Violence Against Health Workers
Health workers play a crucial role in the functioning and flourishing of our society. In hospitals, homes, and sites of natural disaster within Canada and around the world, these essential…
Author: Gordon Thane
Social Determinants of Health: Educational Attainment and Public Health Literacy
It is often said that education is the foundational pillar of lifelong success. Indeed, a theme familiar to many modern families is the paramount importance parents place on getting their…
Barriers to Safe Consumption Sites: How Stipulation Stops Us From Solving The Opioid Crisis
Being an issue with multiple intersecting factors, the opioid crisis is a complex epidemic that is affecting the everyday person each day. There have been many approaches to this issue,…
Social Determinants of Health: Understanding the Causes of the Causes
Contemporary discourse commonly frames the root causes of good or poor health as a primarily biomedical phenomenon. We are told that it is the intersection of diet, lifestyle, genetic, and…
Opioids: The Prescription that Caused the Epidemic
Opioid use has been recorded throughout history but has recently experienced a sudden and dramatic surge in opioid use and dependence. With about 62 million people using opioids at least…
A Ticket to Freedom or a License for Segregation? The Evolution of the Immunity Passport Discussion
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic’s Delta-driven fourth wave, governments around the world, including many Canadian provincial and local jurisdictions, are turning to so-called “immunity” or “vaccine passports” to…
Racism, the Black Experience, and the Perpetual Fight for Equality
On Monday, May 25th, 2020, George Floyd, an African American man in his 40s was killed while in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota in the United States. These scenarios have…
Colour-Coded Health Disparities
A familiar theme in public health is the uneven distribution of outcomes across segments of the population occupying different tiers of the socio-cultural hierarchy. Despite the tremendous progress North America…
Gun Violence and Public Health: No Silver Bullet?
On the evening of April 18 2020, a 51-year-old gunman went on a 13-hour rampage across the small town of Portapique, Nova Scotia, murdering 22 people and injuring six others…
The Paradox of Vaccine Preventable Diseases
May 8, 2020 marked the 40th anniversary of the smallpox eradication. However, this historical achievement has been tempered as there is a growing concern that global societal disruptions and lockdowns…