody likes that. 

Janice McDonald: Yeah. And I will say, Valerie, that, which I say regularly to my children, 10 percent on the problem, 90 percent of our effort on the solution. And so you're absolutely right. It stings. But, you know, I'm more driven to ensure that I'm not making that same mistake. Because I'm going to keep making mistakes. That's inevitable. But really, have I learned, have I taken the steps, am I improving on this current problem, this current situation in front of me? 

Valerie Pringle: Now, I think this transitions nicely because what we what we sort of want to do here, and I think this would be helpful for the community and people listening to the podcast is to have a bit of a thought exercise about dealing with this. You know, how do you find strategies that you can use in real life situations where you face a choice? You try and assess the risks, build on experiences you have.  And, you know, I'm not an academic. My background is broadcasting, so I don't know that that world. And Laya maybe you can weigh in on this to start with. You know, is it different in academia? Are you supposed to always look like and be a success in order to keep moving forward on some track that will take you to, wherever, professorship, tenure-ship, you know, whatever is deemed as the big success? 

Laya Behbahani: My experience, I mean, part of academia is you're expected to make mistakes because the expectation or the understanding is that that's the only way you learn. I've talked to professors who are established, professors who have had their papers rejected 18, 19, 20 times over. And so failure is very much embedded in that experience because it's understood that experiential learning carries so much more weight than it does being given the green light every single time you try to do something. And so positive reinforcement, taking productive risks, this is all part of the academic experience. And that's something that I actually think is one of the highlights of academia, is that you're expected to take productive risks and you're expected to fail. You are expected to make mistakes because it's all seen as an opportunity to contribute to the person that you're going to become as an academic.

Valerie Pringle: Alison, leap in or Janice, how do you assess how do you look at these things? How do you how do you figure out which risks are worth taking? 

Allison Furniss: I mean, for me, a big part of this conversation around taking risks involves being mindful of alternative views but never being afraid to question them. I really think in in taking risk, you're taking actions. You're probably going to face a lot of naysayers within that. So there's going to be tons of people who tell you,"You can't do it, you shouldn't do it. Whatever you're doing is impossible." And I am so convicted to not listening to those voices, and those people, but of course being mindful of those alternative views, but never afraid to question them. So for me, I'll give the example of my master's field work in eastern DRC. It's a context of political instability, unpredictability. There's still active armed groups, even though it's more of a post-conflict context. So when I was going to do fieldwork, everyone told me I couldn't do it, I shouldn't do it. Even my own supervisor, my academic supervisor told me she thought I was crazy to do research in eastern DRC, but I was convicted. I knew it was a worthwhile project. I knew it could be done and I knew I could do it. And it almost failed, really, because I faced so many delays and so many challenges in organizing that kind of research in that kind of environment,that's just unpredictable and a bit unstable, that it was really challenging. I mean, I went in really cold. I didn't know anyone. I didn't have people to help me in the beginning like I was going in. 

Valerie Pringle: Really. Alison, if I were your mother, I would have been worried! 

Allison Furniss: No really. It's true. She was worried. But I mean, there was like a few, you know, a handful of people. And literally I can count them on one hand who supported the idea. And for me, my strategy became that those negative voices were so prevalent that it actually did start to erode my confidence on the project. So what I started doing was just essentially not really talking to people about the project or really watering down what I was doing so that I wasn't constantly immersed in that kind of negativity, to sort of protect myself from from people telling me I couldn't when I knew I could. So I think, you know, I think that's a really important conversation. And, you know, obviously, if my supervisor is telling me about she's worried about real dangers, sure. I need to prepare a safety plan in those kind of things. And I need to outline that I have good health insurance and all that kind of stuff. But it doesn't mean it can't be done. And I think especially a lot of in academia, people are pushing boundaries. They're going to places that not everyone goes to. They're asking questions people don't want to hear. You're going to face a lot of pushback on that.\]You're going to face a lot of challenges. But you have to always, like I always go back to being mindful of alternative views but never afraid to question them.

Valerie Pringle: Janice, sounds fearless to me. Right?

Janice McDonald: Yeah, absolutely. And I think, listen, highlighted something really important, which is especially when you're pushing boundaries and taking those risks, you need to have a or some champions or at least cheerleaders that you can turn to and feel like they're going to build you up. And because hopefully you are, and as she's indicated, asking yourself the questions that she needs in terms of a safety plan, et cetera. And for all of us, when we think about what would be a helpful question to move forward. Well, many entrepreneurs, but I think this is true of scholars as well, is asking yourself, well, what's the worst thing that can happen? 

Valerie Pringle: I've asked myself that many, many times in my life. Right. 

Janice McDonald: Right. And so the first reason, because sometimes we even sidestep looking at what really the worst thing is, or the or the worst things can be. And so, first of all, really kind of doing an audit of what that is. and then get comfortable with those possibilities. Next, we have to evaluate the likelihood of those things happening and then clearly adjust as necessary. So determine where you are on that comfort level. The other thing that can be really helpful is taking smaller steps in the direction that you want to go, and that could be even if it's not directly in the direction that you want to go, perhaps adjacent to. So continuing to move forward until perhaps you feel you're ready to move into that more kind of serious direction. But around this idea of still moving forward in the direction that you ultimately want to go.

Laya Behbahani: Yeah, I was going to say, I totally agree with both Janice and Alice. And I think the one thing that I always have to take into account, similar to Alison, is that my research is a bit of a taboo subject in the Gulf, so no one really wants to talk about forced labor or slavery or human trafficking. Doing field research is not optimal there, but having made the decision to do research in that area, on this subject, one of the things that I sort of foreground in any of my work is," Will it pose a harm to myself or anyone else?" And if that's the case, then for me personally, I think that productive of risk tends to weigh on the side of "It's not worth it, "the cost is just too high. But if you're thinking about it in terms of risk taking, unless you take those types of risks, Allison's right, you can't produce the kind of work that academia encourages. We are encouraged to think outside the box, we are encouraged to do work that is perhaps pushing the boundaries. 

Valerie Pringle: You've got to ruffle feathers and you've got to be brave, I guess, to stand up and defend. 

Laya Behbahani: Yeah and to ask those difficult questions that Allison's right, that people don't want to ask. 

Valerie Pringle: You know Laya with you, just as you say, with your research, you know, intrinsically there may be resistance where you're studying human trafficking, et cetera, that we don't want to talk about it. It doesn't exist here. It's verboten. How do you assess going forward and what risks are worth taking? 

Laya Behbahani: I would say it's probably more than just pushing boundaries and assessing risk. In the case of the Gulf States, certain types of research will bar you from ever entering the country. And so that's the sort of subject that I'm looking at. Is it worth it? Is it worth never being able to go back to those states? Is it worth putting some of those communities at risk? And so for me, not really doing research on the ground there is not worth it. But I can certainly do research that's a bit more innovative and start to look at work that, you know, looking at migration patterns from sending countries who send migrant workers to the Gulf states. And that's possible. So there's always an alternative strategy that you can take where you're not necessarily pushing aside your area of interest or the questions that that you think should be asked. But there's a way to do it in a way that poses perhaps less harm or no harm ultimately to those who you're studying. So for me, putting the migrant communities that I'm working with and I'm studying, top of mind, I would say that their safety is most important to me. And then second to that is, of course, asking those difficult questions. And so I've reframed my research to, like I said, do field research from the sending countries which are like Egypt, India, Pakistan and the Philippines. And in doing field research, they're asking questions, doing participant observations and interviews with migrant communities rather than going to the Gulf states and putting those communities at risk because they're already in precarious situations. And so for me, it wouldn't be worth the risk to put them in potential potential harm. 

Valerie Pringle: And, Alison, for you as well, I mean, if you're essentially been doing this but giving advice to another scholar who's listening about your work and how you approach it, 

Allison Furniss: I think it's true that what Laya was saying, to build on that, it is true that you have to calculate risk differently between yourself as the researcher, if I'm speaking in an academic space, versus your participants. But I would say honestly, I really think people are too afraid to do things a lot of times just because of assumptions and stereotypes. And that's where I really want to just say again how important, if you're a young scholar, you want to do fieldwork, primary research yourself, ethnography, whatever, interviews even, don't be afraid to do something that other people haven't done just because people tell you you can't. But be strong in your convictions and your confidence in the project and really be firm in your beliefs that there's value in what you're doing, 

Janice McDonald: And I'll build on that, because I think, generally speaking, people make too few mistakes. They're not taking enough risks. And sure, that might be my entrepreneurial hat. But, you know, having been a researcher myself as well, I agree that people are telling you, "Don't do this, don't do that," particularly, I think, for women. But one of the things that I would like in terms of advice for people to consider is to be intentional about their network. And if we go back to the Foundation, there is a beautiful network of support. And I think for scholars and those pursuing their career to bring some intention into expanding their network and getting those different points of view in different areas of support can be powerful, in terms of leading you in new directions and questioning your assumptions, how you're approaching things. So I know certainly it's been powerful for me to be intentional in that way, and I've seen the benefit of that for others. So I offer that for consideration.

