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On pandemics: Deadly diseases from bubonic plague to coronavirus
By David Waltner-Toews. 2020
Authored by a leading epidemiologist, this engrossing book answers our questions about animal diseases that jump to humans—called zoonoses—including what…
attracts them to humans, why they have become more common in recent history, and how we can keep them at bay. Almost all pandemics and epidemics have been caused by diseases that come to us from animals, including SARS, Ebola, and—now—Covid-19. Epidemiologist, veterinarian, and ecosystem health specialist, David Waltner-Toews, gathers the latest research to profile dozens of illnesses in On Pandemics . Chapters are broken into short, dynamic explainers, each one tackling a different disease. Readers will discover: Why zoonotic diseases jump from animals to humans—and why some decide to stick around for good. How governments have responded to pandemics and epidemics throughout history, for better or for worse. The role of climate change, industrialized farming, cultural practices, biodiversity loss, and globalization in making these diseases not only possible, but inevitable outcomes of our modern lifestyles. Coronaviruses, such as those that cause SARS and Covid-19, have made bats their home for centuries. Until SARS came along, we didn't know they were there, nor do we know how many other death-dealing viruses might be living undetected in wildlife. On Pandemics shows the greater impact of animal-borne diseases on our world, and encourages us to re-examine our role in pandemics, if not for our own health, then for the health of our planet. Published originally in 2007 as The Chickens Fight Back: Pandemic Panics and Deadly Diseases that Jump from Animals to Humans , this book has been updated in light of the COVID-19 pandemicStill: A memoir of love, loss, and motherhood
By Emma Hansen. 2020
A moving, candid account of one woman's experience with stillbirth. Emma Hansen is 39 weeks and six days pregnant when…
she feels her baby go quiet inside of her. At the hospital, her worst fears are confirmed: doctors explain that her baby has died, and she will need to deliver him, still. Hansen gives birth to her son, Reid, amidst an avalanche of grief. Nine days later, she publishes a candid essay on her website sharing photos from the delivery room. Much to her surprise, her essay goes viral, sparking positive reactions around the world. Still shares what comes next: a struggle with grief and confusion alongside a desire to better understand stillbirth, which is experienced by more than two million women annually, but rarely talked about in public. At once honest, brave, and uplifting, Still is about one woman's search for her own definition of motherhood, even as she faces one of life's greatest challenges: learning to live after lossPeace and Good Order: The Case for Indigenous Justice in Canada
By Harold R. Johnson. 2019
An urgent, informed, intimate condemnation of the Canadian state and its failure to deliver justice to Indigenous people by national…
bestselling author and former Crown prosecutor Harold R. Johnson."The night of the decision in the Gerald Stanley trial for the murder of Colten Boushie, I received a text message from a retired provincial court judge. He was feeling ashamed for his time in a system that was so badly tilted. I too feel this way about my time as both defence counsel and as a Crown prosecutor; that I didn't have the courage to stand up in the court room and shout 'Enough is enough.' This book is my act of taking responsibility for what I did, for my actions and inactions." --Harold R. JohnsonIn early 2018, the failures of Canada's justice system were sharply and painfully revealed in the verdicts issued in the deaths of Colten Boushie and Tina Fontaine. The outrage and confusion that followed those verdicts inspired former Crown prosecutor and bestselling author Harold R. Johnson to make the case against Canada for its failure to fulfill its duty under Treaty to effectively deliver justice to Indigenous people, worsening the situation and ensuring long-term damage to Indigenous communities. In this direct, concise, and essential volume, Harold R. Johnson examines the justice system's failures to deliver "peace and good order" to Indigenous people. He explores the part that he understands himself to have played in that mismanagement, drawing on insights he has gained from the experience; insights into the roots and immediate effects of how the justice system has failed Indigenous people, in all the communities in which they live; and insights into the struggle for peace and good order for Indigenous people now.Soap and Water & Common Sense: The definitive guide to viruses, bacteria, parasites and disease
By Dr Bonnie Henry. 2020
The definitive guide to fighting coronaviruses, colds, flus, pandemics, and deadly diseases, from one of North America’s leading public health…
