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The Current Transcript for April 1, 2020

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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VOICE 1: It took less than a day for you to go from like we can do this to no, we can't.

VOICE 2: There was a question about school and I melted.

MATT GALLOWAY: School is out and there's no idea whether it'll be backed by summer. As kids remain out of the classroom in this pandemic, parents are trying their hands at home schooling and teachers are looking to connect remotely. We will explore the new normal for public education coming up. And then, remember this ad?

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VOICE: This is your brain. This is drugs. This is your brain on drugs.

MG: The public service announcement is back. Not all of them are entirely effective. Under the Influence host Terry O'Reilly is here to grade the COVID-19 PSAs. Also this morning, if you were still able to fly anywhere, chances are you'd see the books of Yuval Noah Harari in the airport bookstore. The best-selling historian is here later this morning to explore what matters in this pandemic and why he believes will be different when we come out of it. Plus, Tom Power speaks with Sir Patrick Stewart about Star Trek and sonnets. We begin though with a question: to wear a mask or not wear a mask? Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway. And this is an extended edition of The Current.

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Mixed messaging on mask wearing leaves people confused

Guests: Amy Williamson, Roxanne Khamsi

MG: Well, it's a debate happening around many dinner tables right now. This week it reached the U.S. task force on COVID-19. The question is, should healthy citizens wear masks when they go outside? Countries like Austria and Slovakia have made it mandatory and so has their neighbour, the Czech Republic.

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VOICE: The Czech Republic is one of the few in Europe that has significantly slowed down the spread of the virus. We are following social distancing and the rules stay at home, but the main difference is everyone who has to leave their house has to wear a face mask.

MG: That's a public service announcement from the Czech Republic. Here in Canada, the official word is quite different. If you have no known exposure or symptoms, you don't need to wear a mask, especially since they're in high demand at Canada's hospitals. My next guest has been making masks for a hospital in Toronto. Amy Williamson, good morning.

AMY WILLIAMSON: Good morning.

MG: Why did you want to start making masks?

AMY WILLIAMSON: Well, I love to sow. So I consider myself somewhat of a hobby sower. And I thought, I've got to do something. I'm cooped up as well as many others. And how can I use my time effectively?

MG: How did you learn how to make masks? You sell houses for a living, right?

AMY WILLIAMSON: I do sell houses for a living. My mother was a bit of a hobby sower, maybe even a seamstress, I guess. And I learned how to sow at a young age. And it was pillows, so a lot of very simple stitches and just stuffing. So it came a long way and she taught me a lot of basic fundamental skills. And it's kind of like riding a bike. So if you can apply it again, you just you really do remember. And it's a pretty simple stitch to build a mask.

MG: OK. I don't know of stitching. So how difficult is it to make a mask?

AMY WILLIAMSON: Well, I would say that the hardest part is really sitting in front of a sewing machine and facing it and saying, OK, where do I begin? And this actually started with a good friend of mine who reached out on Saturday, who asked if she could borrow my sewing machine. My sewing machine is pretty sentimental to me and I wanted to hold onto it. And I was already in the production of making some homemade mats just for friends, just for people in my neighbourhood and something to do. So when I told her I could I could just face time her and show her actually how to thread the needle, fill a bargain. It became a little bit more daunting of a task, but she was able to do it. And I walked her through it and I helped her out. And and that's really how we started. And, you know, if it can be simple, it's just you have to buckle down and just go over, make a few mistakes and know that really what people are looking for right now is not perfection. So it's really just a fundamental mask to help this court.

MG: What is involved in making a mask? Tell me about the masks that you're making. What do they look like?

AMY WILLIAMSON: Sure. So the ones that we're making specifically this was a challenge brought to us by at Eastend Hospital asking to make personal protective equipment and the type of masks is a two ply maths, meaning that there's a polyester front or an outside liner and then there's an inside line in which they're asking to be 100 percent cotton, followed by two elastic loops on either side. So really it's cutting out squares of two slightly different shapes. The liner being a little bit smaller and having them so spinning around the edges, folding them all in, making a really nice hem, which you would see on like the bottom of a jean or cut. And then doing the same for the interior liner and then you pleat the side and then you attach these little loops. So although that sounds quite easy, it it is really the time it takes to hem and pin all of these sides in corners to create a really, really easy transition to make linerr to the outside liner to elastic. I've got a little bit of a line up going of a workload I would say.

MG: Yeah. Is there like a pattern that you downloaded or something or you just come up with this on your own?

AMY WILLIAMSON: Well first when I first started doing it for myself, I just went online to find a basic a really simple pattern which I found. But then again, with this Eastend hospital challenge, they apply. They actually had a very specific instruction. It's the 17th step how to do it. Really easy to follow. It shows you the measurements that you require for a male of a male size, massive female and then for a child. So we've been doing a bit of both. We've been doing adults and we've been doing the male and female sizes. That said, there is a really easy step by step to follow anyone can. I can I would recommend absolutely using a sewing machine if you have one. It would be very, very labour intensive if you tried to hand sow this product.

MG: Where are you getting the materials for this?

AMY WILLIAMSON: I so happened, I did some hemming, again, being a little bit bored in the last week and a half.

MG: You and all of us, yeah, stuck in our houses.

AMY WILLIAMSON: That's right. Now's the time to hem those drapes that I had downstairs for the last year and a half. So in doing so, I had an excess amount of fabrics, so I started using that. However, it wasn't cotton. It wasn't 100 percent cotton. So I needed, I thought, I'll use that for the outside liner. And I called upon my friend. She had old duvet covers from her children's bedspreads that were 100 percent cotton that we've laundered and everything has been laundered. And it will be again. Once the masks are fully constructed, they'll be laundered by the hospitals and then given out as well.

MG: Well, and that's I mean, one of the questions I guess people might have is, is are these masks going to be up to the level that is needed to protect people from this virus spreading?

AMY WILLIAMSON: Well, that's the question. And when I first started doing this, my intention was not to make, you know, an N-95 or a personal protective piece of equipment that was suitable for frontline nurses and doctors. My intention was really thinking exactly what we're hearing now is that having a protective mask is actually somewhat helpful, especially with the elderly. So I was just looking to build something that was easy enough and did a little bit of good. So do I think that these are going to be worn by nurses and doctors at the frontline? No, but what I do believe they will be worn by are those necessary visitors who are coming into hospital and those patients that are being discharged from hospitals.

MG: And because the hospital asked for them and have put out this thing, the the kind of guidelines, presumably they would have a sense as to whether these are going to meet the standards or not, that they're looking for.

AMY WILLIAMSON: Correct. And it's fairly simple. Like I said, it's just it's a 100 percent cotton for the liner and then just a regular piece of polyester for the outside. So really, if you have one of the things I was talking about with a friend was, she wanted to make some donations of clothes, just to drop off. However, that resource is now clothes. So I said, go through your bag, pull out any fabric that you know isn't denim. Ideally, if it's cotton, put it aside, but if it's really anything, so I'm asking a lot of my friends and and colleagues to pull out all those clothes they were going to drop off, set them aside and I'm happy to rip them up and cut away. Or if they want to cut them for me, I'd be happy about that, too.

MG: How many masks have you made so far?

AMY WILLIAMSON: I've made 65 and I'll finish 100 today. So in three days. We're trying to do about 20, 30 a day. It's an easy enough task to have to do if you have the ability. I don't have children, so it's quite easy for me to power through quite a few of these in a day. And I'm just asking anyone if they want to help that they cut for me, l eave it in a bag at my house. There's a lot of path to this that take up a lot of time and my feel is definitely sowing them and constructing them. So cutting is helpful.

MG: Your mom, the seamstress, would have been proud of you, Amy.

AMY WILLIAMSON: She would have been proud. She would be doing this exact same thing. So that's exactly why I'm doing it.

MG: Thanks for talking to us. Good to hear what you're up to.

AMY WILLIAMSON: Thanks Matt. Have a great day.

MG: And you. Amy Williamson is a Toronto realtor who is making masks at home for a hospital in Toronto. Disposable masks are currently under debate at the White House. The U.S. task force on COVID-19 is said to be discussing whether they should recommend mask use to the general public. It's the same debate also playing out within families. Krystal Chin lives in Squamish, B.C. and this conversation is very personal for her.

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VOICE: So my family is Chinese and we have family members who lived in Hong Kong during the SARS crisis. The fight started off with a group conversation with two other family members debating about how COVID-19 is being transmitted. And with me accidentally triggering the landslide by saying, yes, COVID-19 is not airborne, and that's why masks don't work. And the debate escalated into or the fight escalated into them saying, well, are we being total jerks then for wanting to protect ourselves? And there's this many millions of people in Hong Kong saying that, you know, they're all being selfish by wearing a masks, if masks don't work. Anyways, needless to say, this debate didn't end so well and now I don't talk to them anymore.

MG: Krystal Chin lives in Squamish, B.C. Roxanne Khamsi is a science writer and editor based in Montreal. Roxanne, good morning to you.

ROXANNE KHAMSI: Good morning, Matt. How are you?

MG: I'm well, thanks. Why is this debate over whether or not we should be wearing masks?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: Well, there is some evidence that a homemade masks might work, but it's not unanimous. And so public health officials in some places are saying the jury's still out. And, you know, there's an emphasis that public health workers should get masks for us, which I totally agree with. But, you know, for example, there's a study in 2009 in Australia that looked at 143 households and they did some calculations to find that mask wearing within households reduced transmission of sickness by about 60 to 80 percent. And then there was another study in 2013 that looked at homemade masks and found that, you know, t-shirts provided at least about a third the protection of of of aerosol transmission as surgical masks. So there's an inkling, but it's not unanimous. We don't have all the evidence we need.

MG: You've written about this in Wired magazine. You wrote a long Twitter thread about this as well. In Wired, the title of the piece was, "They say coronavirus isn't airborne, but it's definitely borne by air." What are you getting at that?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: Well, so, I mean, part of this is a language issue, right? So the word airborne means something different to different people and it means something different to different scientists. So. Technically, the word airborn just means something that travels in the air. So if you're coughing even into your elbow between your mouth and your elbow, it's going to travel in the air and there are aero biologists out there that take that point of view as well. But public health officials have used this traditional cut-off, which some say is arbitrary of anything larger than five microns being a droplet and anything smaller than that being an aerosol that can kind of float like a feather or something can float longer in the air. I don't know if that helps.

MG: Well, part of that, one of the reasons why that's confusing is because it ends up using a bunch of medical jargon that, we're all becoming experts on something that we didn't know anything about two months ago. Do you think that that jargon can create confusion for people in terms of how they should behave?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: I mean, absolutely. And that's that's why I wrote the piece, because I could not wrap my head around the jargon. And the deeper I dug into it, the more I saw that there was even debate amongst scientists and that this idea that something can only be spread by these large droplets versus small aerosolized things, some of the very people that study how pathogens travel in the air see that that's a false dichotomy. So I think for me, it really challenged some of the messaging that we're hearing. And it also played or showcase how the jargon really can create confusion. So I think you're right on here.