Valerie Pringle: Well, I thank all of you for your insight and for telling us your stories and for your bravery. So I will thank Laya Behbahani again and Alice Furniss and Janice McDonald, all part of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation community. Next time we'll be discussing how we look after ourselves and recover after a really difficult, challenging conversations that obviously many people in this community have as they're doing their research and moving forward. So the guests then will be 2019, Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Scholar Diane Roberts and 2019 Mentor Shannon Litzenberger. So thank you very much.

Cindy Blackstock, McGill University Professor, joins Vardit Ravitsky for a discussion about the impact of COVID-19 on Indigenous communities and how years of neglect left them unable to combat the pandemic on equal terms.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Vardit Ravitsky: There is no longer any doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has taken a greater toll on marginalized groups in our society, and exposed gaping holes in our health and social security networks. Cindy Blackstock, Professor at the McGill School of Social Work and Executive Director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, has to say she wasn’t really surprised.

Cindy Blackstock: Well, I'm a proud member of the Gitxsan First Nation of British Columbia, and I'm a professor at McGill University and the executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada. What I really do is spend most of my days trying to get equitable access to public services for First Nations children in Canada. They still get less across the board in almost every public service, simply because of who they are. 

Vardit R.: You know, a lot of Canadians have read in the media and have seen on the news that the impact of COVID on First Nations has been more severe, that communities on reserves are at higher risk. Why is that? 

Cindy Blackstock: Well, one of the reasons that is, is it goes right back to Confederation. The federal government funds all public services on reserve, whereas the provinces and territories fund them for everyone else. The problem is, is that the federal government has chronically underfunded all of these services by a significant portion, as much as 50 percent, 30 percent. And of course, we have First Nations without water, without proper sanitation systems. And I should underscore that this isn't a question of remoteness. Some of your listeners will remember just a couple of weeks ago in White Rock, which is right next to Vancouver, there's a First Nation there that was under a boil water advisory for well over several decades. So this is a question of when you're on reserve, you get less. And that is been highly, highly problematic. It really puts First Nations at a severe disadvantage from the outset because you're not able to deal with the regular types of things that will come your way as a society. 

Vardit R.: I'd like to ask you, Cindy, about your first memory of the pandemic or closing a year now of living in these extremely unusual circumstances. What was the first moment after the pandemic was announced by the WHO that you realized that this is going to have a very different impact on First Nations communities or your first experience from a professional perspective with a pandemic?

Cindy Blackstock: It was immediate. It was kind of like my heart skipped a beat because I knew how vulnerable some of these communities were. And I need to just say that that vulnerability isn't because of the First Nations communities. That vulnerability exists because governments make choices to give them less and place them in those vulnerable situations by underfunding all of these services. And so when even in the early days of the pandemic, they were telling us things like, you know, don't go out of your home, wash your hands, all of that stuff. And I knew how impossible that was going to be for so many First Nations families across this country. And I really was very, very worried for what it would look like. The other thing, though, that I I thought about is that if I was in a community where there was no water. Covid-19 probably wouldn't have been my top worry. Talk or it would be about how do I get a clean glass of water for my child or for an elder who's living in my home. Covid-19 is a serious issue but arguably, if I was to turn off the water taps of every person in Canada, they would actually be more concerned about the water shortage than they would about COVID-19. And that is the reality of First Nations folks for far too many people across the country.

Vardit R.: So describe for us how the pandemic played out in such disadvantaged settings. What what happened on the ground.

Cindy Blackstock: Right. Well, First Nations communities, many of the leadership and the elders and knowledge keepers decided to lock the communities down so that no one would be able able to go in or out of the community unless it was absolutely necessary. That was that was an essential step, because without water or without overcrowded homes, if that virus got in there, it would just spread like wildfire. But that also meant that families were being separated. There was a lot less freedom of movement than even I got here in Ottawa during the most severe parts of the lockdown. And keep in mind that only thirty five percent of First Nations have access to broadband in their households. So while you and I might have been struggling with online work and have people in the household struggling with online learning, that wasn't even an option in First Nations communities. 

Vardit R.: Cindy, you told me at one point during the early stage of the pandemic about a conversation you had with your mother. Would you care to share that with us? 

Cindy Blackstock: Yeah, well, my mom has followed me in what is now a 14-year piece of litigation against the Canadian government to get equitable services for First Nations children. The Canadian government was found responsible in 2016 for racially discriminating against these kids by underfunding these services with an order to stop. It was a legal binding order. And yet Canada did not stop. It took very limited, piecemeal measures. And it took, I think we're up to nine noncompliance orders. Finally, we are starting to see some movement, but that's that's just beginning to comply with the law by the Canadian government. So my mom has watched this all these years. And her question was, you know, "Why? Why would any government give little kids less because of who they are? And so when COVID started happening, she said, "I didn't even know we had all this money." If the government was spraying money everywhere. And what that said to her is that it was always possible to get First Nations children a clean glass of water. It was always possible to give them equitable education. It was always possible to get them equitable health care. It was a choice by successive governments not to do it. 

Vardit R.: I cannot imagine the frustration that this would entail for people who have been watching this unfolding for so many years. 

Cindy Blackstock: Yeah, it's the quiet pandemic really. These types of, this kind of chronic problem goes unaddressed. And we let governments get off with these ideas while First Nations, "You can be patient. We can't create change overnight." Well, this has been going on for one hundred and fifty three years. It's not overnight. And governments always do complicated things. We've seen that during this pandemic, too, thankfully, with the very quick rollout of CERB and other types of support. So it's really unthinkable that we can roll out things like CERB, we can do a trade agreement with that crazy that used to be in the White House. And yet we're still struggling to get equitable services to First Nations children. I can't, I don't understand it.

Vardit R.: We are all aware of the unequal impact that the pandemic had on racialized communities and on all sorts of minorities and disadvantaged groups. So I wanted to ask you what it felt like during that pandemic to see the debate, the discourse in Canada around racism. People were asking, are we like the United States? Are we different? Is there racism in Canada? I know that you found this conversation extremely frustrating, but I want to hear from you about this. 

Cindy Blackstock: Yeah. You know, I think in Canada, we have this kind of identity, this Canadian identity, about being a bastion of human rights, that this kind of racism that we see in the United States against black people and against others, that doesn't happen here, is kind of the narrative in Canada. But I like to remind people that we have the Indian Act. It is the only race based piece of legislation in the Western world, and it's been here as long as the country has. And just to give you a sense of what it is to look, to live under the Indian Act, it would decide, for example, if you had a baby, whether that child was status or non status First Nations. And what that means is whether the government would recognize any rights that it or obligations it has to you as a First Nations person to that child. [00:09:32] [00:09:40] It requires that the reserve system be set up. Those reserves, a reserve of boundaries were set up in eighteen hundreds. And unlike like the municipal boundaries of, say, Ottawa or Toronto, they didn't grow as the population grew, they stood static. And that's why we get all that overcrowding. It replaced the band government with band councils. And so you end up with this whole racist colonial act being applied to First Nations and, you know, systemic racism towards First Nations folks in Canada is actually threaded in the DNA of the actual country. And it was colonialism was rolled out not only to disadvantage and severely oppress and violate the rights of First Nations, Métis and Indian peoples, but it purposely left caring Canadians in the dark. And it wove this narrative that were so great and we'll never be like the Americans, don't worry. And that has led to the average Canadian less so today than, say, about a decade ago, but many Canadians still can't see the systemic discrimination. They don't believe it could happen here, but it is happening here. And once we acknowledge it, then we'll be able to deal with it. 

Vardit R.: And you're right that most Canadians really have this sense that we are a society based on solidarity, justice, human rights. There's this discrepancy that's really hard to come to terms with between our sort of image of ourselves as Canadians. And the reality or describing. 

Cindy Blackstock: It is really hard. But it's I think what I would invite people to do is, is be curious. Get on to Google and Google the Indian Act. Just look at the table of contents. And then we at the Caring Society ways people can make ay have 73 ways people can make a difference in under 15 minutes. Read the auditor general of Canada's reports, the parliamentary budget officers reports. All of the evidence is right there. We just have to try and de-normalize this discrimination and see it. And once we see it and embrace it as a society, then we have a hope of living up to that identity that for far too many years has been a myth but can become a reality. That we are a country of justice, that we are a country human rights, and that we're not afraid of acknowledging where things hurt in our society and addressing. 

Vardit R.: So, you know, so many of us are saying constantly that we can't wait to go back to normal, go back to our normal lives, social lives, professional lives. But this expression of craving the back to normal is so prevalent, especially now, is the vaccines are rolling out. I imagine that for you, going back to normal is not exactly how you would like to see the future. So tell us what what kind of normal would you like to see after covid? 

