Oil Spills

Ever since I was a kid I’ve thought the worst thing that could happen to the ocean was an oil spill.
The images on TV of people soaping up birds after the Exxon Valdez oil spill forever stuck in my mind.
Even as an adult I feel badly when I hear about after math of the explosion of the British Petroleum rig located off the coast of Louisiana.
According to press reports, “The Gulf Coast is experiencing an ecological disaster … Coastal areas outside of the immediate spill region will be impacted too.”
Reuters warns that some oil is in the Loop Current already "which could carry the oil down to the Florida Keys, Cuba, and East Coast."
It’s horrifying to think of all the beautiful water tainted by oil, but I also hope this will open people’s eyes
In North America we use so much oil and yet so many people life their lives without a thought of how it gets to their cars or how else it’s used as energy.
Around the globe people experience the negative effects of the over consumption of petroleum by the developed world.
Photographs in an exhibition called War Photo, show the mess in Nigeria, where Shell has operated for years with out regard for the environment or human lives — spills that continue for weeks, making farming in impossible, flames burning from leaks and a slick covering the top of bodies of water.
There is so much damage that will be done by this latest of oil spills but maybe it will be the thing that finally shows people why they need to reduce dependency, why alternative energies should be looked at and what goes on in the rest of the world.

Snow warnings in May

Just a quick question -- what am I doing here?

It’s not some great existentialist question.

No this has more to do with wondering why I am living in a place that was 20 C yesterday and snowing today.

And not just a little snow either.

I’m counting down the days to Sudan and Uganda. Then what?

CMA/CNA Media Awards

Excellence in Local Reporting...

Health stories brought to light by excellence in reporting

The subtle addition of information

Favourite subtle addition of information of the week goes to my co-worker Tessa Holloway for the way she slipped in MP Randy Hoback was on vacation.

"Our constituents have more concerns on their minds," he said by phone Tuesday from California, where he is vacationing. "They want us to concentrate on jobs, get people back to work, and get the budget back in order. And that's what I'll focus on when I get back to Parliament and that's what I'm focusing on now."

The Globe and Mail called her the other day to see if he was still away...
See the original article here.

Helping Haiti

This morning I listened to CBC’s The Current as the host interviewed Jean-Louis Warnholz on economic opportunities in Haiti.
He listed off mango exports, tourism and the garment industry as major economic benefits to the nation that were just starting to grow before the earthquake.
I waited for Anna Maria Tremonti to take Warnholz to task.
“Garment industry, who is he kidding,” I thought.
The opportunity passed her by as she asked about Mango production.
So I will fill in the blanks.
The so-called garment industry in Haiti produces the GAP shirts, Levi Jeans and a number of Disney products. It is low-pay, long hours and bad conditions, in short sweatshops in free-trade zones. They are set up to benefit the corporations that use them, not support a society in need of stability.
In 1996 workers in the FTZ made about 28 cents a day. Now, they might make up to $1 or $2 a day, but not likely.
The very reason Haiti is in so much trouble is because it has been abused a place for cheap labour and given unfair treatments from the West for decades.
That needs to change if we really want to support the country.
Let not use this earthquake as a time to ram through policy change in the very same ‘shock and awe’ way the US did in Iraq.
Throwing the doors open to more transnational corporations, paying significantly below a living wage is not going to help Haitians get back on their feet now, or if something occurs again in the future.

Torch Relay

The day the Olympic torch came to town.

Once I got over the rampant commercialism I really enjoyed the torch run and as it was lit for the briefest of moments I felt connected to people all across the country.

Then the announcer said Coca Cola needed a big round of applause.

... another day older and deeper in debt

I have two degrees that came after six years of international experience
I have one year of international journalism experience
And am well into my second year of daily reporting
What does that get me?
Enough income to qualify for the low income credit handed out by the Saskatchewan Government.

*sigh*

How's the weather over there?

It is so cold, it hurts.
How does cold hurt, you ask?
Well for all you warm people from somewhere other than north-central Saskatchewan and don’t understand what -35 C actually means, I’ll tell you.