MG: There's official direction coming from the chief public health officer in this country saying that unless you have had known exposure to the coronavirus or you're showing symptoms, a mask is unnecessary. That seems fairly straightforward. What do you make of that direction?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: So on the surface, it does seem straightforward, but then this COVID-19 is presenting us with some challenges because 25 percent of people with it are asymptomatic. And so the question then becomes, how do we deal with that complication here? So I think that she raises some really good points about how masks could create a risk if people don't take them off properly. You could kind of, are you touching your face a lot because you've got a mask on? So I think that she's raised some really good points. But there are complications here because, you know, with this pathogen, it does seem like people could be, you know, coughing and thinking they have allergies and whereas actually that is something more serious, it's COVID-19.

MG: Theresa Tam said that if used improperly and you've hinted at this, the mask could actually maybe pose a risk. We have a tendency to fiddle with them. You might have contaminated hands. You might take the mask down to talk to somebody or what have you. Maybe you take it down because it's uncomfortable. Is there evidence to back up that concern, that if you're using the mask improperly, that actually could put you at some risk?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: So I think that that's an extension of some of the studies that we do have which show that peop- hospital workers, if they're not removing their personal protective equipment properly, that they can infect themselves. But I have not come across a study that shows on a public health measure at the population level that that's a risk. It might be out there,b but what I have only seen is the hospital worker examples where people are in, you know, areas where they're really in the high risk exposure and they're improperly moving, removing their masks.

MG: People want to be as as safe and healthy as possible. That's what we say to each other at the end of a conversation, stay safe, stay healthy. And one of the ways that people are doing that is by wearing a mask. Even if it isn't perfect, isn't it better to have some sort of imperfect protection than no protection at all?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: I mean, there are a lot of public health officials that come down on exactly that conclusion. And as you hinted earlier in the show, there are countries that have taken that stance now. And in some of those countries, we have seen a slower rate of infection that might be for other reasons that this isn't an easy thing to pick variables out and point to something conclusively, but there are kind of inklings that something might be better than nothing.

MG: How do you account for the fact to your point that there are different countries that have different requirements and different bits of guidance? So Austria, the Czech Republic, for example, saying that you need to wear a mask in other countries, saying you don't need to wear a mask again unless you have symptoms.

ROXANNE KHAMSI: So I have asked this question myself. You know, why do different countries have different approaches? And I've kind of boiled it down into three reasons. One of which is cultural norms. You know, some places just it's more traditional for people to wear masks when they're sick so they don't get other people sick. Another is that they interpret the data differently in terms of, you know, everyone can look at data and interpret it differently. And that the last being that there was a reluctance in a lot of places to recommend masks because people wanted to preserve their national stockpiles or the health workers who need it most. And I really can't emphasize that enough. I have friends working on the frontline as doctors and nurses and I really think, you know, people working for public transi,. Things like that. People in the grocery store, these people need the masks first.

MG: What about making your own mask like Amy is?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: Well, I think that she made some really great points. And, you know, I have a sewing machine. I'm going to be honest with you. I have a sewing machine at home. I haven't touched it in this whole period, but I've seen online that there are these tutorials about using paper towels and rubber bands. So for those of us who either are kind of looking at their sewing machines, like with a little bit of fear or who who don't have one at home, there are other options online of, you know, making masks, other materials and also, you know, scarves, other things like that. There could be a lot of improvised ways to do this.

MG: So should I wear a mask?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: I think at this point it's up to you and it's up to whether, you know, are you coughing? Do you think you have allergies? I'm not a public health official, so it's not my place to make a recommendation.

MG: Are you wearing a mask?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: I'm sorry.

MG: Are you wearing a mask?

ROXANNE KHAMSI: So I you know, you obviously we're just coming out of winter not so long ago. I have one of, a ski mask type of thing that I put on when I go to the grocery store. Whether or not it's just for my own psychosomatic or psychological benefit or the benefit of others, time will tell. Scientific studies will show us in the future. At the moment, I think we're just kind of operating on common sense or our best possible conclusions for the moment.

MG: Roxanne, good to speak with you. Stay well.

ROXANNE KHAMSI: You too as well.

MG: Roxanne Khamsi is a science journalist based in Montreal. There is a she has been saying conflicting information out there about the utility of using masks. On Monday, Canada's Chief Public Health Officer, Dr. Theresa Tam was asked why she does not recommend the widespread use of masks. This is her response.

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VOICE: There's two separate reasons. I think for sure, absolutely, we want to protect our frontline health care workers and prioritizing supply in that setting is critically important. And we're looking at all sorts of different avenues to procure. For the public I think the scientific evidence is that if you are sick, then put on a mask to prevent those droplets from flying, you know, in any space as you're perhaps going to a clinic or having to move yourselves around the community for essential needs. Putting a mask on a asymptomatic person is not an official, obviously, if you're not infected. If you have close contacts of a case and under certain circumstances especially, you'll also be in self isolation, by the way, if you're close contact of the case and you also need to move for any essential reason, that's perhaps another situation. What we worry about is actually the potential negative aspects of wearing masks where people are not protecting their eyes or, you know, other aspects of where the virus could enter your body. And that gives you a false sense of confidence, but also it increases the touching of your face. If you think about it, if you've got a mask around your face, sometimes you can't help it because you're just touching parts of your face. The other thing is the outside of the mask could be contaminated as well. So the key is hand-washing, absolutely, for sure. It doesn't matter what you're doing, hand-washing is really key. When you're removing a mask and numerous infectious diseases even in the hospital setting, we find that it's removing personal protective equipment that can actually lead to infection. So if people try to use these measures, they have to be really, really careful and wash their hands. Absolutely, that's the key. So we're also worried about the negative, potentially negative impacts.

MG: Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada's Chief Public Health Officer. Later in the program, in about an hour and a half from now, I'll speak with Canada's procurement minister about the government's plan to boost this nation's supply of masks and other personal protective equipment. The CBC News is next and then, schools are closed, going to talk about online learning. Educators are warning that it's the most vulnerable kids who stand to suffer the most from this change in how those kids are being taught. We'll hear from teachers who are scrambling to adapt. That's coming up in about six minutes time. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current on CBC Radio One. Stay with us.

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Are Canadian schools ready to move to online and distance learning?

Guests: Ana Ramirez, Amy Szerminska, Craig Morgan, Michael Barbour

MG: Good morning, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

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MG: Still to come, our national affairs panel will decode the government's messaging going into month two of this pandemic. Yes, indeed, it is the first of April. But first, congratulations everyone. Whether you know it or not, you may be part of the biggest home learning experiment in history.

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MG: Well, here's something you're probably getting familiar with right now. Adaptation, no matter who you are or where you are in this country, you're most likely adjusting to a new normal. A new way of doing things parenting, working, socializing. This is especially true for teachers across this country. Teachers are dealing with a pretty hard responsibility right now. They are figuring out how to continue educating their students while everyone is in self isolation. Ana Ramirez is a kindergarten and Grade 1 teacher in Burnaby, British Columbia. Amy Szerminska teaches grade 9 and 12 in Barrie, Ontario. And Craig Morgan teaches grades 7 and 8 in Toronto. Good morning to you all.

CRAIG MORGAN: Good morning.

AMY SZERMINSKA: Good morning.

ANA RAMIREZ: Good morning.

MG: How is everyone doing? Craig, we'll start with you. These are strange times, to put it bluntly, and life for you in terms of the work and the relationships that you'd have with your students are in a different place right now. How are you holding up?

CRAIG MORGAN: We're doing all right. We've been spending the last week just trying to reconnect with our students. When we left just before March break, we really had no idea what the future held. We thought we'd be back in a few weeks and that quickly changed to the end of the end of April right now. So we're just trying to reconnect with our students and make them feel comfortable and keep that sense of consistency in their learning.

MG: Amy, how are you doing?

AMY SZERMINSKA: I'm doing all right. Similar to Craig, I've been reconnecting with my students, which has been great. They have a lot of questions, their parents have questions and we're slowly figuring out what the answers to those questions are.

MG: I want to talk about those questions and the answers in a moment. Ana, for you, how are things?

ANA RAMIREZ: Pretty much the same. Yeah, well, we were sort of lucky that we just came back from spring break, so we got two weeks to sort of try to distance ourselves and try to think how we're going to figure this out and yeah, so we just started this week back. Again, just checking in with our communities, our families and trying to give our students a little bit sense of normalcy.

MG: What are you doing this week to try to prepare for whatever is going to unfold in the weeks ahead, Craig?

CRAIG MORGAN: For the last week or so, we've been building a lot of platforms like Google Classroom and then trying to get our students collected on it. I teach almost 200 students. So it's been a bit of a challenge to connect with all of them.

MG: What is it just for people who don't use it, just briefly explain what Google classroom is.

CRAIG MORGAN: Google Classroom is just as a learning platform that allows a teacher or teachers to connect with what are multiple students. We can post information, we can post assignments, students can ask questions. They can have conversations amongst themselves. It's creating a false classroom if you're not in a face to face, but you still have that opportunity to discuss items with each other.

MG: Amy, what are you doing?

AMY SZERMINSKA: Well, we've got a couple of back meetings to discuss what's happening. I also had the pleasure of connecting with some other grade 12 chemistry teachers from around Ontario yesterday. A Toronto teacher, reached out on social media. So that was really great. We're really trying to evaluate what are the most important things that we want our students to learn if they're going to continue learning. And what can they demonstrate at a distance? And we really need to have conversations and lean on each other to help find answers to those questions.

MG: So what came out of that discussion when you take a look at what students need, but also how you can work together? What what was the result of that discussion?

AMY SZERMINSKA: Well, it's fabulous because we can share resources with one another. Different teachers have different levels of experience when it comes to doing some kinds of online learning. And so some teachers have used more. For instance, in our case, we can't do labs anymore. We won't be able to assess students lab skills. So there are some teachers who had some great ideas and resources about how we can look at some of those curriculum expectations online through simulations and things like that. So it was really great. The reverse sharing is fantastic.

MG: What do you think the classroom or whatever it is that you're creating, Ana, is going to look like? You are working and teaching with young kids. I mean, these are kindergarten kids, Grade 1 kids and this is their first time being in a classroom with a lot of other students often. What is what you're creating going to look like?

