Opioids kill hundreds of Canadians a year. Why are doctors still prescribing so many?

August 10, 2015 – Anna Mehler Paperny, Global News

David Juurlink sees them daily — old and young, with strokes or pneumonia or broken bones or drug-related overdoses, accidents, constipation.

Their ailments and backgrounds and health conditions run the gamut. And they’re all on high doses of a drug five times more powerful than morphine.

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Alberta oil spill: When ‘failsafe’ leak detection systems fail

July 17, 2015 – Anna Mehler Paperny, Global News

Nexen is investigating why its “failsafe” leak detection system failed to detect what turned out to be a massive spill that leaked 5,000 cubic metres of bitumen, sand and wastewater into an area of northern Alberta so remote the oil and gas company needs to build roads from scratch just to access the spill site.

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