Cindy Blackstock: I want to see the Canadian government finally cut its chains with this long history of apartheid services for First Nations children, families and young people. I want them to finally agree to something called the spirit of Aeroplan, which is to cost out all the inequities in First Nations public services and address them like a Marshall Plan and make this the first generation of First Nations kids who knows what it is to be treated in a fair and equitable and culturally based way. I'd like to see similar actions happening for Inuit communities and Métis communities where there are these action plans that are literally sitting right there with the government of Canada that they could they could really get going on A.S.A.P. and make a huge difference in the lives of children. That's the kind of reality I want to I want to see. I believe that every First Nations, Métis and Inuit child is sacred and every one of those kids is worth the money. And we have got to stop being a country that saves money by racially discriminating against these children, depriving them of basic services like water and proper health care and schools without black mold so that we can fund things like big sporting events or big festivals or all these things that we like to enjoy. We cannot use racial discrimination as a fiscal restraint measure and still feel proud of ourselves as a collective society. 

Vardit R.: You know, one of the things that the pandemic has done is really to show us what it looks like when governments invest in an urgent fashion to achieve a goal, the kind of enlisting that occurs when the threat is real and present. But how did you feel seeing the these investments after so many years of working so hard to change the priorities of the government and all of a sudden the threat on the majority makes so much possible?

Cindy Blackstock: You know, when I thought about is what it would look like if I was one of those First Nations children getting less. I thought about Shannen Koostachin, one of my greatest heroes, First Nations girl from Attawapiskat First Nation, who led a child rights campaign in Canada, inviting non-Indigenous kids to write letters to the government so that the kids in Attawapiskat and in other First Nations could get a proper school. And the reason that she was doing this is that her school sat on a toxic waste dump of sixty thousand, pardon me, thirty thousand gallons of diesel fuel and that those diesel fuel fumes were making the kids sick. And Shannen spent her whole childhood fighting for an equal school because she said school is a time for dreams and every kid deserves this. And when she was 13, she had to go hundreds of kilometers away from her community to go to high school because the school in her own community was so underfunded, she could never become a human rights lawyer to stand up for kids education rights that she wanted. And it was there in 2010 as she was going to the high school. She would have never have attended had the one in her own community been funded properly, that she dies in an automobile accident. Shannen Koostachin never knew what it was like to be treated the same as other kids in Canada. She always knew in her entire childhood that the government felt she wasn't worth the money. This is a girl who is nominated for the International Children's Peace Prize, one of forty five kids in the world to receive that honor. And yet the government of Canada didn't think that kids like her worth the money. And that's what I thought of when I saw the government spending all kinds of money on all of this emergency response and yet still fighting against First Nations children in court.

Vardit R.: You know, so many of my colleagues in different disciplines talk about the pandemic as a teachable moment. They say, yes, this showed us the deep inequity in our society. It showed us how the marginalized groups are impacted by the disease and a more severe way it exposed vulnerability. I want to go back with you to this notion of teachable moment. Do you think that Canadian society will learn, will implement the lessons that covid has been teaching us?

Cindy Blackstock: I think that depends. I think one of the things that I feel hopeful of is I find so many Canadians of all diversities, including all political diversities, once they look at the credible reports of the auditor general, the legal rulings against Canada and everything else, and they show these inequalities there, quite frankly, appalled that this is going on and they really want to see it stop where I think that in this particular case, I think that Canadians as a whole are actually out in front of the government. I think the government is really operating in the dark ages on a lot of these issues. I saw thousands and thousands of Canadians come to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada's events to listen to survivors, to stand in solidarity. They have a vision of this country that's greater and more humane than that, for which the government thinks it is possible right now. So if people get on their members of parliament and say, you know what, black lives do matter to me, First Nations kids, they deserve it. They matter to me. We want to see children not grow up where the TB rate is like hundreds of times more than it is in every other part of the society and made children having access to culture based services. If people do that, then we we take this moment from just being a teachable moment into a moment of action that can transform the country. 

Vardit R.: Thank you so much, Cindy, for taking the time to talk to us and for being such an inspiring leader. You've touched our intellects and our hearts and your your plea for a better Canada is very well heard. Thank you so much.

Cindy Blackstock: Well, thank you for our time and for your listeners. When you say Kanata, it's actually a First Nations word. So use that as your memory and your opportunity to do something to make this world a better and more just place for First Nations. Thank you.

André Picard, award-winning Globe & Mail reporter, joins Vardit Ravitsky to discuss Canada’s failure to protect seniors during the pandemic and the urgent need to reform our system of eldercare.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

André Picard: I started following this very early. I remember reading a tweet, I spend way too much time on Twitter, but it was December 31, it was New Year's Eve. During the day, there was my colleague Hellen Brownswell, who works for Stat News, in Boston. She tweeted, "Oh, there’s an interesting pneumonia going on in China, a few cases, it reminds me of SRAS in 2003." Hellen and I had covered SRAS a lot and it really looked very similar. It put us on our toes. We said, "This is interesting, is this another SARS?". So we started tracking that early on. And eventually, we saw that, yes, it was another coronavirus very similar to the one we saw 15 years ago, which hit Canada hard. So, we were interested very, very early and by February, we saw all the deaths in Spain, Italy and China. All the dead were among the elderly, so we knew very early on that it was going to hit the elderly, the seniors in Canada hard too.  

Vardit Ravitsky:  Your latest book, Neglected No More, takes a look at the living conditions revealed by this crisis, especially in older Canadians living in residences, long-term care homes. What are the facts on the ground that we should know about older people in Canada during the pandemic?

André Picard: I think the most important thing is that we knew there was a risk, a very, very big risk and we did nothing to prepare. We prepared our hospitals in Canada very well and we left long-term care residences to their own devices, we left seniors to their own misfortunes. To me, that's the most serious thing. Much, much of what happened could have been prevented, but we didn't act fast enough. But in this situation, why were seniors at risk? Because they live in ideal conditions for the spread of the virus. They live in facilities with 200, 300 people. They often live 3 or 4 to a room, share toilets. They eat together. They're not very mobile, they have chronic diseases. It's a perfect storm. It's ideal for a virus while we knew it was a problem. And viruses are a year-round problem in these residences. But this one was much more serious because it was new, we'd never seen this virus, so everyone was at risk. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Apart from these living conditions which, frankly, seem difficult on an everyday basis, what other vulnerabilities did you notice in the system? What other problems could have been avoided? 

André Picard: It's really a systematic problem. As you said, it's a little, a little, a lot of ageism in our public policies. Older people are a bit stuck, are a bit forgotten or very forgotten, except in institutions, we don't have adequate home care. Our cities are not built for people who become less mobile, etc. So it's really a very, very broad societal problem. And we've just seen the intensity of it in the residences in particular.

Vardit Ravitsky: And I'm sure you've looked at what's happened in other countries when you compare Canada to other places around the world. Did we have a particular problem? Were the issues shared by everyone? What do you think? 

André Picard: I think the risk was pretty much the same everywhere. But in Canada, we had the worst death tolls by far. About 80 per cent of all our deaths in Canada are among seniors. In most countries, it’s 20%, 30%,40% of deaths. In the US it’s 40 per cent. But in Canada, 80 per cent. It’s really a catastrophe. It’s shameful what happened. So what have others done better? They protected their seniors before we did, but more importantly, they have systems that are better. There's less movement between residences, there are no three-bed rooms, four-bed rooms, etc. So it's really the system that was the big flaw in this.

Vardit Ravitsky: What could we have or what can we now learn from the way things are done elsewhere? What should we adopt at home?

André Picard: I think, mostly, we need to think of where our seniors should live when they lose mobility, etc., when they have chronic illnesses. Is it our philosophy to keep them in the community? I think so. It should be our no. 1 philosophy. Everyone should live in the community. We adapt the community to people’s needs. We can’t just send them to a home. And when people need really critical care, then these residences should look like homes, not prisons. So these are two major philosophical changes that need to happen. And in each of these elements we need practical things, we need more staff, better staff training, a better infrastructure. All very practical things. But once you have a philosophy of changing seniors’ treatment, details are fairly easy. 

Vardit Ravitsky: I absolutely share any perspective on the change in philosophy and cultural change from an ethical standpoint. It is extremely troubling, the reality that has been exposed by the pandemic, but the solutions you mention cost money and our policy makers often tell us it is a matter of resources. I wonder if you agree, that there’s a limit to resources. And even if it’s true, what should our priorities be? What do we need to focus on?

André Picard: Of course, there’s a limit to resources, but we have to make choices. We must make political choices. We have to make societal choices. And for me, this should be a priority. We should take care of our seniors out of respect. The other issue, I find, is the issue of money resources. It is often an excuse because in reality, we spend a lot of money, but we spend it badly. So if we start spending our money better, that's a great start. After that, it's choices. So how much will we spend on the COVID response? I think so far it’s 500 billion, some 500 billion. We could repair, we could really improve elder care with, what? 3 billion? 4 billion? Really, when you look at the big picture, it’s a bit petty cash in all this. So money isn’t the real issue for me, it’s the desire to make these priorities happen.