ANA RAMIREZ: Yeah, I would be sad for. I mean, it's obviously a challenge for everyone. But in the case of early primaries specifically, we have another layer added to that. We have students who have not been exposed to really using computer or being online. So we have started to brainstorm a lot of tools that we can use. We're really grateful where the strike they have begun to develop website for parents to use. They're calling into continuing learning Web site and they have started to post activities by grade level to suggest and help parents. However, as a teacher, we are just trying to find an array of tools that will be available for our parents and we actually use a platform called Frustrate. So Frustrate allows you to create digital portfolios. I was lucky that I set up those ahead of time, just as a way to compliment my practise in the classroom, show the parents what we were doing and showcase my students work. So now that that is set up, I'm really thankful for that. And it's another layer that I can use to communicate with the pens, post little videos for my students, little activities. That's just one of the many tools that we'll have to use to make sure that we keep trying to make learning as hands-on engaging and even placy space as it is in their early learning years.

MG: So there are different approaches to this because some teachers at different levels perhaps are going to be engaging the students through video chat or what have you. They'll be doing a lab online. When you're dealing with with younger kids like that, it's more this is what we were doing in the classroom and then you turn it over to the parents, is that what you're saying?

ANA RAMIREZ: Not completely. I mean, of course, because they are younger. We will need a certain degree of pressure from the parents that perhaps you don't need. With older grades, just because they're more independent, they can go online. In my case, for example, my kids are just beginning to read and write. So I want to make sure that I can offer the parents as much as I can. Terms of, for example, if I can send maybe a video instruction, I'm even teaching. But for sure, it will be a greater challenge that you might be with all the kids who will be more independent, right.

MG: Craig, for you, you're teaching grades, having great aid. We got a better sense from the Ontario government as to what the next little bit is going to look like in terms of a structure for at home or online learning in terms of time expectations for students, but also the fact that the work that they do will be graded. What did you make of what the the interim government announced yesterday?

CRAIG MORGAN: It was interesting for us, just because I know we've even had messages from our director and people trying to figure out what that's going to look like. Now, obviously, when we're evaluating in the classroom, it's a little bit different than we're evaluating online. I think one of the struggles that we're going to have is that we know students learn differently. Some of them we do hands on activities. Some need to collaborate with others. Some are happy reading. And now we have them doing online learning. And it's going to be very difficult to try to. Yes, all of their different talents and love can be something that we're going to have to obviously judge as we go along. I think our first week when we get back to things starting on Monday, we're going to throw stuff at them and then we'll have to see how they respond, how we respond and then adjust what we're doing to make sure that they all have an opportunity to be successful.

MG: Amy, what happens with some of the students you work with that have special needs and perhaps additional challenges? How are they meant to cope with this?

AMY SZERMINSKA: Oh, my students are dealing with a number of different challenges in my Grade 9 class. They have a wide variety of learning needs and I usually work with a couple of ease in the classroom to support those students. So we're going to have to figure out on a case by case basis how we can support them, what they're learning at home. With my grade twelve in my communication with them, I've discovered some of them are currently working almost full time hours at grocery stores. So they're maybe not in a situation where they have the ability to engage in their learning. We have to make sure that students have access to what they need to learn. But what we can't control are the other factors. Right. Do they have a quiet space? Do they have some family support? Are they. Is their mental health? OK. Like, are they in a place where they can learn? We've got a lot of things we're dealing with. And I did take heart in the minister's press conference. He did say that we would be grading. But I listened to very carefully and he said with appropriate flexibility. Yeah. So we're going to be using our professional judgement, as we always do, and looking at our students as individuals and making sure that whatever we put in place isn't going to be unfairly penalizing students who don't have access to what they need. Another issue I wanted to mention briefly is I have a couple of students who are English language learners. So I need to figure out how am I going to communicate with them so that they can access the curriculum material.

MG: What does that say about the expectations that we all should have? These are extraordinary times and the students should be in the class. They're not in the class. People have called this online learning. Other folks have called this at home learning. What are the expectations that we should have about what we are engaging in? Amy?

AMY SZERMINSKA: I think we need to be really flexible. I mean, we need to be flexible with our expectations, with teachers. Many of our teachers have young kids at home and may not be able to engage with their students in the same way that others would. We have teachers in our school board who live in rural areas and don't have access to technology because they don't have a great Internet connection and we have to extend that flexibility to our students. So what's happening right now has never happened before. We know that the learning of students they're going to get is not going to be the same as what they would get during a regular semester and we're gonna have to be creative.

MG: Do your grade 12 students worry and I want to get to to Craig and Ana in a moment, but do your grade 12 students worry that given that this is not normal learning, they're gonna be heading out of post-secondary, out of secondary school into perhaps post-secondary school. Do they worry that they won't be as equipped as they would have been had things than usual?

AMY SZERMINSKA: And they are certainly worried about that. And all we can do is reassure them. And I can do the best that I can to give them the most important skills they need going forward. However, I know that the post-secondary institutions have a great understanding of what's going on. They're dealing with the same thing. I have friends that teach in university and in college and they know that they're going to have a great understanding of the challenges we are facing because they have faced them with the end of their semesters as well. So I think that they will be treating those students with the same grace and compassion that we would like to treat them with now.

MG: Craig, I wonder whether your grade eight students have the same anxiety?

CRAIG MORGAN: Yeah, I've noticed that I wanted to try to reconnect with the grade seven eight students. The great seven students have been a bit of a struggle. They were like, okay, that's great. Were the great aides have been very appreciative. Had many thank you's that I've offered to continue the learning for them. I know as they're heading into high school in the next, they've essentially got three months of middle school left and then heading off to grade nine. They're obviously nervous that they're gonna be properly prepared when they get to high school. It's obviously a big step for them. I'm not overly concerned. I know a lot of them are very laid down, that good foundation, but they obviously won't make sure they have a skillset that they can be successful in high school as well.

MG: And Ana, you're at the other end of the spectrum where you have kids who I mean, so much of being in the classroom when you're in kindergarten, a grade one is just learning how to socialize.

ANA RAMIREZ: Exactly. Yeah the piece of the social emotional learning is huge. So one of the things that I am really trying to figure out is how to give my students a piece of continuing see for that for their social emotional learning. It is amazing. Just as requisitioning like his students are getting anxious and everything, even with the little ones. Right before we went on spring break, I actually talked to students. I addressed their questions. They were, they hear everything, right? They're little sponges that they see, they watch the news. They hear maybe what their parents and their families are saying, their concerns, their own worries about their own family. So I got to witness with my own students, again, 5-6 years old, how they were anxious and how they were nervous and just having that level of uncertainty just really hypens all that. It was actually quite sad that I, in my mind was like, okay, take care, wash your hands, be kind. I'll see you in two weeks. Everything will be okay. I understand that the situation outside is escalating, but we got this, right. So now knowing that I won't go back, I'm not back in a classroom.

MG: You're all teachers and you're parents as well. And so in the remaining few seconds that we have and I just want to do this very quickly, I'll start with you. Ana, what's one word of advice that you would give parents as they try to navigate this new world?

ANA RAMIREZ: Patience. I know that this is a new situation for them as well. I know a lot of parents are putting a lot of anxiety on their own. How are they going to teach their kids? So just be patient with yourself, be kind with yourself. We're here to help.

MG: Amy, briefly from you?

AMY SZERMINSKA: I will echo patience. I also think it's really important that we listen to each other. Listen to your kids and make sure that they're OK. That's the most important thing. They can't learn if they're not OK.

MG: Craig, a word of advice for parents.

CRAIG MORGAN: I'm going to go with the patience again, 100 percent agree, but also finish off just love and kindness towards everybody.

MG: Good luck to all of you. This is an adventure that we're all on together. I appreciate you speaking with us and your students will appreciate the work that you're doing as well. Thank you.

CRAIG MORGAN: Thank you.

AMY SZERMINSKA: Thank you, Miles.

MG: Ana Ramirez teaches kindergarten and grade 1 in Burnaby, British Columbia. Craig Morgan teaches Grade 7 and 8 in Toronto. And Amy Szerminska teaches Grade 9 and 12 in Barrie, Ontario. Michael Barbour is an associate professor who focuses on using technology in education for more than two decades. He has been researching how provinces and territories in Canada are using online and distance learning. Michael, good morning to you.

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Good morning.

MG: What do you make of what you've heard from those teachers?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Well, if all the teachers across the country are approaching the scenes with the same sort of mindset that these three individuals were, I think we'll probably be in good stead. I mean, they seem to be going into it with their eyes wide open. But at the same time, with a sense of optimism that this is something that they're going to figure out.

MG: You called this a triage situation. What do you mean by that?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Well, obviously, we're in an emergency situation here. I mean, this is a pandemic, no one expected that schools were going to closed. And in all likelihood, we'll stay closed for the remainder of the school year. So we're scrambling. And in any emergency situation, when you treat it, you're essentially just trying to stabilize the system, which is, I think, what our immediate concerns are right now in terms of, say, the next two to six weeks. You know, how do we get it to a place where people are at least starting to feel some level of comfort and some level of normal normalcy when it comes to how things are operating? Because this is something that we're going to have to deal with for at least the rest of the school year, I would imagine and potentially into next school year.

MG: What do you think the main challenges will be that teachers will face. We heard three teachers there talking about what they're up against. More broadly, what do you think teachers will be facing?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Wellthe biggest challenge I would suggest is that the students that they're working with and for that matter, the teachers themselves, you know, everyone is accustomed to and used to learning in a face to face the environment with, say, Amy as an example, you know, her grade 10 students have had now almost 11 full years of experience on how to learn effectively in a face to face classroom setting and now the setting we're asking them with really next to no notice whatsoever to learn how to learn in a completely different environment. And there's going to be a drop there and how we essentially train them, how to be effective in this environment, both from the student perspective on how do I learn when I don't have all of the trappings of the classroom around me to the teachers as well. Most teachers and not just Canada, but in most countries, they may get a single course in their teacher preparation program on technology integration. None of them would have experienced a course, you know, online pedagogy and and how to design and develop online instruction. So trying to put all of this together and think is the biggest challenge. And then there's the obvious ones that we think of. You know, there are students that have special needs, that require additional supports, that oftentimes have additional personnel in the classroom to provide those supports that now they're not there. We've got students that don't have technology at home, who don't have adequate bandwidth, even those that do have technology at home, oftentimes mom and or dad are also working at home now and how many computers does the average Canadian household have? You know, if both mom and dad work and they both need computers during the day, what's the students going to do? That's assuming you just have one child. If you had three children, all of a sudden you need three or four computers to be able to accomplish this.

MG: This helps shape the question around expectations. This isn't going to be school as people understand it. So what's reasonable perhaps for parents to expect in this situation?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Well, I think that's going to vary really depending upon grade level and even depending upon courses and jurisdictions, I think initially starting off the main expectation would be just to establish some routines for these children. They're used to getting up in the morning and getting on a bus and going to school, moving there from 9 to 3 or 8 to 5. What does that look like when everyone is at home? So establishing those kinds of routines and figuring out when we do things, scheduling things out, when am I supposed to be online, when am I supposed to be doing hands-on things that my teachers gotten? If teachers are calling students and I know many, particularly those with their technology, aren't, you know, when are those things scheduled in on a regular basis? But, you know, I'm trying to figure out the term you used, you know, this is going to be the new normal for a while. What does that normal look like and how quickly can I get into a routine that makes us at least feel somewhat normal?

