Exploring Canada's health care workforce

The Canadian Institue for Health Research (CIHI) released Canada's Health Care Providers, 1997 to 2006, A Reference Guide Sept. 30, 2008. The guide provides the latest available information on 24 health service occupations in Canada, including midwives, dentists, audiologists and chiropractors.
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Stop tranquillizing polar bears for research, NTI says

Leaders with Nunavut's land-claim organization say they want scientists to stop tranquillizing polar bears and other wildlife, citing the concerns of Inuit elders and hunters about the impact of that practice on their health.
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Man's death in Winnipeg ER 'preventable': chief medical examiner

Death was preventable for a Winnipeg man found after more than 34 hours in the waiting room of a major hospital's emergency department, the province's chief medical examiner said Wednesday.
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Physician Advocacy Essential for Canada's First Nations

Peter Warren, MB B Chir, Winnipeg Man. - The Government of Canada recently apologized to our First Nations' people for its residential school policy, which effectively suppressed the linguistic, cultural and spiritual practices of their pupils, with the ultimate aim of assimilation. Federal underfunding coupled with harsh discipline, exacerbated by the presence of abusive staff in some schools, also served to demoralize students and compromise their resistance to disease.
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Mohawk Council of Akwesasne Contributes $1 Million to Cornwall Community Hospital Renovation Project

Akwesasne, ONTARIO — The Mohawk Council of Akwesasne (MCA) announced that it has made a substantial contribution to ensure that Akwesasne community members will continue to access and receive quality heath care at the Cornwall Community Hospital. MCA has made a $1 million donation to be dispensed over a five-year period towards the hospital’s recent and ongoing renovations to make it the region’s leading State-of-the-Art medical facility
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My Big Fat Diet

Supersize Me meets Northern Exposure in the CBC documentary My Big Fat Diet when the Namgis First Nation of Alert Bay gives up sugar and junk food, returning to a traditional style of eating for a year to fight obesity and diabetes.
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Reminder of the AIDS struggle

Every day an Aboriginal person tests positive for HIV in Canada. To help address the problem, Regina recently joined the rest of Canada on the walk for AIDS through the All Nations Hope AIDS Network (ANHAN).
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Land claim pact brought few benefits: study

The James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement has produced mixed results for Inuit and Cree in northern Quebec, says a report published by the Institute for Research on Public Policy, an independent Canadian think-tank.

Some 30 years after the $225 million deal was signed, the improvements in Inuit and Cree communities are only "marginally greater" with respect to infrastructure, health, education and income than in aboriginal communities that had no land claims deals, says the institute's analysis of the 1975 James Bay agreement, also know as the JBNQA.
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In defence of fat

A controversial new book suggests including fat in the human diet could be healthier than you think.
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Judge criticizes care of at-risk teen

A Calgary youth court judge has severely criticized Nunavut child services and local agencies for their treatment of a 16-year-old boy sent to a group home here 18 months ago. The Inuit teen, now charged with serious crimes, is in danger of falling through the cracks of the child welfare system, Judge Steve Lipton said Wednesday.
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Health survey greeted warmly by communities

NUNAVUT - For nearly a month, 38 members from Nunavut and across Canada cruised the Northwest Passage, stopping in coastal communities along the Inuvialuit Settlement Region and Nunavut to survey Inuit about their health.
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Emotional plea for inquiry into missing women

Aboriginal women from B.C. and their supporters from across the country converged on Parliament Hill yesterday to speak out about missing and murdered family and friends in hopes of raising awareness and ending the violence.

The Walk 4 Justice left Vancouver June 21 to present a petition to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl, asking them for a public inquiry into the 3,000 women -- 80% of them aboriginal -- who have been killed or gone missing over the past decade.
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Challenging a nation to hit the gym

Phil Fontaine, 63, is the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations. At the AFN's annual general assembly in mid-July, he challenged first nation chiefs across Canada to commit to three months of daily physical activity. "One of the reasons for the challenge is to promote the idea of good health," he said. "We know that first nations experience diabetes at three times the rate of the general Canadian population, and so I'm hoping leadership will set an example through their participation in this challenge."
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Traditional Environmental Knowledge Bibliography

The Cumulative Environmental Management Association (CEMA) announces a Bibliography of Existing Traditional Environmental Knowledge Resources relating to the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo
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No more midwives in Arviat

With the departure of its only midwife last month, Arviat women again have no choice but to leave their families and community behind to have babies. The hamlet's long-awaited birthing centre, expected to open months ago, was never completed, and only one maternity care position is currently filled at the local health centre.
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Kahnawake MD gets Research Award

Ann Macaulay had been working as an MD in Kahnawake for more than a decade when she began the research on diabetes that would reshape her career - and have an impact on the health of the Mohawk people. The Gazette's Peggy Curran profiles the McGill doctor named Family Medicine Researcher of the Year for 2008 by the College of Family Physicians of Canada.

McGill University General Information
James Administration Building, 845 Sherbrooke Street West
Montreal, Quebec H3A 2T5

Walk4Justice in Ottawa Sept. 15

Walk4Justice is a group of Indigenous women and men that left Vancouver June 21, and is marching to Ottawa for Sept. 15, to demand a response from Parliament Hill on the violence against Indigenous women.
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Manitoba, Ottawa come to agreement on 'Jordan's Principle'

The provincial and federal governments have reached an agreement aimed at putting jurisdictional issues aside when dealing with children with severe disabilities who live on First Nations reserves.
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Walk raises awareness of suicides on First Nations

After four failed suicide attempts, 13-year-old Brigitte Hastings made a crucial decision. She decided she wanted to live. Hastings is now helping to raise national awareness of the plight of Aboriginal youth as one of 12 members of the Garden Hill First Nation in Manitoba who are participating in a Choose Life walk from Winnipeg to Ottawa.
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WHO Final Report of the Social Determinants of Health

The "social determinants of health" have been the focus of a three-year investigation by an eminent group of policy makers, academics, former heads of state and former ministers of health. Together, they comprise the World Health Organization's Commission on the Social Determinants of Health. Today, the Commission presents its findings to the WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan.
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Country food still the best choice

Nunavut - Contaminant levels in certain Arctic animals have declined in recent years, according to a study released earlier this year.
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Inuit Health Survey kicks off second year with high hopes, less ice

The coastal community health survey will take place on the Canadian Coast Guard Ship (CCGS) Amundsen named after the polar explorer Roald Amundsen.
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Elder interviews to become podcasts

QIKIQTARJUAQ/BROUGHTON ISLAND - For the members of the Inuit Knowledge Project, the term "expert" defies conventional definition.
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Pesticides we use end up in the Arctic

A single gunshot jars the silence of the frigid Arctic air as an Inuit hunter claims his prize on this whaling trip. There is a predator-prey relationship between the hunter and the whale, but they are also connected by a sacred bond of respect and affinity with one another.
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Deadline approaching for National Aboriginal Achievement Awards

Nominations for the 2009 National Aboriginal Achievement Awards (NAAA) close at 5 p.m. on Friday Sept. 19.
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