1. When you spend two seconds outside, even while wearing gloves, your fingers start to freeze. It makes my knuckles ache.
2. The cold wind literally sucks the moisture out of you. I have cold rashes and dry skin on my hands, face, lips, hips, arms and parts of the body you just really don’t want dried, cracking skin.
3. When you breathe in, it feels cold all the way down to your lungs.
4. You shake and your teeth chatter uncontrollably.
5. Snow hides nails, so when frantically jogging across the parking lot to get out of the cold, you step on an old board and puncture both your shoe and the bottom of your foot with a rusty nail.

Admittedly the last one was less of the cold hurting and more of my being a klutz, but I wouldn’t have taken the route I did except to cut down time and get out of the cold.
The good news is I have had a tetanus shot in the last 10 years.
The bad news is that it’s still really cold.

Lets think HIV positive

Medicins Sans Frontiéres, what we in English-speaking Canada call Doctors Without Borders, has an HIV/AIDS awareness slogan, "HIV Positive."

During one international AIDS conference, I looked everywhere to see if I could find this T-shirt with the slogan on it.

The question: Would you wear a T-shirt that would announce you were HIV Positive?

It's not talking about physically being HIV-positive, but it's about attitude.

I've always loved the concept. I like the idea that people can be as positive about finding treatments and a cure for HIV as much as they can be about cancer fundraising.

For some reason, and likely because it was first associated with gay sex and then injection drug use, HIV/AIDS has always carried a stigma. It was seen as a disease that only affected people on the fringe.

But, it's not.

And it needs to be talked about by people infected and their families, friends, partners and communities.

People who are sick shouldn't have to hide it.

Many Canadians who are HIV-positive have no idea. To me that is far scarier than knowing someone who is HIV-positive. Often people would rather not know than be tested and start treatment.

The Ministry of Health announced Tuesday that rapid testing will be provided as a pilot program in Prince Albert. At first I was excited, but currently it's only being offered to people deemed at risk.

I would like to see testing offered to everyone, thus eliminating the idea that only certain people can become HIV-positive. Yes, it is more likely for someone to be infected if they share needles, but unprotected sex with a trusted partner can lead to learning too late they haven't been totally honest.

Like with other diseases, early detection means early treatment and a healthier life. As an added bonus, earlier detection of HIV and treatment also means a decreased chance of transmission.

According to a poster recently released by the Canadian AIDS Society, one in 584 Canadians is HIV-positive. A statistic long used in HIV organizations is one Canadian becomes HIV-positive every two hours.

These statistics alone should be enough to start reducing stigma.

Recently, U.S. President Barack Obama announced the end of the United States protocol of restricting entry for people living with HIV, effective Jan. 4, 2010. The end of government-sponsored stigma against people with HIV will also be a big a positive step to openly discussing the virus.

Knowing there are so many barriers in place for people living with HIV shows the power of many thousands of activists.

"HIV teaches about hope and the human spirit ... people with HIV are amazing," a caseworker said to me recently.

She's right.

So many people with HIV I have met from around the world have amazing inner strength.

In Uganda I met women who would get tested for HIV and then drag their partners in for testing as well. Sometimes their partners would leave them, but they would bring their children in and start everyone on medication.

If these women, who have to carefully budget their money to pay pennies for the bus that takes them to the clinic, can be comfortable with the decision to be tested, then maybe we can too.

While World AIDS Day is a good starting point for discussions, it shouldn't be the end point. Here in Saskatchewan, the HIV rate is only going to increase for the next little while as more people access testing.

As a community we need to encourage people to make healthy decisions and to learn their status. The most important way to protect public health is not by discriminating against those who have HIV, but by openly talking about AIDS.

Then we can all be HIV Positive.

Angela Hill is the Herald's health reporter.

This article first appeared in the Prince Albert Daily Herald Dec. 2

Eid al-Adha

I was invited to the local mosque for Eid al-Adha, the last day of the Hajj and a festival celebrated by Muslims worldwide.

The so-called sacrifice festival is to honour Abraham, who nearly sacrificed his own son to prove to God how devote he was. God then told Abraham that it was a test and sent him a ram to slaughter.

This sounded very familiar to me, having heard the story from the bible many times.

The women that invited me were thrilled I figured this out.

“Yes, it’s the same,” they told me over and over, before pointing out several other prophets that are the same.

One God shared by many religions. Too bad we all can’t see the similarities.

The mosque is a small store front in a strip mall, but the community gathers the same as if they were shouting the call to prayers from a minaret.

Here are some images from Nov. 27.