Vardit Ravitsky: The pandemic is described a lot as a "teachable moment," a moment of learning and a moment of reflection for the future of our society. What can we do to keep the attention of the younger generation? To that question, so that it doesn't go away after, after the pandemic?

André Picard: Yes, it's a very big risk. We have very, very short memories in politics. So how do you keep the focus on this issue? I think it's very essential as I do. The way to do it is to do what we do in journalism: tell very personal stories. And I think, at the end of the day, the bottom line in all of this, is that nobody wants to live in those conditions. So, we should insist that everyone lives in the same conditions that we want to live in. So, you ask, we do surveys, 100% of people don't want to live in long-term care residences. It tells us that there is a problem, so there should be a political answer to this issue and we really need to insist on every failing. We have to talk about it, we have to contact our MP, we have to say that it is not acceptable anymore. 

Vardit Ravitsky: But do you think that from a political point of view, there is not enough impact? That's part of the reason behind this abysmal failure. 

André Picard: I think a little bit. Seniors, those with chronic illnesses, don't really have a voice. They're in a system, they have a lot of other issues besides politics. But there are many, many seniors who are healthy and we know that they vote. They vote in huge numbers. They need to put their emphasis on these issues and other things. So I think there's a very general interest in this issue. One of the things that has struck me most during the crisis is that young people are very interested in this issue. They are sick and tired of seeing how their parents, their grandparents are treated. And there is really a mobilization of young people on this issue of the treatment of the elderly. That's going to make a big, big difference in policy as well. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Another issue that was very present in the media and public debate was the staff. We realized the conditions under which they do their daily work. We realized the lack of protective equipment. We realized that the staff is going through several facilities to make more money. Tell us a little bit about what you discovered for your work, for the book in relation to staff issues? 

André Picard: The working conditions are really horrible and we know that the working conditions are going to be a direct reflection of the treatment conditions. So if employees are mistreated, we're never going to get good care. So it's essential to recognize this very direct connection. In Quebec, for example, caregivers were paid as little as $13 an hour. No benefits, no full time work, they worked in many different residences, etc. They were horrible working conditions.

André Picard: There is a problem also that most of the people are people – immigrants, refugees – people who don't really have a voice in society. They are mostly women. Long-term care, it's women taking care of women. Sexism is part of it, racism, it's all people in society who live in the margins, who are forgotten. And all this multiplies the problem. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Workers passing between institutions must have exacerbated significantly the spread of the virus.

André Picard:  No question. People in residential care do not walk around in their residence. All the infections came in via the staff and I'm not saying that to blame the staff too. They were victims of the system, they didn't want to work in five different institutions, but they needed that to feed their families. They had very little, as you mentioned, very little protection. All that protection went to the hospitals. The hospitals were well protected and the others were left out. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Another issue that has been debated a lot is the existence of private long-term care facilities and institutions. It has become very controversial. How do you see this relationship between the public and the private in the context of institutions? 

André Picard: It's a complex issue. I'm afraid people will see this as a simplistic solution. "We just need to get rid of the private and everything will be better." But that's not true. So I'm trying to answer that question in two steps. First, do we need private residences? No, we don't. But we must ask the question, why are they there? They are there because the government refuses to invest in infrastructure. So they have become necessary. So the question becomes, not getting rid of them, but finding a way to regulate them properly. Also there are different levels of private. There are a lot of small long-term care residences that are families. They are very nice, very nice residences. There are big chains. They have very good residences and they have not so good ones. We have public residences that are horrible. We have some really good ones. So it's not as simple as public/private. Even in Quebec, we have private residences with agreements, which means that they receive money from the government. And some without agreements, no money from the government. Those two categories are very, very different too. So it's a complex issue and we risk making it just a simplistic political issue. And we have to ask ourselves, if there were no private residences today, would the care be better? And the answer to that question is no.

Vardit Ravitsky: So, for you, the ideal would be to have all institutions in the public domain?

André Picard: If we started from scratch maybe, many countries do this, many countries have a mix of public / private residence. I think the "ownership" issue is not important. There are many, there are 50 other things that need to be addressed before we talk about who owns a home. But let’s say we start anew today. If we started building this system from scratch, no, we don't need private, we could do it like our hospital system. There are no private hospitals in Canada, all hospitals are government funded, managed by non-profit corporations, etc. That’s a good system. We don’t need private. But once we’re there, the question becomes, "How can we get rid of it and is it necessary?" Etc. 

Vardit Ravitsky: There is this deep desire, that people call getting back to normal life. And when I think of the elderly, of course, there's the desire to see their grandkids, to get out, for those who are healthy to travel, to get back to a social life, but from the descriptions you offer, it's not really a desire to get back to the old life. So how do you see Canada’s future in terms of our approaches towards older people? 

André Picard: Yes, I think so. It's not about going back to normal. It's about understanding what the pandemic has taught us, what we should fundamentally change in the way we treat seniors. So we need to invest a lot more in home care, and when we have institutions, those institutions should look like homes, not prisons. Yes, all solutions exist. They exist in Canada. So we have very good long-term care residences. One example in my book is Sunnybrook. Sunnybrook is a residence for Word War Two veterans. It’s a very elderly, mostly male population, 96 years old on average. It's not a pretty sight as far as infrastructure goes, but the care is really exceptional. And what's special about them, they’re really patient-centered. And there are many similar residences in Canada. I think that's what gives me hope. The most hopeful thing is that we know the solutions very well and we know how to do it. And it's doable. It's affordable. Sunnybrook is a public, government-funded establishment. It’s not much more expensive than others. This is what should give us hope.

Vardit Ravitsky: I share your hopefulness. Thank you so much for shedding a light on reality and possible solutions for us. Many thanks, André.

André Picard:Thank you. 

Tim Caulfield, Professor in the Faculty of Law and the School of Public Health, and Research Director of the Health Law Institute at the University of Alberta, speaks to Vardit Ravitsky about the spread of misinformation on social media during the pandemic, and how we can address this issue through action and policy changes.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Vardit Ravitsky: Living through a pandemic was a first for all of us. It was also a first for the social media phenomenon. Never before had the world experienced a deadly pandemic during which practically anyone with a smart phone could discuss the situation, promote any theory at all and even garner a substantial following. Tim Caulfield, a Professor in the Faculty of Law and the School of Public Health and Research Director of the Health Law Institute at the University of Alberta, followed the results with fascination. 

Timothy Caulfield: As you know Vardit, I do a lot of health law and science policy stuff. And increasingly it really has focused on how science, health, pseudoscience, how these things are represented in the public sphere. And I mean that broadly. I mean in the context of pop culture, in the scientific literature on social media. And so our team, I have this fantastic interdisciplinary team. We do empirical work on that. We do policy work on that. And look, I'll tell you, a year ago, I had no idea how bad it was going to be during the pandemic. I had a sense it was going to be bad. And by that I mean the spread of misinformation. This is even worse than I anticipated. This is a huge issue. I mean, battling misinformation, I think has become one of the defining challenges of our time. Now, that sounds like hyperbole, but I really don't think it is. I really don't think it is. If you look at the impact that misinformation has had, not just in the context of politics and we all know how that's played out, not just in the context of the marketing of misinformation, but look at the harm it has done over the past year deaths, hospitalizations, skewed health and science policy, and just increasing the chaotic information environment. So this really is, I think, one of the defining challenges of our time. 

Vardit Ravitsky: I couldn't agree more at this point in time. Misinformation kills. It's not just an undesirable social phenomenon. It kills. So to kick off our conversation about how misinformation is spread, what you've learned about how to fight it. I want to make you listen to an excerpt.

EXCERPT from President Trump says he is taking hydroxychloroquine - YouTube

A lot of good things have come out about the hydroxy. A lot of good things have come out. You’d be surprised at how many people are taking it, especially the frontline workers, before you catch it. The frontline workers, many, many are taking it. I happen to be taking it. I happen to be taking it. I’m taking it. Hydroxy chloroquine. Right now, yeah. Couple of weeks ago, I started taking it. Because I think its good, I’ve heard a lot of good stories.

Vardit Ravitsky: How does that exemplify for you what misinformation can do and how it is spread? 

Tim Caulfield: Just listening to that, it is a trigger. I can't believe it's already a year that since that kind of nonsense was spreading. But it is a fantastic example of the impact of misinformation and also how misinformation can spread. 

