A video clip of Danielle Smith outlining how Alberta could privatize major public hospitals like the Peter Lougheed Centre, the Rockyview General Hospital, and South Health Campus appeared on social media last week. The massive South Health Campus public hospital facility in Calgary – targeted by Alberta’s premier for privatization?
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Alberta Politics: Unhinged: Danielle Smith says vaccinated Albertans are just like the German voters who elected Hitler
In an unhinged commentary recorded by Danielle Smith on Nov. 10, 2021, the day before Remembrance Day, Alberta’s future premier compared Albertans who got vaccinated against COVID-19 with Germans who voted for Hitler. NDP Opposition Leader and former Alberta premier Rachel Notley called Ms. Smith’s comments “horrifying” (Photo: David J.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Will Stone writes about the role viral reservoirs may be playing in both prolonging individual long COVID symptoms, and allowing for the development of new variants. Simran Purewal, Kaylee Byers, Kayli Jamieson and Neda Zolfaghari highlight the need for people talking about
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Gregg Gonsalves writes that rather than spurring the development of more effective public health mechanisms, the COVID-19 pandemic has instead seen massive backsliding as a culture of denial has overtaken even existing programs. And Justin Ling points out the painful inability of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Ewen Callaway writes about the current state of the COVID-19 pandemic – with both a high baseline of cases, and frequent “wavelets” in comparison to seasonal diseases as new variants develop and spread with little resistance. – Tina Yazdani and Meredith Bond report on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Cassandra Willyard writes about the dangers of repeat COVID-19 infections. Kieren Williams reports on new research confirming how COVID-19 stiffens arterial walls, resulting in an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. Erin Prater reports on Deborah Birx’s observation that COVID will almost
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – The Canadian Health Coalition weighs in on the recent study showing that privatized surgeries in Quebec cost more than twice what public procedures would. And Matt Bruenig discusses the U.S. Democrats’ development of a layer of bureaucracy for a child care subsidy program
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Australia’s Inquiry into Long COVID has produced a report (PDF) confirming the obvious needs both to limit the continued spread of COVID-19, and to provide support for the people suffering ongoing effects of the coronavirus. – Michele Friedner writes about the people
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Kendra Pierre-Louis discusses the need for journalists to cover the massive health risks posed by COVID-19 even as (or even because of) the failure of governments to do so. – Jed Anderson calls out the increasing privatization of universities in Canada (facilitated
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Linda McQuaig calls out the Ford PCs for making it even more difficult to hold corporate health care operators to account for sub-par service. And Emma McIntosh, Fatima Syed and Denise Balkissoon discuss Ford’s latest sketchy step to turn farmland and industrial areas into
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Ritika Goel, Vanessa Redditt and Michaela Beder discuss how the Ford PCs are cruelly taking health care away from the marginalized people who need it most. And CBC News reports on the preferred right-wing model of privatized profit centres threatening patients into paying
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Nicole Grether writes about the hundreds of thousands of young people orphaned by COVID-19 in the U.S. alone, while Kyodo News reports on research in Japan documenting how acute brain syndrome following infection can be fatal for children. Lisa Riley Roche tells the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: You can never believe anything until it’s been officially denied: The UCP just denied it wants to privatize health care
If it is truly an axiom of practical politics that you can you can never believe anything until it’s been officially denied, we now have confirmation Danielle Smith’s government is bent on privatizing health care in Alberta. Home of the University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy, publisher of Premier
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Dave Hansen et al. discuss the attempt in progress by publishers to attack the Internet Archive in order to restrict access to materials. And Walled Culture examines the problem of trying to preserve any “public domain” at all when the profit motive
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Aria Bendix examines the state of current knowledge as to how likely people are to suffer from long COVID after being infected – with a seemingly declining risk for any given infection being more than counterbalanced by the threat from repeated reinfection.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – David Wallace-Wells discusses how the U.S. is woefully unprepared to deal with the real prospect of another pandemic (particularly on top of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic which is the subject of a policy of denial). – Peter Frankopan writes that climate is a crucial
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Eric Reinhart discusses the importance of approaching public health from a collective perspective, rather than presuming health is simply a matter of individual-level choices. And Michael Hiltzik highlights the usual combination of dishonesty and ignorance behind yet another set of talking points
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Eric Anderson writes that capitalism has been developed to exploit psychological vulnerability for profit. And Ludvig Weir and Gabriel Zucman highlight how the corporate profits shifted between countries for the purpose of tax avoidance approached a trillion dollars in 2019 (and likely soared past
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Liam Mannix examines how the scientists with the deepest knowledge of the risks of COVID-19 are protecting themselves from the ongoing pandemic. And Robson Fletcher writes about the attempts of Calgary parents to gather data on how to keep schools safe (in the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – E. Wesley Ely discusses the developing – and worrisome – body of knowledge of how COVID-19 affects the brain, while Korin Miller reports on the link between COVID and diabetes. William Brangham and Dorothy Hastings talk to people living with long COVID about
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