authorities, now updated with a new introduction on protecting yourself and others from COVID-19.Dr. Bonnie Henry, a leading epidemiologist (microbe hunter) and public health doctor at the forefront of the fight against the worldwide COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak, has spent the better part of the last three decades chasing bugs all over the world — from Ebola in Uganda to polio in Pakistan, SARS in Toronto, and the H1N1 influenza outbreak across North America. Now she offers three simple rules to live by: wash your hands, cover your mouth when you cough, and stay at home when you have a fever.From viruses to bacteria to parasites and fungi, Dr. Henry takes us on a tour through the halls of Microbes Inc., providing up-to-date and accurate information on everything from the bugs we breathe, to the bugs we eat and drink, the bugs in our backyard, and beyond. Urgent and informative, Soap and Water & Common Sense is the definitive guide to staying healthy in a germ-filled world.Life on the Ground Floor: Letters from the Edge of Emergency Medicine
By Dr James Maskalyk. 2018
*Canada Reads 2019 Longlist*Winner of the 2017 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for NonfictionDo no harm is our most important…
rule, but we break it all the time trying to do good. In this deeply personal book, winner of the 2017 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction, humanitarian doctor and activist James Maskalyk reflects upon his extensive experience in emergency medicine. Splitting his time between a trauma centre in Toronto's inner city and the largest teaching hospital in Addis Ababa, he discovers that though the cultures, resources and medical challenges of the hospitals may differ, they are linked indelibly by the ground floor: the location of their emergency rooms. Here, on the ground floor, is where Maskalyk confronts his fears and doubts about medicine, and witnesses our mourning and laughter, tragedies and hopes, the frailty of being and the resilience of the human spirit. Yet, he is swept most intimately into this story of "human aliveness" not as a physician, but as a grandson carrying for his grandfather, now in his nineties. Masterfully written and artfully structured, Life on the Ground Floor is more than just an emergency doctor's memoir—it's a meditation on health and sickness, on when to hang on tight, and when to let go.Hello I Want to Die Please Fix Me: Depression in the First Person
By Anna Mehler Paperny. 2019
NATIONAL BESTSELLERSHORTLISTED FOR THE HILARY WESTON WRITERS' TRUST PRIZE FOR NONFICTIONAward-winning journalist Anna Mehler Paperny's stunning memoir chronicles with courageous…
honesty and uncommon eloquence her experience of depression and her quest to explore what we know and don't know about this disease that afflicts almost a fifth of the population--providing an invaluable guide to a system struggling to find solutions. As fascinating as it is heartrending, as outrageously funny as it is serious, it is a must-read for anyone impacted by depression--and that's pretty much everybody. Depression is a havoc-wreaking illness that masquerades as personal failing and hijacks your life. After a major suicide attempt in her early twenties, Anna Mehler Paperny resolved to put her reporter's skills to use to get to know her enemy, setting off on a journey to understand her condition, the dizzying array of medical treatments on offer and a medical profession in search of answers. Charting the way depression wrecks so many, she maps competing schools of therapy, pharmacology, cutting-edge medicine, the pill-popping pitfalls of long-term treatment, the glaring unknowns and the institutional shortcomings that both patients and practitioners are up against. She interviews leading medical experts across Canada and the US, from psychiatrists to neurologists, brain-mapping pioneers to family practitioners, and others dabbling in strange hypotheses--and shares compassionate conversations with fellow sufferers.Hello I Want to Die Please Fix Me tracks Anna's quest for knowledge and her desire to get well. Impeccably reported, it is a profoundly compelling story about the human spirit and the myriad ways we treat (and fail to treat) the disease that accounts for more years swallowed up by disability than any other in the world.The Vagina Bible: The vulva and the vagina--separating the myth from the medicine
By Dr Jen Gunter. 2019
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLERFrom Canadian OB/GYN, women's health advocate and New York Times columnist Dr. Jen Gunter: The Vagina Bible is…