We have to remember, all this noise about hydroxy chloroquine, what I call the hydroxy chloroquine debacle, started with a small preprint study in France. So you have that study, and you have comments from Donald Trump and a few other prominent individuals like Elon Musk. And the debacle is born. And because of his statement, we saw an incredible spike in interest in hydroxy chloroquine, not just among the public, but we saw prescriptions go up two thousand percent. So this had a real damaging impact. Number one, it created the misperception that there was an effective drug out there to combat covid not true. Number two, it resulted in a shortage of this drug that was actually useful for individuals that needed it, that had a clinical indication.  And then another interesting thing happens, Vardit. Belief in hydroxy chloroquine takes on an ideological spin. Who would have ever guessed that a pharmaceutical product hydroxy chloroquine could become an ideological flag? So if you are of a particular ideological leaning, this is one of the cluster of beliefs that you're supposed to adopt hydroxy chloroquine is effective. And, you know, the amazing thing is, despite the fact that now we have, I would say, a really robust body of evidence with clinical studies, we have observational studies. This does not work, right? Hydroxy chloroquine does not work in the context of COVID. I think we can say that really definitively. Despite that, because of this ideological component to the story, there are many people that still believe hydroxy chloroquine works and.

Vardit Ravitsky: Still, still now?

Tim Caulfield:  Vardit, I get hate mail about it. We could bring a real time experiment right now, I can post go post something about hydroxy chloroquine on my Twitter feed, and instantaneously there'd be people saying it works and they and they point me to these studies that allegedly support them. Now, the other really important part of the hydroxy chloroquine story, I think, is this. It demonstrates also how misinformation spreads. We know that this is largely not entirely, but largely a social media phenomenon. And what happened, of course, is Donald Trump started talking about this and people that follow him or even people on the on the margins of that of that kind of ideological movement started sharing this content. So it really highlights how prominent individuals can shape public discourse.

Vardit Ravitsky: So this is a great opportunity to ask you to tell us about your #ScienceUp first project. 

Tim Caulfield: So just over a year ago, we got a couple of big research grants to explore how how is misinformation being spread about covid?  I think there's enough research now coming at it from different methodological directions that we can say with some certainty that this is largely a social media phenomenon. And social media really does have an impact on the spread of misinformation and on people believing misinformation. So we thought it was essential, absolutely essential to create really a movement. Vahedi, we want this to be a movement that that counters misinformation in those spaces. Right. We want to go where the misinformation resides. So Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and soon on tick tock also. And we wanted to create good content. We wanted to share good content on those spaces. And in addition to that, we really wanted to to, as I said, create this movement. This movement, hashtag #Science Up First, that allows people to kind of embrace this idea of accuracy and credibility. the other thing about this, this movement is we know this works. So sort of building on the research that we've done and research other people have done, like Gordon Pennycook at the University of Regina, we want to make sure that the messaging is evidence based. So in other words, that the strategies that we're using to counter misinformation are evidence based. So it's the content is scientifically accurate and the messaging is based on the best available evidence. So we're trying to do all of that. And it's been really successful, but it hasn't been out much. We started late January and already tens of millions of interactions. We have thousands of people joining the team. It has been fantastic. 

Vardit Ravitsky: So give us an example of a good way and a bad way of fighting misinformation on social media. Are you, for example, in favor of complete transparency? Should we repackage things to make them easier to understand? What works?

Tim Caulfield: Debunking does work and we have good empirical evidence to back it up. And I think we should think of it like a public health intervention, because you want to you want to measure the impact on a population level. And so what does a good debunk look like? You want to use good, credible sources of information and refer to the body of evidence. And there is evidence to suggests that really does work. So you talk about the scientific consensus. There's work from the climate change area, there's work from GMOs, there's work from vaccine hesitancy that suggests doing that can have an impact. Number two, you want to highlight the rhetorical tricks that are used to push misinformation. So what do I mean about those two? Let me give you an example. Someone will say, “Tim, I hear that these vaccines can change your DNA” or a better one maybe. “Tim, I hear that vaccines cause infertility,” and you can go, “Well, you know, there's actually no evidence to back that up. And here is scientific consensus from these scientific organizations, these professional organizations. And by the way, the person that is pushing that misinformation is using an anecdote. They're using a testimonial. They're misrepresenting risk. They're relying on a conspiracy theory.” You put those two things together and you really can have an impact. The other thing I think it's really important to do is, is to be nice, to be empathetic, to be humble, it can be really hard to do that. Also, you should always aim at the general public. That's your audience, not those hardcore deniers. And this goes to that that question you had about “What's the wrong way to do this?” Well, the wrong way, I think, to do it is to get into a fight with a troll on your social media, to feed them. It’s just a waste of time from a psychic perspective. You're just giving oxygen to this individual. Really think of the general public. You can use absurd statements from conspiracy theorists and deniers and celebrities as a sort of a pop culture moment to talk about what the real science says. But don't get pulled into that into that vortex. I really think about the general public or perhaps a particular community. Don't waste your time on the denier.

Vardit Ravitsky: We'll talk about social media in a minute. But I want to ask you a personal question. You talked about hate mail, you talked about trolls. How do you cope with working in a domain that is so volatile, explosive that exposes you even personally, your family to so much public attention and hate? 

Tim Caulfield: It is ridiculous, isn't it, that people are this polarized, that they put this much energy into and to hate, really? And I do get a ridiculous amount of hate mail. I got another death threat just just days ago. You get involved in a lawsuit from an anti-vaxer. It is exhausting. I don't think this is the experience that most people have. It is exhausting. But I think this highlights something a really important point. And this is something that I'm thinking about doing more work on in the future. It's really important, I think, now to support individuals that are doing this work and who are fighting misinformation, World Health Organization has asked more scientists and clinicians to step up and fight misinformation. If governments have done that, institutions have done that, and if we're going to make that request. We have to make sure those individuals have that support. So that means that universities, hospitals, whatever the institution is, they have to reward people, to incentivize them for doing this. So it's got to be part of their job. We have to give them the training if they want it. You and I coauthored a piece for the Royal Society of Canada on science communication. And that was one of our recommendations, right. That more individuals need to get out there. In fact, we even said that it's the responsibility of the scientific community at some level, at some level to to counter misinformation. But we also say in that report that it's also the responsibility of these institutions to back individuals up who are doing this work.

Vardit Ravitsky: Tim, let's talk a little bit about social media, because you kept referring to its prominence in the spread of misinformation. What role do you think social media companies should play to address this issue? Are they doing enough? Are they meeting their ethical responsibility here? Who should be the referee? Are we dealing with a threat of censorship and threats to freedom of expression, or is this free for all reality just too dangerous and has to be controlled?

Tim Caulfield: Wow. This is a complex, complex topic. You know, at the beginning at the beginning, I said this is one of the great the spread of misinformation is one of the challenges of our time. And I think what you just described is one of the policy challenges of our time, our social media platforms doing enough to battle misinformation. And I think the short answer is no. The good news is every platform now recognizes the dominant role that they play in the context of this issue. And so we are seeing more and more action by all of the social media platforms. Recently, you saw Facebook get very aggressive about misinformation in the context of vaccines. They need to do something, right? They absolutely need to do something because this is where the misinformation is spreading. So then the next question is, are the strategies that they're utilizing effective? So they're doing a broad brush stroke. They're sending out warnings, flagging misinformation, they're posting redirects. They're inviting, Twitter does this, inviting you to read the article right before you post it. All of those things, I think are good. And I think in the aggregate, if you look at the literature, they do seem to help. But we need to be careful. I think we need to do more research on this. Are there unintended consequences? For example, there was some interesting work, again, done by my colleague Gordon Pennycook, where he found that that flagging something as misinformation. Might we need more research on this? Have the unintended consequences of making something that does not have a flag seem more accurate than it really is? So I think we need more empirical research on what kind of social media interventions actually work and what are the potential downsides of these interventions. I think short term that I get asked a lot about these bans and served platforming. I think I think short term they are a good thing. And you get this interesting right slanguage that emerges around, you know, freedom of expression and censorship. But this is really not a good representation of what's going on. You don't have a human right to be on Twitter. I think people think that, you know, what's fascinating is the people are making that claim. Your censorship, freedom of expression. But I think that we do need ideally, I would like to see and this isn't going to happen, but this is sort of an independent oversight entity that was accountable to the public sort of monitoring the behavior of these social media platforms. And it would have to be international in scope. How would you ever? So I don't know what the answer is. I really don't know what the answer is, because there are sort of freedom of expression issues here. We're asking private companies to make decisions about what we see. And the other platforms are involved, and yes, this probably doesn't really trigger freedom of expression in the context of charter issues. But these are big questions and how we resolve them, I'm not sure.

Vardit Ravitsky: So you talked about the empirical research showing what an important role social media plays in general and the spread of misinformation. But you also mentioned those super spreaders, right? Celebrities, politicians, people with huge presence that once they push something, it gets visibility out of proportion, visibility. Some people have proposed to ban super spreaders from social media platforms, What do you think about that proposal?

