Category: Health Fitness

AstraZeneca says it is withdrawing Vaxzevria, its vaccine to protect against COVID-19, from global markets. The vaccine was used early on in the pandemic in many countries, including Canada. In an update on the European Medicines Agency’s website on Wednesday, the regulator said that the approval for Vaxzevria had been withdrawn “at the request of the […]

Updated screening rules for sperm and egg donors came into force on Wednesday that remove a ban that restricted gay and bisexual men from donating to sperm banks, Health Canada said. “As a continuation of changes made to screening criteria for blood donations, Health Canada reviewed the donor screening criteria for sperm and ova donors […]

Warning: This story contains distressing details and discussions of sexual violence. Glorieuse Uwizeye believes it was a miracle that she and her family survived the 100-day genocide in 1994 against the Tutsis, a minority group in Rwanda.  Thirty years later, Uwizeye is an associate professor in nursing at Western University in London, Ont., and studies the physical and […]

Minister of Addictions and Mental Health Ya’ara Saks said Tuesday the federal government has approved the B.C. government’s request to recriminalize the use of illicit drugs in public spaces. The province is just over a year into a pilot program that allows adults to carry up to 2.5 grams of drugs for personal use without […]

Quebec’s Laurentian health authority is putting in place corrective measures in the Saint-Jérôme hospital weeks after the death of Normand Meunier, who developed a severe bedsore during his four-day hospital stay in January. The 66-year-old quadriplegic Quebec man chose assisted dying in March after developing the horrific pressure sore — where bone and muscle were exposed. […]

In the U.S., the growing role of private equity firms in health care is coming under heightened scrutiny, with Senate committee hearings and a cross-government public inquiry launched earlier this year.  “When private equity firms buy out health-care facilities only to slash staffing and cut quality, patients lose out,” said Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina […]

The Dose347:46:40How do ultra-processed foods affect my health? Sandra Elia is intimately aware of how prevalent ultra-processed foods are in the Canadian diet.  As a recovering food addict, Elia struggled for years to control her intake of ultra-processed fried foods, heavy in refined sugar and flour.  She’s not alone; Canadians get nearly half of their […]

The Current23:09What dying people see in their dreams As Charlotte Good was dying of pancreatic cancer in a Toronto hospital in 2007, she experienced a dream or vision of her own mother — who had died years before. Charlotte’s daughter, Cynthia Good, was staying over that night and sensed that she’d sat up. “I got […]

London Drugs is gradually reopening its stores across Western Canada, six days after it shuttered all locations due to a “cybersecurity incident,”  the retail and pharmacy chain said. It is working with its nearly 80 stores in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba individually to get them up and running, said the retailer, headquartered in Richmond, a […]

Sandra Langlois has no other choice but to get her left foot amputated on Monday. For a year, she’s had a bedsore that just won’t heal. “It’s very debilitating,” said Langlois, who is paralyzed from the waist down. She says she’s come to terms with it, but it took time. “There was a period when […]