No plans to make Suboxone more easily available in Ontario, Deb Matthews says

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Photo by Moe Doiron/The Globe and Mail

Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews says the province has no immediate plans to put Suboxone on the Ontario Drug Benefit, which would make it more readily available to treat addicts who can’t get methadone, a more common treatment for opioid addiction. Health-care practitioners, especially in remote areas, want to use Suboxone more in cases where there are simply no licensed methadone doctors around, or no spaces available. Buprenorphine, the active ingredient in Suboxone, is supposed to be safer and easier for others (nurses, for example) to give out. It’s also really expensive.

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Canada’s pandemic response needs work, federal health agency says

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Photo by Henry Romero/Reuters

April 3, 2012 – Globe and Mail

ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY

There are still serious shortcomings in the way public-health bodies communicate with physicians, nurses and pharmacists on the front lines of a pandemic, says the Public Health Agency of Canada.

And almost three years after a flu pandemic put the country on high alert, the federal agency has put out a call for a new strategy to improve communication with clinicians during pandemic response.

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A penny spurned: Anatomy of Canada’s soon-to-be defunct one-cent coin

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Susanna Blunt, who designed the latest queen on Canada's coins, seen here at Capilano University, in North Vancouver.
Photo by John Lehmann/Globe and Mail

Saturday, March 31, 2012 – Globe and Mail

ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY
Pity the penny: In the past 15 years it’s lost its copper, its usage and its cost-effectiveness – the butt of jokes and bane of neat freaks well before its end became official in Thursday’s federal budget.

Despite its lowly monetary status, the penny is a high-maintenance bit of metal. It is by far the most expensive Canadian coin to produce, relative to its value. At a cost of a little over 1.6 cents per penny, it’s the only piece of currency in the country that now costs more than its value to make.

While the news of the penny’s phase-out came as a surprise even to the Royal Canadian Mint, the analysts and coin-crafters in charge of Canada’s money say they’ve known for years its days were numbered.

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The Tyrolean Iceman cometh, and shows us heart disease has ancient origins

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Photo courtesy of South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology

Wednesday, March 7 – Globe and Mail

ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY

A few ground-up grams of spongy bone, drilled from a 5,300-year-old mummy’s right hip and painstakingly bathed, sequenced and analyzed, have yielded a near-complete genome of Italy’s Iceman. The discovery not only offers a glimpse into an early human ancestor, but also gives a fresh perspective on one of the leading causes of death in the 21st century: The Iceman had a genetic predisposition to heart disease

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Germ warfare: The creation of a lethal virus sparks a debate pitting science against security

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Colorized transmission electron micrograph of Avian influenza A H5N1 viruses (seen in gold) grown in MDCK cells (seen in green) are shown in this 1997 image.
Cynthia Goldsmith/THE CANADIAN PRESS

With a recommendation that scientists be allowed to publish details of how they engineered a highly contagious strain of bird flu, the World Health Organization has come down on the side of those who argue that humanity is best served by the free exchange of knowledge. In doing so, it may have risked letting that knowledge fall into the hands of those who would do humanity harm

ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY
Thursday, February 23, 2012 – Globe and Mail

When two groups of scientists on either side of the Atlantic engineered a highly contagious strain of avian flu, their findings were variously hailed as brilliant, groundbreaking – and reckless.

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As more drugs crack down on oxycodone abuse, addiction experts fear public insurance limits don’t go far enough

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Photo by Michelle Siu for the Globe and Mail

Tuesday, February 21, 2012 – Globe and Mail
ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY

Nova Scotia has become the latest province to clamp down on OxyContin prescriptions, with Health Minister Maureen MacDonald announcing the province will only pay for the potent painkiller’s replacement in extenuating circumstances – for cancer-related pain or palliative care.

Nova Scotia’s move comes days after Ontario, with the highest rates of prescription-opioid addiction in the country, announced it is tightening rules for the painkiller.

Physicians called the move a step forward, but warned that changing publicly funded drug plans won’t be nearly enough to stem abuse from the prescription drug.

“There is a lot more that needs to be done,” said David Juurlink, a drug-safety specialist at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto. “These drugs should be harder to obtain, harder to prescribe – and certainly at high doses.”

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Provinces clamp down on OxyContin abuse

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Photo by Michelle Siu for the Globe and Mail

Saturday, February 18, 2012 – Globe and Mail
ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY

The epicentres of Canada’s prescription pill problem have said they’ll only pay for the leading brand of potent painkillers under special circumstances – one of the most dramatic steps taken in years to tackle the country’s fastest-growing addiction.

Purdue Pharmaceuticals, which manufactures OxyContin, is replacing it with a drug that’s supposed to be less prone to abuse. But some provinces have decided that’s not good enough.

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In two capitals, pressure grows for an end to Bashar al-Assad’s brutal repression

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Tuesday, February 14, 2012 – Globe and Mail
ANNA MEHLER PAPERNY

Through private meetings with ministers, rallies online and on the streets, through fundraisers pooling hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, the Syrian-Canadian community has been an active player in Syria’s resistance movement.

But as the violence escalates and spreads, many of the more than 30,000 Canadians who trace their lineage to Syria are calling on the government to act: It’s one thing to pay lip service to Syria’s opposition, they contend; but it’s time for Ottawa to put its money – and its might on the international stage – where its mouth is.

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Poor prospects: Toronto’s impoverished are working hard and hardly earning

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Armira Varga moved to Canada from Colombia 23 years ago, built a life for herself and her kids. Now, out of a job and juggling multiple new gigs, she's joined the growing ranks of Toronto's working poor.
(Photo by Moe Doiron / The Globe and Mail)

They’re often single and not originally from Canada. They work close to full-time hours but likely bring home less than $20,000 a year. In the first Canadian study of its kind, the growth of Toronto’s working-poor population has been charted, and the results are shocking: Even during times of economic prosperity the number of working people unable to make ends meets grew by 42 per cent in the GTA, a figure that shows no sign of stopping. Anna Mehler Paperny reports

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