Tim Caulfield: OK, so my heart says, yes, do it, please. So that's what my heart says. And I also think that there is some evidence to suggest it works, right? That it does work. It slows the spread of misinformation. We saw that with de platforming of Trump. It did slow the spread. So I think in the aggregate, if the goal is slowing the spread of misinformation in the aggregate, it probably works, especially for those who are the movable middle. So do I mean by that people that are who are vaccination hesitant will use them as an example. They're not all hardcore deniers, obviously, right there on a continuum. And the ones that we really want to try to target with our messaging is that movable middle right. The and I think when you do platform people, the group that benefits the most is that movable middle because they're the ones that aren't going to see the misinformation as much, because we've got a platform that it's not going to wash over them in their daily life. And that's really what you're aiming. So that takes me to the potential downside of platforming, because, again, I think we need empirical evidence to see if this is true. But I think it it it makes sense that there's concern it's going to lead to further polarization, where these individuals are going to go to different platforms and it's going to create a really intense echo chamber. And those that are sort of more hardcore deniers are going to be even more in an echo chamber. And they feel they're going to feel that this platform you just. It plays to their conspiracy theory, world view right platform that may see it is a conspiracy theory. It is a conspiracy. So I think that there's that concern. But why I still say in the aggregate it's beneficials or probably it's very difficult to change the minds, as I said earlier, of those hard-core deniers, right? So if if you think of fighting misinformation as a public health intervention, de platforming is the right move. But I do think we need to talk about what that means for long term policy. Is this really the right way to deal with misinformation, but short term in the middle of a pandemic when you're trying to get people vaccinated? I think it makes sense.

Vardit Ravitsky: So interesting what you just said, that at least now we're all present in the same space and we talk to each other. And you've painted this really dark scenario of the two groups not even interacting because they have their own platforms. And you have to kind of peek to the other worlds to see what their what is being told there. Thank you so much for all your insights. This has been tremendously Eye-Opening and fascinating. Thank you, Tim.

Tim Caulfield: Thank you very. And thank you for all the stuff that you do.

Steven Hoffman, Professor at York University and Scientific Director of the CIHR’s Institute of Population & Public Health, talks to Vardit Ravitsky about the challenges of creating public policy during the COVID-19 pandemic and how we can better prepare for the next one.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Vardit Ravitsky: So what has the COVID-19 pandemic taught us? And how will we apply the experience when the next pandemic appears. Will we be ready to respond with agility, or will we stumble over unexpected and unpredictable obstacles? Stephen Hoffman, a Professor of Global Health, Law, and Political Science at York University and the Scientific Director of CIHR’s Research’s Institute of Population & Public Health, has been investigating these questions since before this pandemic. 

Steven Hoffman: Well, my research is very much focused on how countries work together to address transnational health threats like pandemics, like antimicrobial resistance. So in some respects, a lot of the research that I've been doing for over a decade now has really been about preparing for that future, inevitable pandemic that would be at some point coming our way and in fact, that we've all been now living through for more than a year. So I have to say, though, it's much more fun to be researching pandemics than to be a researcher living through one. But that's something we can discuss more as we continue. 

Vardit Ravitsky: So I remember a year ago the big ongoing debates of to mask or not to mask. That was the big question when we were getting used to living in these new circumstances. Why did the clear policy regarding masks take so long? What does it tell us about the difficult blend of science and political decisions?

Steven Hoffman: Well, I think the whole mask debates around whether the general public should be wearing nonmedical masks will be one of those enduring situations that we're going to look back on and reflect about the way decisions get made during emergencies. The reason I say that is because, of course, today we have the benefit of hindsight and we're able to look in that rearview mirror and judge whether, for example, should we have been wearing masks from the beginning or not and such. But of course, when making those decisions, public health leaders don't have crystal balls that they can look into and know what the future holds. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Tell us a little bit about the science behind the original hesitancy that governments worldwide had regarding what to tell their citizens 

Steven Hoffman: Well before a February 21, 2020, there was no evidence of pre or asymptomatic transmission of covid-19. And so the key data point or the key bit of evidence that would be needed for a public health leader to recommend the general public to where nonmedical masks would be if there was strong evidence of pre or asymptomatic transmission of the virus. And so there was this worry that if public health leaders just recommended wearing nonmedical masks, that potentially it could have caused more harm than good. In the sense that a mask presents all sorts of opportunities for people to touch that mask, to have the virus go into people's hands, people then touch their faces afterwards. And so there is a risk involved in asking the general public to wear a nonmedical mask. But of course, that risk is trumped if there is asymptomatic or pre symptomatic transmission. Before 21 February 2020, there is no evidence. And on that date, 21 February 2020, there was some initial evidence published in the Journal of the American Medical Association that highlighted for the first time, maybe there is pre or asymptomatic transmission. And it was really only on May 4th 2020 that there is a journal article in Emerging Infectious Diseases that highlights, OK, actually there is now gathering evidence that there could be some pre and asymptomatic transmission. And indeed, it was exactly two weeks later that the Public Health Agency of Canada then made their recommendation on the basis of that very early gathering evidence around pre and asymptomatic transmission. But really, it was only actually a month later, after the public health agency of Canada started recommending the general public wear nonmedical masks that we had a definitive study published in The Lancet medical journal that confirmed that masks are actually effective when worn by general public in specific circumstances. All of that to say, it's clear that evidence evolves and you don't have all the knowledge up front yet. You have to make decisions. And there's always pros and cons to any decision. And we then want to ensure that we're judging our public health leaders to make the best decisions they can based on what evidence and knowledge is available at that time. 

Vardit Ravitsky: So, Stephen, when you do look back, do you think public health officials in Canada made decisions based on evidence in a timely fashion overall? There are so many decisions that had to be made and the science kept evolving, I know it's not fair to look back and judge but overall, would you say that we responded well to the evolving evidence?

Steven Hoffman: Well, I think that no response to a pandemic is perfect. And certainly, when you look across countries around the world, and I've done that, there is no country that has responded perfectly to this pandemic. Every country can do better. Should have done better if they were better prepared. I think the reality is, if you consider what we had done before this pandemic and how we've prepared or not prepared, I think at the federal level, the response has been overall pretty good in the sense that as evidence evolved, and so did the public health guidance. I think where the Canadian response has really broken down is at the provincial level. I mean, there are several provinces that have cut their funding to public health budgets over the last few years. And indeed, in the case of Ontario, it was literally the day before this pandemic was alerted to the World Health Organization, a massive budget cut to Ontario's system for public health came into effect. So you literally have a public health agency and public health units in Ontario that have just fired a whole lot of their staff. And the people who are left over are now suddenly asked to mount a heroic response with far fewer resources after having just said goodbye to a lot of their colleagues. And yet we then, in our society, we are making criticisms of them for not being ready. I mean, the time when you decide how well a jurisdiction is going to be ready to respond to a pandemic is not during a pandemic. It is the time when the legislatures make decisions on budgets. I mean, and that would be the number one predictor of how well we are prepared for a pandemic. It would very much be around what we invest in our public health system. The massive budget cuts, I think everyone would agree that came before this pandemic were clearly a mistake. Again, though, with the benefit of hindsight, we can say that. we know that investing in public health is one of the very best investments a government can possibly make. And cuts then to public health not only don't allow us to reap the rewards, but it also means where we're less ready to react to these kind of emergencies like COVID-19 that we know we're going to be increasingly frequent in the future.

Vardit Ravitsky: To follow up on what you just said, and it's it's really difficult to digest now, as you say, in hindsight, with the information that you're sharing with us about budget cuts to the public health system. But I hear public health experts say that this is probably not the last pandemic we will see in our lifetime. None of us wants to think about this right now. We have pandemic fatigue where we we suffered tragic losses and all we want is to move on. But we may be facing another crisis such as this in maybe the near future. What is your recommendation to the Canadian government, the federal, provincial and to governments around the world in terms of pandemic preparedness and the future?

Steven Hoffman: Well, what is clear is that there's no society around the world that invested in a way that investments needed to be made in advance of a pandemic. No society around the world was ready for covid-19. But that was a choice because it's not like we didn't know it was coming. Indeed, I remember just a couple of years before covid, we were celebrating the 100-year anniversary of the Spanish influenza pandemic and of course, celebration. I put it in air quotes because that was an event that resulted in massive loss of life and radical consequences for everyone around the world on a scale that's similar to what we're now seeing with covid-19. And so we knew something like that was going to happen again. And because of the way that we are traveling more and trading more around the world, we are more globally interconnected. We know we are going to see those events happening more frequently. I think the tragedy of it is that it was just only a few years before covid when we saw a little bit about the dramatic consequence of a pandemic. And by that, I'm referring to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Yes.

Steven Hoffman: That was an event that should have been the clarion call to get ready, because that event, while it was mostly contained within West Africa, it caused such devastation to the countries affected. And it gave us a window into what might happen if the virus of that next pandemic was slightly different, more transmissible, potentially airborne transmissible, such that it gave us a sense of how bad it would be in real time. And I remember after that outbreak, I wrote a commentary in a journal and the title was “How many people must die before we start treating pandemics seriously?” And then the conclusion of that editorial was that, well, fifteen thousand deaths from Ebola in West Africa? Not enough to activate the world's preparation for that next pandemic. And my only hope is that the millions who have died in COVID-19 proves to be enough to activate the world. And because that, I think, would be the best sort of solemn monuments and recognition of all that death, which was totally avoidable if only we were prepared. The best way to honor those who have been affected and those who have died in this pandemic is to make sure we're better prepared for the next one. And that is a choice that we have to make. 