MG: We heard Amy talking about her grade 12 students and concerns that they might have that they aren't going to be fully prepared for post-secondary education because their school year has been interrupted. Is that a genuine concern? A legitimate concern?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: It is a valid concern. I mean, for sure there are curriculum outcomes, learning objectives that each of the ministries has added to courses that they think it's important for a well-rounded high school graduate to know. That may not be things that are absolutely necessary for a student that's entering into the post-secondary environment to have. And it would behove our ministries right now to start sitting down with their curriculum right off the bat and trying to figure out which learning outcomes are not vitally important at every grade level for what the students are going to have to face in the fall and communicating that to the teachers right away so that they can focus upon those things that are vitally important. But as I think it was, Amy had noted, universities are finding themselves in this exact same position and they understand that the graduating students are coming to them. They're coming to them in a really extraordinary circumstances and in much the same way that come September's, schools are going to have to adjust things to accommodate the fact that the end of this school year didn't go the way it would normally go. Universities are going to have to adjust what they do for their first year students come the fall to make those same accommodations.

MG: Let's spend, just we have a minute or so left. Let me just ask you advice and again, one word of advice for people who are in the midst of this and start with teachers. What's a word of advice that you would give the teachers as they're trying to move forward in this?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: The first thing I would say is that as you go into the next week or two, the content isn't important at this stage, establishing the relationships that you've built up over the last eight months, six months with your students, having them experience the tools that you and your colleagues have chosen to use. That's really the key upfront, making everyone sort of feel comfortable and secure.

MG: For parents? One word of advice to them.

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Students are used to having a sense of routine and a sense of schedule, and if there's any way possible that you can establish that within your household, even if it doesn't look like a traditional school day would look like, that sense of pattern and routine for the student is going to help them during this time.

MG: And what about for the students, just very briefly?

MICHAEL BARBOUR: In all honesty, I think the students are probably the best equipped for this because they tend to be the most flexible. They tend to be the ones that can adjust to what it is they're doing the easiest. But at the same time, I think I'd say to them that everybody that's in this situation has them at the heart of all of their decisions and everything that we're doing at this point is to try to ensure that they are not disadvantaged.

MG: Michael, great to speak with you. Thank you.

MICHAEL BARBOUR: Thank you.

MG: Michael Barbour, an assistant professor in education at Touro University in California. Parents, students, teachers, we'd love to hear from you. How are you dealing with the new normal when it comes to education? Homeschooling? Taking a bit of a break? Are you worried about what's happening? You can let us know. Reach us through the website, cbc.ca/thecurrent. Click on the Contact link. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current. We're back in 90 seconds. Stay with us.

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National affairs panel and trumpets, window visits and virtual cards: How families are connecting with loved ones in nursing homes

Guests: Susan Delacourt, Shachi Kurl, Aaron Wherry, Shannon Buell

MG: Hello, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

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VOICE: This week is a truly critical week. We must practise physical distancing. We must stay strong and stay at home. I know that this is very hard, but I also know that Canadians are resilient and I know that we can do this.

MG: Stay strong and stay home. Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland reminded Canadians yesterday about the drill that we have heard countless times now. As Canada's COVID-19 crisis enters its second month, it's becoming clear those directives aren't going away anytime soon. Our national affairs panel is ready to walk us through the latest. Susan Delacourt is national columnist for The Toronto Star. Shachi Kurl, executive director of the Angus Reid Institute. And Aaron Wherry is a senior writer with the CBC's Parliament Hill Bureau. Good morning to you all.

SUSAN DELACOURT: Good morning.

SHACHI KURL: Good morning.

MG: Shachi, we are just a few weeks into this new reality. No one knows how long this is going to go on for, but suddenly it's the 1st of April and spring is in the air. How well do you think Canadians are adjusting to what we're in right now?

SHACHI KURL: I think they are absolutely seised and gripped by two things. First of all, the absolute jarring nature of what has happened to us as a country, what's happened to the world in in a matter of weeks, and how realities and things that we have so easily taken for granted as as recently as the middle of March no longer exists. So I think there is that reality that we continue to try to wrap our arms around, get our heads around. And that has been followed very quickly by just the the no sugar coating fact that for so many Canadians, this has also plunged them, their own households into complete economic chaos. We've we've talked to Canadians, 40/40, 44 percent saying they've lost work in their own household. Another 20 percent say they anticipate losing work. Most of these folks are not being bridged by their employers in terms of compensation or having their pay topped up. Most of them think they're in it for the long haul. They're trying to apply for EAI. And those who have been most disproportionately affected are also most likely to say, you know what? We're we're close to the edge anyway. We were having a hard enough time keeping our heads above water. Now, we don't think we could even manage a small hundred five hundred dollar unanticipated expense. So this is really serious.

MG: Susan Delacourt, you've said that this is the week when short term hopes will confront long term reality. What did you mean by that?

SUSAN DELACOURT: I do think April 1st and happy April Fool's Day everyone is is a bit of a psychological threshold or a mileposts for people. Not only is it economic, they have to pay their rent. I think a lot of people and Shachi would probably know this better went into self-isolation or this mode in mid-March thinking this was going to be a few weeks. And we you know, we saw Donald Trump in the United States saying, you know, this will all be over by Easter. And you saw Donald Trump yesterday particularly saying that we're in this for the long haul. And I think it it really is confronting parents. I know in Ontario, they extended the time that kids would be off school. I do think all around the country, all over the world, we've realized there's no quick fix for this.

MG: Prime Minister clearly realizes that, Aaron. In part because just about every day he announces new money to deal with this crisis. Yesterday, another $2 billion to purchase medical equipment. He has made these regular appearances in front of Rideau Cottage, where he remains in isolation. How do you think he's doing when it comes to his overall approach in dealing with this crisis?

AARON WHERRY: I mean, I think he's very much focussed on trying to do to reassure people to sort of build this foundation, this idea that that we're all in this together. And, you know, not only are we all supposed to stay home, but, you know, some of our fellow citizens are making extraordinary efforts, not only health care workers, but, you know, truck drivers, grocers, etc., etc. So I think he's he's he's focussing on sort of uniting people, on reminding people that the government is there and is taking measures to help people, is there to sort of backstop people in this time of need in this sort of extraordinary disruption. He is, though, as Susan says, I think he's running up against this with this burgeoning sense of, OK, let's talk about exactly how long this is going to be. You know, yes, we've all been hunkering down for two weeks, but what exactly do the next few months look like?

MG: Susan, how would you assess the prime minister's role in this in terms of how he has addressed, to Aaron's point, some of the anxieties and the fears that Canadians might have?

SUSAN DELACOURT: Well, some of it has been helped by the fact that as his people around him say, he was one of the first Western leaders to have to enter self-isolation anyway. So merely by having to stay at home himself and not go out there. He has sent you know, he is the symbol of Canadians being stuck on in their homes. And you see that even though his wife has received a clean bill of health and he's stayed in the home, that's more public health room. That's less public health than political communication. It's a prime minister who's telling people to stay at home. He's got to stay at home himself.

MG: We're seeing a health care system that might have been stretched at the best of times with hallway medicine and people being treated in dining rooms and in other spaces because there wasn't enough room within the emergency department. How much confidence, do you think Shachi, that Canadians have in the health care system now, in terms of its ability to cope with a crisis that is unprecedented?

SHACHI KURL: That's the question we've actually been tracking since the beginning of February around this, Matt. And it's all about where you live locally. So that is the question we've put to people across the country. And what's been notable and what we've seen is that as the number of diagnoses have increased, as the number of deaths have increased. You've seen a correlated sense of less confidence in local health systems, walk in clinics, hospitals to be able to handle what's happening. So that's not surprising. As the stuff literally gets more real, people are now taking a step back, go over. Well, we have less confidence in in our local systems than we did, say, six weeks ago. It doesn't mean that that people are generally not confident, but it's it's only about half who are expressing confidence nationally. You see the lowest levels in places like British Columbia, where the numbers are higher per capita than than other parts of the country. Interestingly, though, Quebec, which has been hit so hard, continues to have high levels of confidence. So I think, again, it also has to do with how leaders, whether it's the prime minister, local premiers or local public health officials are perceived in terms of what they're communicating.

MG: A sense of transparency that they're offering.

SHACHI KURL: Indeed. Yeah. And I think, you know, as I look ahead over the next couple of weeks, there's going to be a few things that I think will have an impact on how people are perceiving those different levels of government and officialdom. First of all, it will have to do with how clearly they are communicating not just on the situation, but also on what you should be doing. We've gone from messaging that was very vague around, oh, maintain physical distance, but also go out for walks and don't leave home. But do leave home and carry on with your lives to really specific stuff. Keep two meters apart, only leave for groceries. And I think as those messages have hardened, that has has I think helped clarify for many Canadians an understanding of what they're supposed to be doing. But it's a question we're going to be putting to them. The bigger question, though, really does have to do with what is the size and the scope of the situations. And you've seen reporting in the last couple of days really emerging where people are saying, well, we get these updates every day on a number of diagnoses, number of deaths, but we don't know what that is in relation to the situation per capita. We don't know what that means around testing. We don't really understand the full size of the pandemic because we don't know what the denominator is in all of this. We understand what the numerator is, new situations, but how big is this thing?

MG: Well and part of that speaks to how much the government is willing to spend to try and address the situation. In addition to reassuring the nation, Aaron, every day the prime minister comes out, it seems, and offers more details on more money being spent. This started out with a $27 billion dollar package, I think. It's now up to a hundred and some billion dollars and could grow and grow.

MG: How much money do you think the government is willing to put into this?

AARON WHERRY: I think they've at least signalled that they're willing to spend whatever it takes. I think we're going to all get a bit of a lesson now in how much a government can actually afford to spend. You know, go back a month ago and we thought a $17 billion deficit was a serious point of concern. And, you know, now there's talk of the deficit reaching $100 billion, $200 billion. But the message coming back from from economists, from people who, you know, the Parliamentary Budget Office, from people who who who understand these things is look, the federal government can afford to spend this. This money had a low debt to GDP ratio. It wasn't going into this in a debt crisis. It can afford to spend a lot of money in a relatively short term. The other part of that though, is that there really isn't a debate on that. There is no one right now saying don't spend money. If ianything, there is only a debate about spending more and spreading it more widely.

MG: Susan, is there any debate whatsoever about it at some point in time that this money would need to be paid back? And that doesn't diminish the seriousness of the situation we're in right now and the need to do whatever to address it, but is there any conversation about what happens down the line?