a comprehensive, accessible antidote to the maelstrom of misinformation around female sexual health, and the ultimate guide to everything a person needs to know about the vagina and vulva.We are well into the twenty-first century and have access to more information than ever before, yet many people don't know that a vagina is self-cleaning, condoms should be used with a lubricant, eating sugar doesn't cause a yeast infection, and sex shouldn't be painful. As a physician with twenty-five years of clinical experience, Dr. Jen Gunter is all too familiar with the fears, fallacies and misinformation that abound about vaginal health. On Twitter, she hilariously exposes unscientific wellness advice and debunks potentially harmful and stunningly unnecessary products from "vagina profiteers." Dr. Gunter knows the questions women (and men) have about female sexual health, and in The Vagina Bible, she answers them all. For: • the sixteen-year-old trying to figure out tampons; • the twenty-six-year-old wondering how to avoid a UTI; • the thirty-six-year-old trans woman navigating her new anatomy; • the forty-six-year-old worried about the changing appearance of her vulva; • the fifty-six-year-old looking into the HPV vaccine for her daughter (and maybe herself); • the sixty-six-year-old experiencing painful sex;The Vagina Bible offers a repository of accurate information based on science, and delivered with wit and wisdom. This is the fact-based, inclusive, and empowering guide you deserve to advocate for your own body.Daughter of Family G: A Memoir of Cancer Genes, Love and Fate
By Ami McKay. 2019
Weaving together family history, genetic discovery, and scenes from her life, Ami McKay tells the compelling, true-science story of her…
own family's unsettling legacy of hereditary cancer while exploring the challenges that come from carrying the mutation that not only killed many people you loved, but might also kill you.The story of Ami McKay's connection to a genetic disorder called Lynch syndrome begins over seventy years before she was born and long before scientists discovered DNA. In 1895 her great-great aunt, Pauline Gross, a seamstress in Ann Arbor, Michigan, confided to a pathology professor at the local university that she expected to die young, like so many others in her family. Rather than dismiss her fears, the pathologist chose to enlist Pauline in the careful tracking of those in her family tree who had died of cancer. Pauline's premonition proved true--she died at 46--but because of her efforts, her family (who the pathologist dubbed 'Family G') would become the longest and most detailed cancer genealogy ever studied in the world. A century after Pauline's confession, researchers would identify the genetic mutation responsible for the family's woes. Now known as Lynch syndrome, the genetic condition predisposes its carriers to several types of cancer, including colorectal, endometrial, ovarian and pancreatic. In 2001, as a young mother with two sons and a keen interest in survival, Ami McKay was among the first to be tested for Lynch syndrome. She had a feeling she'd test positive: her mother's side of the family was riddled with early deaths and her own mother was being treated for the disease. When the test proved her fears true, she began living in "an unsettling state between wellness and cancer," and she's been there ever since. Intimate, candid, and probing, her genetic memoir tells a fascinating story, teasing out the many ways to live with the hand you are dealt.A Mind Spread Out on the Ground
By Alicia Elliott. 2019
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2019 HILARY WESTON WRITERS' TRUST PRIZE FOR NONFICTIONNAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF…
2019 BY THE GLOBE AND MAIL • CBC • CHATELAINE • QUILL & QUIRE • THE HILL TIMES • POP MATTERSA bold and profound meditation on trauma, legacy, oppression and racism in North America from award-winning Haudenosaunee writer Alicia Elliott.In an urgent and visceral work that asks essential questions about the treatment of Native people in North America while drawing on intimate details of her own life and experience with intergenerational trauma, Alicia Elliott offers indispensable insight into the ongoing legacy of colonialism. She engages with such wide-ranging topics as race, parenthood, love, mental illness, poverty, sexual assault, gentrifcation, writing and representation, and in the process makes connections both large and small between the past and present, the personal and political—from overcoming a years-long battle with head lice to the way Native writers are treated within the Canadian literary industry; her unplanned teenage pregnancy to the history of dark matter and how it relates to racism in the court system; her childhood diet of Kraft Dinner to how systemic oppression is directly linked to health problems in Native communities. With deep consideration and searing prose, Elliott provides a candid look at our past, an illuminating portrait of our present and a powerful tool for a better future.Natural Killer: A Memoir
By Harriet Alida Lye. 2020
"I need people to know that I exist, that their experiment worked, that by some combination of luck and science,…