Vardit Ravitsky: That is such a heart wrenching way of presenting the past few years and in a way also infuriating until we remember that every decision to fund means resources allocated in one direction and taken from another.

Steven Hoffman: I think one of the challenges from a political perspective is that you don't actually know if these investments are going to reap the rewards within the political time frame. And I think essentially what we see is that, at least in democracies, every democratically elected leader is just praying that that pandemic doesn't happen on their watch, that it happens when the next person is in office. And so as a result, there's a massive underinvestment in managing this risk.

Vardit Ravitsky: Absolutely. I also work in a school of public health. And we always say that success in our domain is when nothing happens and then politically we have nothing to show for. Good public health preparedness means that no life was lost and the pandemic maybe was beat before it even started. That is a huge challenge for our field, isn't it?

Steven Hoffman: Exactly. No, I think that is right. And one of the things that gets me is there is a lot of rhetoric at the provincial level around sort of cutting the red tape or cutting the back-office function and putting all the investment into the front lines, into the hospitals and such. And of course, our hospitals need investments according to what their needs are. But, you know, I think people don't realize those back-office functions, it's things like epidemiologists, it's things like contact tracers, it's things like ensuring we have good plans in place for when that next pandemic happens. And so there has been over the last couple of decades these systematic efforts to cut and cut those budgets and functions. And as you said, if success is not hearing about it, then politically, based on the systems we've created, it then becomes very difficult to continue to justify those investments. And that's a problem.

Vardit Ravitsky: That's our job, yours and mine, to keep it alive, to sensitize the public and politicians to the implications of such funding decisions. Let's move on to the solution, the vaccines. We're in the midst of rolling them out as an epidemiologist, as someone working on the global scale, would love to hear your thoughts about how the vaccine campaign and how the rollout is happening here in Canada and how do you compare that to other countries?

Steven Hoffman: I mean, obviously, the vaccine rollout in Canada has not gone as fast as citizens would like. I think that the problems that we're seeing today with the lack of manufacturing capacity around the world, these were noted by people who research pandemics like me. And the situation of vaccine nationalism that we're seeing around the world where each country is doing their own thing and doing what they perceived to be best for themselves. This was written in the textbooks. Like this, of course, is what would happen, because politically it becomes so difficult to take a global approach when actually we elect our leaders on a national basis. And why would a country allow vaccines that are manufactured in that country to leave that country, unless its whole population has already been vaccinated? These were predicted and we knew this was going to be a problem. That being said, just because you know it's a problem doesn't mean you have a solution. And, you know, the really sad part of this whole thing is  what's actually best for all of us is to take a global approach, noting especially that new variants of concern are emerging. So this virus is changing and there is a real risk that this virus will continue to change and that it might actually escape immune capture. And by that, what I mean is the vaccines and diagnostics and other technologies that we're counting on to beat this virus might actually, over time, no longer start to work. I mean, already we're seeing that the new variants that were first identified in the UK and South Africa, that the vaccine, existing vaccines are not as effective against those variants as the original virus. And so that's a real challenge. What it means, though, is we need a global approach and the fact that most rich countries in the world are suggesting that they need to vaccinate their entire populations even before poor people in poorer countries are able to vaccinate their health care workers or those who are at greatest risk of death from getting covid such as the elderly, that highlights not only a broken system, and broken global governance in this space. But actually, it's not in any of our interests because all that means is that this virus will continue to circulate. It's going to continue to mutate and change, and we're increasing the risk that it will escape immune capture. That's not good for anyone, including everyone who's in richer countries. 

Vardit Ravitsky: Stephen, I heard a testimonial at the U.N. that really touched my heart. And it said that history will judge us, that generations to come will look back at this moment in history and how we responded globally and whether or not we have abandoned the more vulnerable societies and those who had less resources or whether we stood together and supported each other with solidarity, and that our children and grandchildren will judge us ethically on this decision. What do you think about that?

Steven Hoffman: I think there's many aspects to our response to this pandemic that we will be judged for very harshly in the future. But it's on vaccines where we're going to be judged so harshly. And that's around the way we then did not ensure that amazing technology was accessible in an equitable way because it's so not equitable. And this is actually going to only exacerbate problems. And I think when it then comes to on one hand about the development of the vaccine, I get excited and I'm excited that, OK, through science we can solve the range of global challenges we face climate change, weapons, managing outer space, plastics in the oceans. We can solve these big, tough issues and science is a leading way of getting through them. But then when we watch about the access to vaccine, it's really depressing. Is this the kind of world that we're creating for ourselves and our future? Because if so, we are not going to be able to solve any of these other very big challenges that we also face. I think the one bit of silver lining is that it is actually not too late to remove ourselves from this very dangerous path of vaccine nationalism before even thinking about what's in the best interest of everyone. And instead, there is still opportunities to shift towards a path of solidarity, of equity, of fairness around the world. And my only hope is that we shift off the dangerous path and move to that path. That's not only better, but it's actually safer for all of us and benefits all of us.

Vardit Ravitsky: Thank you for this optimistic and hopeful message. It's nice to end with a positive tone and a hope that we can get on the right track. Thank you so much, Steven. It was a great pleasure talking to you today. 

Steven Hoffman: Thanks so much Vardit. 

with Valerie Pringle, Beverley McLachlin, Eric Meslin and Vardit Ravitsky

Former Supreme Court Justice of Canada Beverley McLachlin, Université de Montréal professor Vardit Ravitsky, and Eric Meslin, President of the Council of Canadian Academies, join Valerie Pringle to discuss the Declaration developed by the COVID-19 Impact Committee.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Valerie Pringle: The COVID-19 pandemic showed us how vulnerable we all are to the sudden emergence of a new and powerful virus, but it also showed that some of us are more vulnerable than others because of the way our society treated their communities before the pandemic. Over a year ago, the Pierre Elliot Trudeau Foundation established its COVID-19 IMPAC Committee to examine this situation and propose solutions to the problems communities across the country are facing. The committee is now presenting its findings through the Commitment to Action Declaration, which is a published document and a newly released podcast series that features one on one discussions with its members. Our guests work on the committee, raised many issues, Canada and in fact, the rest of the world must address. Let me introduce our panel. Vardit Ravitsky is 2020 Fellow and chair of the COVID-19 Impact Committee.

Vardit Ravitsky: Hi, Valerie. Lovely to be here.

Valerie Pringle:  And Beverly McLachlin, who is a 2020 Mentor.

Beverley McLachlin: Hello. And lovely to join you today.

Valerie Pringle: And finally, Eric Maslin, who is also a 2020 Mentor.

Eric Meslin: Nice to be here. Valerie, thanks very much.

Valerie Pringle: I think the declaration effectively sums up the challenge before us in the statement. "Our post COVID world should not go back to the normal we previously knew." I'm going to ask our guests what is at the top of your list for the old normal that we must not return to and why? So what would be the first step that you would recommend? Eric, let me start with you.

Eric Meslin: Thanks, Valerie. I don't think we need to go much further than the old normal of how nursing homes, institutions of long term care, were badly underfunded, poorly staffed and really ill prepared to deal with not only the COVID-19 emergency, but as the pandemic exposed many other areas of access to quality care for not just elders, but but others. It was obvious to all of us as we watched COVID-19 emerge that these were not only hot spots from the epidemiologic perspective, but they exposed the fragility, the cracks in a system that had for too many years gone, underappreciated and perhaps under the radar. So I would very much hope that we wouldn't return to that form of normal.

Valerie Pringle: Vardit.

Vardit Ravitsky: I couldn't agree more with Eric, and I just want to continue on the theme of groups who are very vulnerable in our society, our declaration says, you know, the test of a society is and how it treats its most vulnerable members. And there are so many groups that the pandemic shone a light on in terms of how ongoing years of discrimination, systemic racism and socioeconomic disadvantage have marginalized these groups and put them in a place that once the pandemic hit us, the impact on them was much more severe. And we all saw the numbers. So, of course, indigenous communities that have been suffering from lack of funding for basic things like housing and water, which increases the rate of all other diseases that made them even more vulnerable to covid. But I want to highlight other groups, such as people with disabilities, people in prison, terrible conditions for an infectious disease, people who are homeless that found themselves so vulnerable when everybody had to stay home. What happens when you don't have a home and people who suffer from poverty? So, for example, if you're living in very congregate settings or even just in a small house, women and children became more vulnerable to domestic violence. Because when you are stuck in a small space very close to someone who has been an aggressor and everybody's more stressed, obviously domestic violence has been on the rise. So many groups in our society, deserve better protections, more funding, more government support and more social support. The pandemic is really an eye opener for all of us to, you know, start thinking about how we can provide better support and better safety for the well-being of all of us.