SUSAN DELACOURT: It's very hard to have a conversation with Canadians about institutional or large macro debt when Canadians are staring down individual debt themselves. And I think we may see that debate, you know, in in a year from now or maybe later in the year. We keep hearing the assurances from Chrystia Freeland, the deputy prime minister and finance minister, Bill Morneau. We're going hear from him again today. But we're hearing from them that that things are going to become, "roaring back" and that that the rebound is is is going to fix this too. I think there's a lot of crossed fingers right now as Aaron and Shachi are talking about too. I just think that just as our lives have become kind of small, so is our outlook and I think people are thinking more day to day than year to year right now.

MG: When is the expected assistance for those in the oil and gas sector sets to come? We've been talking about what's happening in Calgary and the fact that an economy there has taken a clobbering when it comes to the price of oil than this. Then there are other matters as well and people have been waiting for that. For people who are looking for that assistance, do we have any sense, Susan, as to when that might be coming?

SUSAN DELACOURT: I believe they keep saying every day that it's coming. Jason Kenney you saw made a really interesting announcement yesterday of getting the government involved in in the pipeline business as well, which is an ideological break for him, if nothing else. But I take it days, not today, maybe by the end of the week.

MG: What happens, part of this is about the opposition holding the government to account and, Aaron, where is the opposition in this? What's going on with Andrew Scheer, the latest on the race presumably to replace him? Peter Mackay was arguing that the leadership vote should proceed in June as planned. There was this image that was posted up on Twitter of some sort of rotary phone and will you answer the call? Where's the opposition in this?

AARON WHERRY: So the Conservative Party has effectively suspended their leadership campaign. And it's unclear at this point either when it or when it will restart or at what point will actually get around to picking a new leader. And I think that, you know, that just speaks to sort of the political moment we're in where it's very hard to have normal politics. I think to a certain extent, the Conservatives and the NDP found their their footing a little bit after the dispute last week in parliament over spending powers for the government. And I think they've been a bit more robust in their criticism of late. But it's it's a fairly limited field of criticism at this point, because there really isn't much debate over the fact that people need money. There isn't much debate over the fact that the government needs to assist numerous industries and individuals. And so I think that also speaks to the fact that that there is no I don't think there's a huge public appetite for political fights right now. I don't think the public is clamouring to hear their politicians arguing. They just want to hear people talk about solutions and what needs to be done.

MG: Shachi, what's your sense? Are voters pleased with what Ottawa is doing when it comes to how it's approaching this pandemic?

SHACHI KURL: So far, we've seen a couple of really remarkable things that both provincial and the settled different provincial governments and the federal government have been getting consistently good marks from Canadians on how they are perceived to be handling the crisis. We've also seen higher levels of trust in various institutions, whether it's the media or in public health officials, in numbers that we haven't seen in a long time. Canadians tend to be fairly sceptical and fairly fairly circumspect when it comes to giving either politicians or public institutions praise. But to Aaron's point, as this drags. On and it's going to last a while. I think we all know that there will be opportunities, I think, to hold governments to account. Not so much around, you know, well, the pandemic is bad. You're not doing enough to fix that. And more around the specific choices they are making, particularly, I go back to issues around testing. I go back to issues then also of service delivery. So making an announcement today around various rescue packages is not then the same as ensuring that the infrastructure is there to get that money out the door. And so are there enough people picking up the phone on service? Canada hotlines are websites enabled to to take on the influx that will come as people try to access help. And these are going to be the next judgement or decision points for Canadians as they decide, well, are my governments doing a good or a bad job dealing with this?

MG: Just briefly, Shachi, do you think that this will change the role the Canadians want their governments to play? This isn't big government. This is in some ways enormous confidence in flying people back who are stranded and in paying the wages of people who have been laid off. Do you think that this will change how we think of government in the future?

SHACHI KURL: I have to say, how can it not, at least in the short to medium term? But again, a matter of a month ago, we could not have fathomed any of this. We could not have fathomed the size of government, the size of deficits, the amount of spending and the amount of dependency we would have on government. And so this this is a situation in our lifetimes, Matt, without precedent. So you've got to go back to what, the flu pandemic of 102 years ago? Or the Second World War to truly get a grip on what is happening in our country today. I think in the short term, the idea and the rhetoric around small government is going to be one that Canadians will have less appetite for, but, you know, we tend to put things in the rear view pretty quickly as well.

MG: Susan, do you think that this, people are trying to game out in some ways how we'll be different when we come out of this. How do you think Canadians might be changed by this?

SUSAN DELACOURT: Yeah, I'm actually fascinated with this question. And I had, even before this hit and Shachi's right, the magnitude of this we could not have anticipated. But there were three big crises for the government. This government has been in crisis mode since the new year came. On the air crash in Tehran, on then the blockades, which we haven't even talked about in in a month, all the blockades across the country. There was an enormous demand from people to get the government involved, get the trains running on time. And I do think I agree with Shachi that this may be a real turning point that we've seen since the first since the 1980s when people wanted government out of their lives. I think people are now seeing the idea of of having government in your life and if that means that we stop calling citizens taxpayers, I will be enormously grateful.

MG: Aaron, briefly, do we come out of this a different country than how we entered this pandemic?

AARON WHERRY: Yeah, I'm sure we do. I think it's very hard to know exactly how, but there's no question that this has to given just for the size and the extent of change, the general sort of building of community, the role of government, all sorts of things like this are going to change. And I think it'll be interesting to see how that plays into how we move forward on something like climate change, where, you know, a month ago that was the biggest crisis in the world. You know, ultimately and it will still be the biggest crisis whenever we get out of this. But it will be interesting to see how the what's been done over the last, over these last two weeks and what will be done in the months ahead sort of plays into that going forward.

MG: Stay well, all of you and thanks for talking to us. We'll talk again.

SUSAN DELACOURT: Thanks.

SHACHI KURL: Thank you Matt.

MG: Susan Delacourt, national columnist for The Toronto Star. Shachi Kurl is executive director of the Angus Reid Institute. And Aaron Wherry is a senior writer with the CBC's Parliamentary Bureau.

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[Sound of trumpet]

MG: Like a lot of people, Sam Monckton isn't able to see her father right now. He's at the Haro Park seniors home in Vancouver, where dozens of residents have contracted COVID-19, including her dad. So she went to his window and played his trumpet.

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VOICE: The songs that I chose for my dad were Blue Moon because I used to play it when I was in high school all the time, much to his joy and irritation, depending on if I was in the house. And also By the Light of the Silvery Moon, because he used to sing that to me when I was like three or four, we would sing it together. And so I knew that one would be a good one for him too to listen to.

MG: And Sam says her trumpet serenade wasn't just for her dad to hear.

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VOICE: It was pretty amazing to be playing outside of his home because it not only gave him some joy, but it was clearly giving others joy. They were coming to their balconies and windows waving. I wasn't taking any requests, but they were still enjoying the music anyway. So that to me was like an added benefit, knowing that I was helping out others as well.

MG: Sam Monckton's father is blind and in bed with the coronavirus. But she says the nurses told her he had a big smile on his face while she played, and that was ultimately the point.

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VOICE: I really wanted to do this for my dad because right now, when being separated from him is short of just a little bit killing me and I wanted to connect with him, and music is the best way to do that. I feel like because when you're blind, you don't have a lot of senses left and I know that hearing music is one of his favourite things gets. He likes to sing and he always played piano and organ with us and so this was definitely the best way to connect with him.

MG: It's not just family on the outside trying to cheer up residents. Workers inside are doing their best in difficult situations to keep spirits high for seniors who are isolated and worried. Shannon Buell is a good activities director for the Carveth Care Centre in Gananoque Ontario. Shannon, good morning.

SHANNON BUELL: Good morning.

MG: You're doing a bunch of things. Let's start with the messages that you're sharing on Facebook. What's happening there?

SHANNON BUELL: Well, so we created this template and on the top of our template, it's about eleven by seventeen paper. It's says 'Together forever, never apart. Maybe in distance, but never in heart.' And we just asked the residents to write a note down to send to one of their family members, and then what we did is we took a picture of the residents holding their note and we posted on our Facebook page. And then that way families, friends, volunteers and community members were able to see these messages.

MG: What sort of response have you received to this? It's such a wonderful thing to.

SHANNON BUELL: Oh, overwhelming. We do have a sister home too, the Helen Henderson Care Centre, and they implemented the project on the same day as us. And we have had like I think Helen Hendersons had over 500 shares. We've had enormous positive response. And every day families are going on and they'll leave little messages. "Oh, I can't wait to see dad's picture." And so we are trying to get all the residents messages out there. So every week we about another 15, 20 and post them. But families are loving it.

MG: The other interesting thing that you've done is this music video. Can you explain what you did there?

SHANNON BUELL: So what the music video, what we did is we edited some music. So it started off with the song Can't Touch This, then it led into Stayin Alive, and then it ended off with Holding Out For a Hero. So we asked some residents if they want to participate in this video and we asked some staff. And so we played the video and we had residents holding signs with the first part. Can't touch. This is a sign that says "COVID, don't touch us." And then when we went into Stayin Alive is that their hope was Stayin Alive. And then at the end, the last sign was Khirbet Care Centre. Staff are heroes. So the residents and staff just dance down the hall and we videotaped it. And it was great because you can see some of the residents were just loving it. They were smiling and trying to dance and the stars. It gave everybody so much happiness that day.

MG: What are you hoping that activities like this will do for people who find themselves in a really scary situation?

SHANNON BUELL: Well, just after that day, like it was just great to go down the hall and hear the residents laughing, the staff laughing, during a very stressful time. And right now, that's what we need in here, because, I mean, staff are stressed, residents are stressed, and we just don't know what's going to happen. So to provide some happiness and some uplifting spirit to the home is just so important at this time. And we don't want the residents to be scared. We want to be there for them.

MG: What would you say to people who are separated from their loved ones in a home? They aren't sure how to stay connected. Maybe they're thinking, well, they'll go and play the trumpet out the window if if that works. What is it that they should be thinking about?

SHANNON BUELL: I think they should be reaching out to their recreation departments as well. 'Cause I know we are the ones that are implementing this virtual visits. So we've set up Skype and face time. We have families that e-mail us and we print off the e-mail and read it to their loved one. We're providing phone calls, setting up different times and going to the room with a particle phone and helping to make those calls. We have also had families arranging window visits. So we just make sure that that resident is at the window at certain hours. Yeah. Like we've had families come in and put posters on their loved ones window just reminding our loved one that they love them. Children from local schools bringing colourings and arts and crafts and taping it on the outside of the window. I think just yet, reaching out to the recreation department and just seeing what they're offering.

MG: Thanks for what you're doing and thanks for telling us about it.

SHANNON BUELL: Thank you.