I'm alive."In this harrowing and intimate memoir, Harriet Alida Lye explores how, at just fifteen years old, she was diagnosed with a form of leukemia called Natural Killer, named "the rarest and worst malignancy." The average survival time of patients with this diagnosis is fifty-eight days. There are no known survivors. There were no known survivors. Fifteen years after Harriet's diagnosis, she became pregnant, despite having been told that her chemotherapy treatment would likely make conception impossible. To be a mother is to make a death, as death is bound up in life. She knew her body had the ability to create death. She never trusted, was told to not even imagine, that it also had the power, that magical banality, to create life. Weaving in source material from the year she spent in hospital, written by both of her parents and her teenage self, this personal reflection is told through a seamless blend of narrative, snapshots, journal entries, and blog updates posted for friends and family. With probing lyricism and searing honesty, Natural Killer explores what it's like to live with a life-threatening illness and survive it; what it means for a body to turn against itself, to self-destruct from within; and what it takes to regain trust in a body that has committed the ultimate betrayal.The Flu Pandemic and You: A Canadian Guide
By Vincent Lam, Dr Colin Lee. 2020
An essential survival guide – both to pandemic influenza, and to the hype surrounding it.Written by an emergency physician and…
a public health physician, The Flu Pandemic and You is a timely and forthright guide on how to prepare for an influenza pandemic, and how to understand the broader context in which this health threat exists. With cool heads and professional expertise, Drs. Lam and Lee carefully explain how readers can assess their level of risk, and set out practical advice on how to contend with a pandemic, addressing such issues as:• How the flu virus works and what level of threat Canadians really face• How to help protect yourself and your family from contracting influenza• How to identify symptoms • What you need to know about antiviral drugs• What to do in a worst-case scenarioThe Flu Pandemic and You develops a lucid framework to help people understand the current anxiety about influenza in the context of the risks we all face in our daily lives. This crucially important book, full of reasoned, knowledgeable advice, is an indispensable resource for fearful times.What Kids Did: Stories of Kindness and Invention In the Time of COVID-19
By Erin Silver. 2020
In the spring of 2020, the Covid-19 virus changed the world and made daily life much more challenging. We had…
to stay apart, away from work, school, and our normal routines. But, all around the world, kids came up with creative and thoughtful ways to help others. From making 3-D printed medical equipment to food bank fundraising to a neighbourhood joke stand, to creating a semi-automatic hand-washing machine, kids made a difference in their communities. Let's celebrate and take inspiration from their stories.Wuhan diary: dispatches from a quarantined city
By Fang Fang. 2020
On January 25, 2020, after the central government imposed a lockdown in Wuhan, acclaimed Chinese writer Fang Fang began publishing…
an online diary. In the days and weeks that followed, Fang Fang's nightly postings gave voice to the fears, frustrations, anger, and hope of millions of her fellow citizens, reflecting on the psychological impact of forced isolation, the role of the internet as both community lifeline and source of misinformation, and most tragically, the lives of neighbors and friends taken by the deadly virusThe doctor who fooled the world: science, deception, and the war on vaccines
By Brian Deer. 2020
Controversy over vaccines is erupting around the globe. Fear is spreading. Banished diseases have returned. And an "anti-vax" movement has…
surfaced to campaign against children's shots. Investigative reporter Brian Deer exposes the truth behind the crisisOn immunity: An Inoculation
By Eula Biss. 2018
Upon becoming a new mother, Eula Biss addresses a chronic condition of fear-fear of the government, the medical establishment, and…
what is in your child's air, food, mattress, medicine, and vaccines. She finds that you cannot immunize your child, or yourself, from the world.In this bold, fascinating book, Biss investigates the metaphors and myths surrounding our conception of immunity and its implications for the individual and the social body. As she hears more and more fears about vaccines, Biss researches what they mean for her own child, her immediate community, America, and the world, both historically and in the present moment. She extends a conversation with other mothers to meditations on Voltaire's Candide, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, Susan Sontag's AIDS and Its Metaphors, and beyond. On Immunity is a moving account of how we are all interconnected-our bodies and our fatesTen lessons for a post-pandemic world
By Fareed Zakaria. 2020
COVID-19 is speeding up history, but how? What is the shape of the world to come? Lenin once said, "There…
are decades when nothing happens and weeks when decades happen." This is one of those times when history has sped up. CNN host and bestselling author Fareed Zakaria helps listeners to understand the nature of a post-pandemic world: the political, social, technological, and economic impacts that may take years to unfold. In the form of ten straightforward "lessons," covering topics from globalization and threat-preparedness to inequality and technological advancement, Zakaria creates a structure for listeners to begin thinking beyond the immediate impacts of COVID-19. Ten Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World speaks to past, present, and future, and, while urgent and timely, is sure to become an enduring stapleA medical doctor and Harvard-trained mind-body expert shares the key to long-lasting health—stress management—with seven simple tools. Do you regularly…