Valerie Pringle: Beverly, what is the pandemic brought to your mind in terms of what has to be changed immediately now and has been brought to the forefront? 

Beverley McLachlin: Two things. The first is that we need to think of justice in a broader sense. It's not just courthouses and jails and that kind of thing, institutional warehousing or infrastructure. We need to think about justice as person centered. What the pandemic has really brought home and which we knew before but we didn't talk too much about it, is the justice is an individual matter in people's lives. That's why we're doing it. And when we see the people, vulnerable people, women who are being threatened, who are the victims of violence. When we see the intersection of health problems and legal problems in ones life, even things like homelessness and so on, you realize that when you're talking about justice, you're not talking about something abstract. The pandemic is showing us that these are real people who are suffering. Part of the problem is often they don't. And if you can get that fixed up like a home to live in or out from under their charges or something else, then everything else will become better. So there's a whole movement in the world now for people-centered justice that has really picked up speed since the pandemic. Second thing is the institutions, they are still extremely important. And what we basically are realizing is that we were working with 20th century institutions where everything is done on paper and what's not done on paper is done in front of a judge. And it all has to be in person. And it all followed certain rules and scripts. And sometimes it took a long time and was expensive. But those rules and scripts were really important. And now, we see that we have to modernize our justice system. It has a lot of good things. I never want to give up in person trials but there are many aspects of the system or different tribunals working on different problems that can use a lot of IT, they call them e-tribunals, and people get better satisfaction. So we're realizing we have to rethink our justice system. And finally, we have to make it user friendly at the bottom so that it helps people who may not know all the ropes who may not be able to hire a lawyer.

Valerie Pringle: So many interesting topics discussed and lessons learned from things that clearly don't work. Eric, you know, besides elder care, for example, what else do you think is critical?

Eric Meslin: We just heard my friends Beverley and Vardit speak, I can't help but make the observation that so much of what I think the COVID-19 pandemic has revealed to us is how we still function. Beverly called it a 20th century system with respect to justice. But I would go back maybe even a century earlier. And we're still thinking in silos about how people and communities, the environment in which people live are hived off from one another, even mentioning long term care and nursing homes as if they were somehow separated from the hospital system, the outpatient system, community-based care. There has been a longstanding interest in personalized medicine, maybe analogous to what Beverly was referring to with a person-based justice system. So I mentioned that almost as an introductory point to answer the question, because to be quite honest, I think that one of the most, if not frustrating, revealing features of the pandemic has been our systematic failure to learn the lessons of the past.

Valerie Pringle: Why is that? Why is it so hard to to learn those lessons from the past? You’d think that would be the first place you'd go and the place that you'd find the most preparedness?

Eric Meslin: I suspect it is a couple of things. My charitable view is that planning for uncertainty is just hard and planning for unlikely events is not a huge priority of society. And in government, it's just hard to do it. We focus on what's immediately in front of us, what the as we like to say, the line of sight is just down the road and maybe the next election, it may be a budget, it may be an important policy decision in front of us. And the public, in their defense, has a hard time making tough decisions about uncertain events. So there's just a whole bunch of uncertainties. That's the charitable version. Perhaps the less charitable version is we haven't learned how to learn the lessons of the past when they are about bad news and when they require us to invest an awful lot of money in planning and preparation in the future. We're really just not built that way. Look at what's going on with with the risks that are being disclosed about vaccines, where it turns out we're occupying a lot of our attention looking at the risks of of blood clots that are better in the one in one hundred thousand range, when, in fact, there are well known medications like the birth control pill that have  a one in a thousand risk of a blood clot. So to put it into some perspective, I think we have a hard time learning how to learn a lesson. We don't know what the lesson is that we're supposed to learn from SARS. Is it that there should be more nurses, that we should close borders? We haven't developed an effective system for deciding what is the most important lesson to learn and who should be teaching it and who should make sure that the lesson has been learned. Sounds very theoretical, but I don't think it's hard to sort of hash out in real terms why it has been difficult.

Valerie Pringle: Vardit as you chaired this group and came up with the declaration.  You can look at the big picture, too, and lessons to be learned going forward, especially with your professional lens.

Vardit Ravitsky: You know, Valerie, I agree with all the reasons Eric gave. But another reason is that just the human nature is such that we know we can save more lives by prevention, by intervening before something bad happens, but then we can put a face on the person. We just have numbers and we just have projections. We tend to invest where we have a sick patient in front of us and we can heroically intervene and save their lives. And so we constantly as a society invest, invest more in the health care system to fix what's wrong rather than preventing people getting to the hospital in the first place. And now with the pandemic, I hope we will finally understand as a public, as a society that prevention saves lives as well. We now can show the public the numbers attached to wearing masks, how the numbers go up and down based on the public health measures. We haven't had great medicine medical interventions for covid in the beginning. So we had to focus on the public health measures and we know that they make a difference. So for me, one normal not to go back to is a lack of funding for public health, a lack of public understanding of how important it is to prepare for the next pandemic. And I hope we'll go back to a new normal, which is public and political and financial support for preventing rather than saving lives when people are already sick.

Valerie Pringle: And from the point of view of of the justice initiatives that you talked about, Beverly, what do you what do you see as the the obstacles to that? You know, how do you get past them? 

Beverley McLachlin: I don't know if we will, but I agree with everything that Eric and Vardit said and about the difficulty of moving people off the concrete and into more abstract areas like let's have a prevention system. We're not very good at that as human beings, but we are rational human beings and when we need to, we can plan. We see our best businesses making huge business plans for the future based on risk. And why our governments and our society as a whole don't do that in a democracy is a big question what I fear is that there will be a very strong force to just go back to where we were instead of saying “OK”.  What the pandemic has done is reveal, I call it the great revealer, reveal weaknesses in where we were. Our 19th and 20th century justice system really could use an update. Not to throw out everything we've learned, we have a good justice system, but to make it more efficient and make it help people more.

Valerie Pringle: Well, for all of you. I mean, you must hear people say to you all the time, just in casual conversation, “I just I can't wait till things get back to normal.” Do you just jump on those people and say, “Wait, wait a minute, think about what you're asking for and think of what this moment is giving us and what is possible now, what we really have to work on.”

Eric Meslin: I think you've touched on a really important nerve and the nerve is the on off nerve that either it's don't go back because it's terrible back there, wherever there was, or please, please, can we just go back to the way it because we're exhausted as we are and as with most things that are that are so profoundly affecting the society, it's it's not easy to say it's one or the other. I suspect that what we're hearing when people say, can we just get back to the way it was, they are adopting a view of not having to think about every single decision. But there was a bit of an autopilot that there was a bit of a comfort, a sort of habitual way of living your life that was intuitively less stressful, even if in actuality it wasn't less stressful. So the idea of not having to think about wearing a mask or not having to wonder about social distancing, it's exhausting to be thinking about what you should do all the time. I suspect that that is more of what people are referring to. But I don't look with skepticism upon people say, can we just go back to to normal? I just think we should acknowledge that there are those who are just darn exhausted by having to make decisions and wonder what happens next and if we can eliminate that form of uncertainty. I think people will feel a little bit better about taking up the options and opportunities we were just describing.

Beverley McLachlin: Yes, I’ll come in, I think it's an attitude to there's many things we've learned and and we know that while we would like to socialize and we all want to get back there, that's part of human nature. We're going to do it in a slightly different way. And the same applies, I think, for caring for those who are vulnerable, be the elderly or whatever. Yeah, there there's basic carers that have to be given, but we're going to do it in a slightly different way. And that way you're not presenting this wrenching message. So I know I'm a bit of a Pollyanna, but I think that's the approach you have to kind of take incremental little things, sometimes big things, sometimes will be some money and infrastructure that's needed. But we're going to we're going to readjust. We're going to retool some of our ways of approaching things in our institutions.

Valerie Pringle: Vardit, do you want to take just a quick stab at this

Vardit Ravitsky: Absolutely. So going back to normal or not going back to normal, as we always say in ethics, it depends. And I think we all want to go back to restaurants and to the beach and to the gym and to vacations. So a lot of the things that we have been missing so badly over the past year. Yeah, we want to go back to normal in terms of our social life, our cultural life. We miss museums, we miss concerts, we miss lecture halls. But in terms of our social structures, in terms of systemic barriers that some of us have been facing and others haven't because we have been very privileged, it's time to recognize these profound differences and it's time to fight them and reject them and build something new that gives gives equal access to all of us, to the fun activities and to the basic needs of human life. So, again, inequality is not inevitable. We can fix it.

Valerie Pringle: Well, I commend all of you for the work that you did and for the commitment to action declaration. It's it's a profound document. And all of you have made great contributions. So I thank you for your thoughts today. And I thank you for your work on that. And I hope it does resonate and and and cause reverberations down the line. Anyway, thank you so much. It's been a pleasure to talk to you again. Vardy's Ravitsky, Beverley McLachlin and Eric Meslin, Thanks for listening. I'm Valerie Pringle.