MG: Shannon Buell is the activities director for the Carveth Care Centre in Gananoque, Ontario. We'd love to hear your stories of how you are trying to connect with people who you can't see face to face and can't give them the hug that you want to give. We got this note from Glen Muise Sydney, Nova Scotia. He writes, I was aware in January that this thing could get legs. I maxed my savings and purchased some equipment and I delivered yesterday to MacGilvary nursing home, a giant projection screen and HD predictor, a laptop with bluetooth speakers and this will allow residents to Skype families and watch drivei-n movies for those in wheelchairs. The 108 residents and staff can now plan a day and have some well-deserved smiles. I call it Operation Smile. Thank you Glen for that. How are you connecting with your elderly loved ones? What are you doing to stay connected? And as Shannon was saying, ensure that people's spirits are lifted during an anxious and difficult time. Send us an e-mail through the website. Go to cbc.ca/thecurrent. Click on the Contact link. cbc.ca/thecurrent. You can also search for us on Facebook or Twitter. We are @TheCurrent.CBC. People are doing the best that they can and then some in a difficult situation and that's good news. The CBC News is next. And then, it's a bit of a PSA renaissance. The public service announcement is making a comeback right now. Larry David of Curb Your Enthusiasm released one last night for residents in California, telling them in his typically crusty way to stay home. The ad guru, Terry O'Reilly will take us through the best and worst ones on COVID 19. That's coming up in about six minutes time on this extended edition of The Current, I'm Matt Galloway. Stay with us.

[Music]

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Under The Influence host Terry O'Reilly on making a pandemic PSA

Guests: Terry O’Reilly, Claire Atkin

MG: Good morning, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to an extended edition of The Current. Still to come, there is a need for ventilators, masks and other critical medical supplies. And Canada's procurement minister, Anita Anand, is in charge of getting them. She's my guest in half an hour. But first, very important public service announcement.

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[Clip of Public Service Announcement]

MG: Hold on a second, we aren't actually being interrupted, it's probably worth saying. There are a lot of very important messages being brought to you these days. You may have noticed that we're seeing and hearing lots of public service announcements (PSAs) around COVID-19 instructions on avoiding gathering in groups, how to wash your hands properly. We thought we would go to the expert on what makes an effective PSA. Terry O'Reilly is the host of Under the Influence right here on your CBC Radio. Terry, good morning.

TERRY O'REILLY: Good morning, Matt.

MG: How you holding up in all of this?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, we're holding up well.

MG: Well, is relative, I think.

TERRY O'REILLY: Yes.

MG: Before we get to the COVID-19 PSAs, if you take a look at the swath of history, as you often do on your great radio program, what makes for an effective public service announcement?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, it shares a lot of the same fundamentals as brand advertising in some ways, because it has to be a clear message. It has to be interesting and creative so it gets noticed. It has to have a call to action. But I think the fundamental difference between a brand commercial and a PSA is instead of selling a product, of course, you're selling an issue. You might be asking for awareness for an issue or donations or volunteer time. But probably the biggest difference is many PSA are trying to change behaviour. So in the past, you've seen PSA that tried to get us all to wear seat belts or to not drink and drive or to quit smoking. So it's a behavioural change, which is a huge task by the way.

MG: What are examples of a good PSA?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, the Advertising Council, which is really where PSA started, which we could get into if you want, which was in World War Two and then president of the United States gathered all the CEOs of all the major Madison Avenue ad agencies together. He summoned them to Washington to ask them that they would pool their resources to create wartime advertising. So they created the War Advertising Council and they created ads that, asked people to buy war bonds or to help with the rationing effort or to support the troops, et cetera. Then after the war, the president asked that council to stay together and do more public service messaging so that they dropped the war from the name became the AD Council. They created landmark campaigns, Matt like Smokey the Bear to prevent forest fire. This is your brain on drugs if you remember that great campaign, or just say no or the talking crash test dummies to promote seatbelt use in the mind is a terrible thing to waste. So they created those incredible landmark PSA campaigns.

MG: What about ones that did not work so well? They weren't as effective as perhaps people had hoped?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, probably one of the ones the ad council did that got a lot of pushback was 'just say no'. That was that Nancy Reagan initiative that a lot of people thought was too simplistic to work. And that was probably one of the ones of the many successful ones the ad council did. That probably was the weakest of them all.

MG: We're now in this, this feels like our own little edition of Under the Influence, which is quite exciting as well. But we're now in this era of the resurgence of the PSA, particularly when it comes to public health and the COVID-19 pandemic. Let's have a listen to some of the public service announcements that we're seeing and hearing. Here's one.

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VOICE 1: COVID-19, is a serious public health threat. All Canadians must act now to reduce the spread. Avoid crowded places and practice social distancing. Avoid non-essential travel and stay home as much as possible. Self-isolate. If you may have been exposed to COVID-19, stay connected with neighbours, friends and family. When you take care of yourself, you take care of others.

VOICE 2: A message from the Government of Canada.

MG: That's chief public health officer, Dr Theresa Tam, who has done a lot of work in trying to get people to modify their behaviour in the midst of this pandemic, how effective is that as a PSA?

TERRY O'REILLY: I think that's really good. I think the government has to strike a certain tone and that and Dr. Tam did it there, which is really important information, sober information, important information, because you want to hear in a time of crisis, you want to hear a calm voice, you want to hear experienced voices, and you want to know that they're the ones that have had their hands on the wheel. So I think that's exactly the tone for the government to strike.

MG: What do you understand about the psychology behind how PSA is mainly made more broadly? Just advertising changes our behaviour. Is it subconscious? Is it based on repetition? I've heard this a thousand times and so now I'm going to not touch my face or I'm going to buy this thing. Is that what it is?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, repetition is a huge part of marketing. And that's that's why you see ads so often. Because the rule of thumb in my industry, Matt, is you have to see something probably about 10 to 12 times before you actually register the message or actually act on it. So repetition's a huge part of it. The other part is the psychology of it. You need a great strategy, you know, underpinning a campaign. You have to know what that motivating triggers might be to get somebody to actually act on something, which usually means you need some emotion in the ads because emotion makes people act on something straight information they may intellectually understand, but they won't act on it. So there has to be an emotional element in great advertising.

MG: Advertising ends up often being focussed on a target audience. With a public service announcement. Your target audience is essentially everybody. How do you craft a message that resonates with as many people as possible, given how diverse this country is?

TERRY O'REILLY: So difficult to do, so difficult to do. That is the toughest part of a public service announcement is making it instead of just, you know, as you say, they're just tackling people 18 to 24, which are pretty easy to understand, you're talking about people from 12 to 80. So very difficult in the other. The other tripwire with a PSA, Matt, is sometimes it can be too effective, in other words. What I mean by that is you can be too horrifying. So there's an ad I see running on late-night television now for abused animals. And I can't look at it. I knew that I meet the screen. It's so heart wrenching that I can't look at it. So sometimes a public service announcement can be too good that people will be repulsed by it.

MG: And then that's not going to do anybody any benefit, because if people aren't watching it, they're not going to get the message?

TERRY O'REILLY: Exactly right. Even if the message is genuinely true, people won't watch it.

MG: All right. We have another PSA. Some people may recognize these voices. Let's have a listen.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: So I'm here to talk to you about social distancing. It means stay six feet away from another person.

VOICE 2: Now there's a scene in the movie Contagion about the tradition of hand-shaking. You extended your hand and showed the person you were meeting that you didn't have a weapon. Well, now the way we're living is like we're all carrying a weapon and we don't even know it.

VOICE 3: Here's something that we can all do to make a difference. Soap and water are all you need. Just get the temperature right.

MG: What are we hearing there Terry O'Reilly?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, I think that was a brilliant campaign. So those were the stars of the movie Contagion. So as we all know, Contagion kind of foretold the crisis we're in now. It's a jump from being, you know, number 343 on the rental list to number two. But taking the stars of that movie and giving them and assigning them each a role in this in the public service campaign, I thought was absolutely brilliant. I thought that was such a smart, smart idea, especially because we live in a celebrity-driven culture. So celebrities get instant attention.

MG: How effective are celebrity endorsements or participation when it comes to PSA? You could imagine. Yes, they get people's attention. They can also perhaps turn people off because they might be seen as is somebody who is taking advantage of a bad situation just to get themselves out in front of people.

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, I don't. I would think that most people don't think that that they're just trying to get attention. I think it's actually a good idea, because as I said earlier, they get a lot of attention. the tone they strike is interesting. So the contagion campaign from the contagion starts was very serious. Yet Ryan Reynolds and Seth Rogen have all done a campaign. I think maybe Prime Minister Trudeau asked them to get involved and they used humour, which is a very interesting choice in this crisis. But it's very much in keeping with their brands to use humour. So I actually thought that was effective too.

MG: So if it seems authentic, if it seems that a this is a celebrity, but also that they genuinely care about your well-being and our well-being together, that that's going to resonate, with people?

TERRY O'REILLY: I think so.

MG: We have one more for you. Have a listen to this.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: The bad news is that everyone is a potential victim, but the good news is that everyone is a potential solution. Sensitize the masses to sanitize. Keep a social distance and quarantine.

MG: Some music from Uganda. That's Bobby Wine in a new song called Coronavirus Alert. What do you make of that, Terry?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, there's there's a lot of ways to create a message. And culturally, every culture probably is more receptive to a different kind of message in Uganda. Maybe music is such a powerful force there. I saw a public service ad from India that used animation in a wildly humorous way for the coronavirus. So every culture has its own methods.

MG: Larry David, was one of the stars of Kerb Your Enthusiasm and one of the people who created Seinfeld, put out public service announcements last night, I think, for the state of California and it's entirely in character and it's funny because it's him and he doesn't really want to be there, but he's there. You wonder whether that is going to just amuse people or whether it's if he's going to do it and if he doesn't want to do it, but he's still doing it, that's enough for me to pay attention to.

TERRY O'REILLY: Yeah. And I think followers and fans of him will understand that point of view that he has and the attitude he has and that may make a difference with it with a whole swath of people.

MG: How do you make sure that people don't start to tune these messages out? This is going to be around us for a while. And these are important messages we appeal to here, but after a while, it could sound like background noise. How do you ensure that it doesn't?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, that is a very good question, because we are being inundated with messages now that the quick answer to that, Matt, is creativity. And that is really what when you see long-running campaigns for brands that have been around our lives forever, trying to refresh their message every year. I think that's going to have to happen here, too. Eventually, creativity will cut through that repetition will cut through the noise or cut through the disinterest. Well, we get to a certain point where we feel we've just been topped up on messages. It will then become a matter of creativity to breakthrough.

MG: What about advertising more broadly? There are brands, there are companies that need to make money. The economy has been turned inside out and upside down. And you could imagine that people are desperate. Companies, big or small, to try and figure out how to add something to the balance sheet. What do they need to keep in mind as they create ads for their products in the middle of a pandemic?

TERRY O'REILLY: Such a difficult time because it's very hard to have a profit agenda right now. You know, who I see doing it well are the car companies. For example, I saw a Chevrolet ad that's been running and it's offering people free OnStar service, which you usually would have to pay for monthly and free Wi-Fi hotspots in their car. And I saw Lincoln did an ad saying, we will come and drop when your car needs servicing. We will come to your home, take your car, leave you a loaner, and you don't even have to come out of the house. And I see car ad thinking there's no interest on car payments for eight years. So car companies are, I think, doing it right. They're giving something back while still advertising their service.