experience pain, anxiety, fatigue, high blood pressure, gut issues, or other symptoms of chronic stress? The continuous and excessive release of stress hormones by the body is the reason for 75 percent of the visits to a doctor's office. What if they said you could manage that chronic stress and its harmful side effects with seven easy and affordable tools? The Mind-Body Cure teaches you to do just that, interweaving evidence-based science with practical advice to calm your mind so you can move from primitive fight-or-flight mode to send healing hormones into your body instead. Dr. Bal Pawa also shares her own story of anxiety and chronic pain following a tragic car accident. Only when she recognized how stress hormones disrupt every system in the body, from digestion to immunity to sleep, was she able to reclaim her health. Having healed herself—and many patients since—Dr. Pawa now shares the secrets to good health in The Mind-Body CureManaging anxiety with mindfulness for dummies
By Joelle Jane Marshall. 2020
Don't panic! Managing Anxiety with Mindfulness For Dummies is a practical guide to overcoming your worries and minimizing anxiety using…
mindfulness techniques. The National Health Service and the National Institute for Care and Excellence recommend mindfulness as a legitimate treatment for anxiety, and it's also been proven to alleviate stress, depression, low self-esteem, and insomnia. This book explains the benefits of mindfulness, and how it can help you face your fears and defeat persistent, irrational worries. Learn how to break the anxiety cycle with an optimistic approach, live in the present moment, and manage your thoughts using the fundamental techniques of mindfulness therapy. This friendly guide will accompany you every step of the way as you understand your anxiety, identify solutions to your problem, maintain your gains, and avoid relapse. Over three million people in the UK suffer from Generalized Anxiety Disorder, with millions more experiencing phobias, OCD, and panic disorders. Anxiety is potentially debilitating, but many people are daunted by navigating the health system and thus fail to seek treatment. This book provides a way for you to begin managing your symptoms at home, using simple techniques that can help change the way you think, feel, and actAnti-vaxxers: How to challenge a misinformed movement
By Jonathan M Berman. 2020
In Anti-Vaxxers, Jonathan Berman explores the phenomenon of the anti-vaccination movement, recounting its history from its nineteenth-century antecedents to today's…
activism, examining its claims, and suggesting a strategy for countering them. After providing background information on vaccines and how they work, Berman describes resistance to Britain's Vaccination Act of 1853, showing that the arguments anticipate those made by today's anti-vaxxers. He discusses the development of new vaccines in the twentieth century, including those protecting against polio and MMR (measles, mumps, rubella), and the debunked paper that linked the MMR vaccine to autism; the CDC conspiracy theory promoted in the documentary Vaxxed; recommendations for an alternative vaccination schedule; Kennedy's misinformed campaign against thimerosal; and the much-abused religious exemption to vaccination. Anti-vaxxers have changed their minds, but rarely because someone has given them a list of facts. Berman argues that anti-vaccination activism is tied closely to how people see themselves as parents and community members. Effective pro-vaccination efforts should emphasize these cultural aspects rather than battling social media postsHow to eat: All your food and diet questions answered
By Mark Bittman. 2020
Bestselling author Mark Bittman and physician David Katz cut through all the noise on food, health, and diet to give…
you the real answers you need What is the "best" diet? Do calories matter? And when it comes to protein, fat, and carbs, which ones are good and which are bad? Mark Bittman and health expert David Katz answer all these questions and more in a lively and easy-to-read Q&A format. Inspired by their viral hit article on Grub Street—one of New York magazine's most popular and most-shared articles—Bittman and Katz share their clear, no-nonsense perspective on food and diet, answering questions covering everything from basic nutrients to superfoods to fad diets. Topics include dietary patterns (Just what should humans eat?); grains (Aren't these just "carbs"? Do I need to avoid gluten?); meat and dairy (Does grass-fed matter?); alcohol (Is drinking wine actually good for me?); and more. Throughout, Bittman and Katz filter the science of diet and nutrition through a lens of common sense, delivering straightforward advice with a healthy dose of wit