MG: What does that do in the minds of the consumer, whether it's somebody who's already in the pocket or somebody who, you know, at some point in time when the economy recovers might be looking to buy a car?

TERRY O'REILLY: Well, the hope, of course, is that they will remember that or have, you know, the way that psychology works in advertising is you don't you're not really aware. You walk up to a wall of canned peas and you pick out Green Giant, because all those, you know, ads you've seen over the years and they've had an effect on you, you become you know, you have a warm feeling towards that brand. And that's why you choose that brand. I think the same will hold true. Hopefully, that's the hope anyway for the car companies that, you know, you will remember what Chevrolet was saying to you in a time of crisis. You may not be able to articulate it, but you'll just have some warm feelings towards that brand.

MG: Let's end where we started. If you are a public health agency and you're looking to create a public service announcement right now to ensure that people pay attention to the important information that they need to know in the midst of this pandemic, what do you, Terry O'Reilly, offer as a word of advice?

TERRY O'REILLY: I think tone is everything. I think right now tone is everything. In other words, that has to be very serious and smart and it has we based in science. And I think time will tell depending on how long we all are self isolating. If it goes into June and July, the tone, may be able to switch a little bit and be a little less sombre then. But I think tone is everything.

MG: Terry, great to speak with you, as always.

TERRY O'REILLY: Thanks, Matt.

MG: Terry O'Reilly is the host of Under the Influence on CBC Radio. Rick Mercer has been in self isolation and the rant master is thinking about PSAs he wishes weren't necessary.

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VOICE 1: Normally when I'm doing a rant, I have a few rules. The first thing you need is a good cameraman and a great looking ally or a great looking cameraman and a good ally. Today I have not. Why? Because I like my cameraman. I like it very much. One of my favourite people. I like him so much. I don't want to be within six feet of him. I don't want to be in the same room with him. I want him to stay at. I'm healthy and go stir crazy just like the rest of us. And why am I not in my alley? Because there will be people there. And what will they be doing? They'll be doing what they're always doing, wandering around, enjoying the magnificent graffiti as if they were in an art gallery. Do you know what you don't do during a pandemic? Visit an art gallery. And I know technically not a gallery. It's an alley. Congratulations. You found yourself a loophole. People stop looking for loopholes. Stop ducking under the police tape. Stop hanging out on narrow pathways. Stop jogging in groups. Yesterday I saw a group of people walking down the street, passing around a joint. Seriously passing around a joint. Legal? Yes. Stupid big time. Yes. Why not just French? Kiss each other. Go home and catch your house on fire. And the neighbours house too. Normally it makes no sense to rant about something that almost everyone agrees with. And honestly, 95 percent of Canadians, they're all doing the right things. But some of us are bending the rules and it has to stop because it is through a loophole that the virus will get in. We can do this, but only together. All of us together. Flatten the curve, plug the holes.

MG: Thank you, Rick. Rick Mercer at home ranting. We've missed him. This is The Current on CBC Radio One. My name's Matt Galloway. While the advertising world works on PSA to prevent the spread of COVID-19, it's also grappling with darker consequences of this pandemic. Claire Aitken is a marketer based in Vancouver and the co-author of the advertising newsletter Branded. She has been watching how covered 19 coverage is influencing advertising. Claire, good morning.

CLAIRE ATKIN: Hi, good morning.

MG: You write about something called brand safety. What is that?

CLAIRE ATKIN: Right. So brand safety is about keeping your ads away from bad publishers. Now, to understand brand safety, you just have to understand two concepts. The first is that every website or video on the Internet that shows ads is making money from those ads. The second is that brands do not want to be called out publicly for having their ads fund bad things. Does that make sense?

MG: And so in this era, what are people thinking about when it comes to brand safety?

CLAIRE ATKIN: Well, brand safety technology was first adopted by marketers who wanted to keep their ads away from certain publishers, like really bad people, like people posting terrorist training videos or beheadings, TD banks did not want to have their ad budget funding ISIS. So they use this mix of technologies, one of which is called key words, blacklisting or blocklisting.

MG: And that does what?

CLAIRE ATKIN: Yeah, sure.I t looks at the content of the page to see if it contains certain keywords. If it comes across one of the key words that are on the blacklist, it will block the ad from appearing on that site.

MG: How many words are generally blacklisted or blocklisted?

CLAIRE ATKIN: OK, so these lists are getting longer and longer. They include words like blood, murder, shooting. They've started to include sort of controversial terms like lesbian trans and they've gotten to be as large as three and four thousand words long.

MG: And these are all things that the companies have determined that they don't want to be associated with, that they don't want to have their ad nearby?

CLAIRE ATKIN: Well, it's sort of become this misinterpretation of brand safety. You can imagine that this technology blocks Web pages when they contain certain words. That's a very different use case from a brand not wanting to fund bad publishers. And it's sort of been this this mis framing, this misunderstanding of what brand safety is really all about. And it's gotten that way because we don't have very other good tools to make this happen at scale, this at the scale of the Internet.

MG: So if an ad was being blacklisted, if I'm scrolling down through a news site, what would I see?

CLAIRE ATKIN: So it depends on which company is blocking the ads. So there's a few major ads sorry, brand safety technology companies out there. One of them is called Double Verify. And if they're blocking the ad, you'll see an illustration of clouds in the place where that ad will be if integral ad science is blocking the ad. You'll see an ad for Integral Ad Science.

MG: How is coronavirus impacting this practise of blacklisting or blocklisting?

CLAIRE ATKIN: OK. Right. So this problem has been increasing for a few years now. And coronavirus has sort of exploded the issue and made it really public somehow this year coronavirus, COVID-19 and any of its variations got put on the keyword list. And at a time when readership is way up, you would expect that with more eyeballs on the page that news revenues should be increasing, but the opposite has happened because of exactly that. News sources have actively then defunded.

MG: We've seen this The New York Times, there's been writing about this, The New York Times has seen a big jump, for example, in blocked ads. That's an example of this in terms of that phrase COVID-19 or the word coronavirus being on this list and therefore ads that would be nearby end up being blocked?

CLAIRE ATKIN: That's right. So we don't have like industry-wide data on that because it's a very obfuscated industry and statistics are hard to come by. But we know that one major advertiser came forward anonymously and and this is like a major advertiser. OK, so we're talking like a $200 million ad spend in a year and they've reported that roughly 36 percent of the ads that were meant to go to New York Times from their campaigns were blocked in March. To put that into perspective, in January, only 3 percent of their ads were blocked. So that's a massive jump.

MG: Is there nothing that a newspaper like The New York Times could do to ensure that those ads aren't blocked?

CLAIRE ATKIN: Well, that's a big question with programmatic ads like this. It's really up to the marketers and the ad tech to make that change. Advertisers. Sort of put newspapers in a rough place when it comes to their revenue, in fact, I would say that we are giving ad tech companies and specifically brand safety technology is way too much power when it comes to what is and is not getting advertising budget.

MG: Well I was going to say if this is really affecting the revenue of news organizations, who's pushing for this to happen? Is it the advertising companies or is it the brands themselves?

CLAIRE ATKIN: That's a really good question. The thing to remember is that the chain of custody between the marketer and the reader who ends up being the ad, the marketer and the publisher events is incredibly obscure. So sometimes the marketer can buy directly from the publisher. Sometimes they can use an ad agency. That ad agency will then use brand safety technology and then we'll buy from an ad exchange. That ad exchange can then buy from even more ad exchanges. And if you can imagine, sort of an unregulated version of the stock market, that's kind of what is happening in ad tech. So I would say the industry at large is responsible for that.

MG: So if these stories aren't going to go anywhere anytime soon and coverage of COVID-19 is going to be around for a long time, just briefly, what's the solution here to ensure that the coverage continues and those who are providing the coverage continue to get paid?

CLAIRE ATKIN: Sure. So at Branded my co-author and I are trying to encourage marketers to check their keywords blocklist to sort of demand to see what the ad agencies are doing. More importantly, they should white lists news organizations. They should make sure that even if they are using blockers they should make, they should ensure that their ads go to news. I would encourage marketers to buy directly from publishers again. I mean, this would save them money in the long term by cutting out the middle person and will keep their ads away from any embarrasing ad placements because newspapers are already really good at that.

MG: Claire, good to speak to you about this. Thank you.

CLAIRE ATKIN: Thanks very much.

MG: Claire Atkin is a marketer and the co-author of the advertising newsletter Branded. We were talking about public service announcements earlier in this half hour, heard a little bit of the coronavirus alert song from Bobby Wine, Ugandan singer-songwriter. It's a really good song. Hard to get out of your head. Bobi Wine will take us to the little newsbreak. In 90 seconds we'll be back. Tom Power is going to be interviewing Sir Patrick Stewart about Star Trek and about sonnets. That's on its way. This is The Current, an extended edition on CBC Radio One. Stay with us.

[Song: "Corona Virus Alert" by Bobi Wine]

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A conversation with Anita Anand, Canada’s Minister of Public Services and Procurement

Guests: Anita Anand

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current. Imagine writing a shopping list for the entire country. That list still includes necessities, except instead of bread and milk, your must-haves are critical medical supplies, things like ventilators, masks and hospital gowns.

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VOICE: We are working very hard to ensure that Canada receives the equipment that we need, both in the short term and in the medium term. We understand that countries around the world are takingtheir own approaches. We will continue to co-ordinate as much as possible, but every step of the way our priority will be ensuring that Canada is able to take care of its own.

MG: That's the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, outlining this country's medical shopping list. And that's up to my next guest to ensure that Canada is well stocked. Anita Anand is the Minister of Public Services and Procurement. Minister, good morning.

ANITA ANAND: Good morning, Matt.

MG: Many measures outlined by the prime minister have a very long lead time, and we know that everybody wants these supplies around the world. This is a global pandemic. And so, you know, competition, if I can put it that way for these supplies is intense. How can you reassure Canadians that there will actually be sufficient supplies, not in the long term, but in the next few days as this pandemic continues?

ANITA ANAND: Well, thanks so much for that great question, and I will say right off the top that we are seeing procurement being done in this country like it has never been done before. We are, as you said, working in a world of scarcity and high demand. And we have been on it not just in the last few days, but in the last weeks and months to ensure that we have the personal protective equipment and other equipment that Canadians need to fight this pandemic. And so this is a cross-government effort that we are banding together within the federal government and with the provinces to ensure that we have the goods and services that we need for Canadians in terms of specific items that you referred to and that the Prime Minister has discussed. We are sourcing ventilators and ninety five maths test kits, gloves, face shields, surgical masks, hand sanitizer, gowns, and we are procuring these items in vast quantities.

MG: Right, but as I said in the in the question, everybody wants these items. Everybody around the world. We're hearing reports that the United States, for example, is buying up much of the necessary PPE supplies that are out there. How can this government compete when it comes to getting those supplies against, for example, a massive country like the United States?

ANITA ANAND: Well, the as I said, the procurement process has been ongoing for the last weeks and months and we are also making large steps to ensure that Canadian industry is retooled, that we are able to rely on Canadian manufacturers to step up to the plate. So, for example, we have made significant buys on a wide range of goods, including one hundred and fifty seven million surgical masks, in part from Medacom in Point Clare, Quebec. We've also been assured of ventilators from Thornhill Medical and test kits, rapid test kits from Spartan in Ottawa. So this combination of international and domestic contracts is really key to making sure that Canada stands ready. And we are sourcing numerous contracts with these suppliers. And in addition, I will indicate that we have a government website buyandsell.gc.ca we've received 16,000 plus offers of support from suppliers within Canada and around the world who want to lend their hand to support this effort and so.

MG: I guess, the question is and I apologize for interrupting, but the question is really about timing. We're hearing in the conversations that we've had on this program in the last several weeks from frontline health care workers who worry that they will not get the equipment that they need in a timely fashion. Jane Philpott, the former Minister of Health, who's also a physician and is working now on the frontlines, wrote in Mclean's magazine, "I see political leaders working tirelessly to intensify the manufacturing and procurement of PPE, but on the ground, workers are nervous about whether it will get to them and whether their safety needs will be met." What do you say to those workers who are nervous now?

ANITA ANAND: I first of all say that I understand. I live in a riding that has the same type of concerns. And it's one of urgency. And we are acting with that urgency. We every day procure items for the broader Canadian public. Once we receive those items, they are then distributed to the provinces who then are charged with the responsibility to ensure that they get out to the health care centres. And so top of mind is this urgent need that we all hear every day to procure the PPE, get it to the provinces so that it can be distributed. And in order to make sure that that occurs efficiently and more streamlined fashion, I am coordinating with my provincial and territorial colleagues to make sure that the supplies are able to get out efficiently. And this is in the immediate term. I'm speaking with the procurement colleagues from the provinces and territories this week.

MG: When would people be able to see those shipments arrive?

ANITA ANAND: Deliveries are beginning. There's no question there's we are sourcing and obtaining goods from China as we speak. There's a flight in the air and so we are seeing the goods on the ground now and they are getting out to the provinces.

MG: You told reporters yesterday, you mentioned ventilators that the government is trying to purchase at least 4000 more ventilators. Does that suggest that we don't have enough ventilators now to deal with the projections of how bad this pandemic will come?

ANITA ANAND: I want you to remember a few stats that Dr. Theresa Tam from the Public Health Agency of Canada has already provided that. In Canada we have about 5000 ventilators at the current time. We are working with a number of suppliers to increase this capacity, including the Thornhill Medical, where we've ordered in total, including Thornhill, 1570 ventilators. We are working on procuring many more. And this is really to be ready for what we might face. We don't know as a country how this virus is going to affect regions and our entire population, but our approach and proper intent is to be overprepared. And so we are planning for all scenarios. And that is why we are taking an aggressive and proactive approach that I've been describing today.

MG: One of the areas that has come under greater scrutiny and some criticism is the area around testing. The Director-General of the World Health organization said that countries need to test, test, test. There are many countries that are doing this better than Canada. There has been a shortage of the reagents required for the testing, some of the other supplies as well. Whereas Canada, when it comes to procuring the amount of tests that we actually need so that we know how widespread this virus is in our population.

ANITA ANAND: Well, the first thing that I would say is that we are very excited to be working with a Canadian company, Spartan of Ottawa, that is making sure that we have rapid test kits that will enable us to test many more Canadians over and above the millions of tests that we have all ready ordered. And what this statement suggests is that there are different types of tests and we know that building up testing capacity is absolutely key to our response. And so we're working very closely with the Public Health Authority of Canada to evaluate new testing kits, to evaluate new technology that will increase our testing capacity and help mitigate the spread of COVID-19.

MG: When would those new testing kits be online? Again, we're trying to figure out where we're at when it comes to figuring out how how widespread the virus is. So when would those new testing kits that you're talking about be online?

ANITA ANAND: The contract is in place and we are expecting to see rapid test kits being produced very shortly.

MG: As companies get involved in this and they ramp up production., there will be presumably more and more workers working in close proximity than they would if they followed the directive to stay home. How do you ensure that people, you know, are involved in this important effort and are creating more of the supplies that we need, but are also safe in that creation?

ANITA ANAND: This is a very good question. And as I have four children myself who live in close proximity to us parents, it's a question that workers and families around our country are struggling with. And we need to remember the very basic guidelines that Prime Minister Trudeau tells us every day that Dr. Theresa Tam tells us every day that we need to practise physical distancing. We need to remain more than one meter apart from each other. And we need to make sure that we are only coming into close contact with people in the absolute essential circumstances that may present themselves, such as you discussed in your question when you are in the health care system. And that is why the safety and protection of our frontline health care professionals are front and centre in terms of priority and the distribution of personal protective equipment.

MG: And you're confident that that physical distancing can happen as those factories ramp up and more people, again, are at work and not at home?

ANITA ANAND: Across industry, we are seeing businesses refocus their efforts to make sure that they are able to practise physical distancing. Keeping two metres apart and we are working with our colleagues and industry to ensure that those guidelines are front and centre as industry ramps up and retool to produce the items that Canadians need to keep themselves safe on the front lines.

MG: You mentioned speaking with provinces. What's the one thing the province in provinces and I can put municipalities in there, say to you in terms of what they need. What's the, is there a headline in terms of what those municipalities and provinces say that they need right now?

ANITA ANAND: The items vary from region to region. As you can expect. We have seen that the virus is taking hold in different parts of our country at different times and that the issues that frontline health care workers are facing differ depending on the stage at which the disease is. The virus is hitting that particular region. I will say that masks have been at popular item on the procurement list of the provinces. And it's not just the N-95 masks, but surgical masks generally. And so our efforts have been to put to meet their needs regardless of what the ask is and we have also focused on masks in particular in our procurement orders.

MG: And just briefly, before I let you go, is there the sense, as you mentioned, that this is, if it's developing in different ways across the country at different times, is that the sense that provinces would be willing to share equipment, co-operate with, you know, who has more of something? I don't need this right now. You need this. We can get this to you and that could work in reverse as well. Is that happening?

ANITA ANAND: Most definitely, Matt. One of the most incredible things about the way in which our country is responding to this crisis is that there is a collaborative and cooperative tone and approach among all provincial and territorial jurisdictions with the federal government regularly. We are hearing of the ability and the willingness of provinces to co-operate with each other and the willingness to come to the table and to share resources. And so I must say, as a first time minister and politician, just having been elected on October 21st, 2019, that that has been a very heartening aspect of my job. We are all in this together. We are working hard and we have each other's back.

MG: Minister, stay safe and stay healthy. And good to talk to you. Thank you.

ANITA ANAND: You too, Matt. Thanks so much.

MG: Anita Anand is Canada's Minister of Public Services and Procurement.

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What would Jean-Luc Picard do about COVID-19? More than Trump and Boris, says Patrick Stewart

Guests: Tom Power, Sir Patrick Stewart

MG: This is an extended edition of The Current on CBC Radio One. My name's Matt Galloway and our pal Tom Power, host of Q is with us. Hello, Tom.

TOM POWER: Matt, are you a Star Trek kind of guy? Are you a trekkie or trekker?

MG: I'm more of a Star Wars man than a Star Trek man.

TOM POWER: You know, I got to go.

MG: It's nice talking to you, Tom. Tom Power is the host of Q on CBC Radio. You know I loved the initial series, as short as it was and I watched the movies and then I sort of lost interest and have watched it and appreciated it from a distance, if I can put it that way.

TOM POWER: I got to tell you, I'm not exactly wearing Spock ears here here either, but that didn't keep me from being excited to talk to Jean-Luc Picard, even though I know different series than Spock. You know, Sir Patrick Stewart, I got to talk to him. I think whether you like Star Trek or not, I think he had some interesting things to say about the world we're living in right now.

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TOM POWER: Hi, how are you?

PATRICK STEWART: Hello Tom. I'm fine, thank you very much. I'm happy to say that I'm well and doing my best to remain so.

TOM POWER: I'm happy to hear it. I see you've been busy bringing Shakespearean sonnets to the masses. Where did where did that idea come from?

PATRICK STEWART: It was never a plan. I was reciting a sonnet Shakespeares on it that I know by heart. The other evening to my wife and she said, that' so beautiful. Why don't you, let me record it and post that. And I said, oh people don't want to hear me doing a sonnet. So anyway, she persuaded me and I did. And it received such a delightful response from so many people. Then I began thinking, well, you know, so many of us are not at work, handicapped by this virus. And so many difficulties, maybe I could just, I don't know, I don't think anybody would want to watch, but I could just send out some sonnets. And it suddenly occurred to me that there was this little saying that my mother used to chant when I was a child, an apple a day keeps the doctor away. And I thought, well, what if I did this thing where I said, a sonnet today keeps the doctor away? It's silly and that's a little embarrassing, but anyway, so my plan is that I record and post one sonnet every day. And I started with Sonnet One and I'm at Seven coming up this morning. And I've been enjoying it very much.

TOM POWER: And that's just this beautiful. You also are also giving information like the information that Picard can be seen without subscription fees for the next month in the U.S. and Canada. Also, nice to give that information, I'm sure.

PATRICK STEWART: Isn't that great? I think it's wonderful of CBS to do that because. Of course our last episode of the first season aired last night. A very emotional experience it was too I found for both myself and my wife. But the whole five, six months that we were filming was a truly extraordinary experience and quite unique. Very, very different from Next Generation, which was exactly what I wanted. Not because I don't have great affection and love for next generation and for all those wonderful actors I worked with who have been my friends from day one of that show, but I wanted to look at something very different. If I were to take on board Star Trek Picard, I wanted a different man in a different world with a different set of values, perhaps, and indeed ourbrilliant team of writers came up with some extraordinary ideas. And so from the very beginning of the series, I was looking to play a man who was so different from the man that we had seen for those seven seasons back in the late 80s and early 90s.

TOM POWER: Well it was so nice to see you doing that as well. I want to play a clip because Picard is not only a great source of entertainment, which I think we all need these days, but in the long legacy of Star Trek mirroring our real world, it also touches on themes that seem pretty relevant today. Take a listen to this.

[Clip from Picard]

TOM POWER: That is a scene from the first episode of Picard where your character is asked by a reporter why he quit Starfleet, essentially the peacekeepers of the Galaxy. Are there some real world parallels there?

PATRICK STEWART: Oh, that's a very good question. You know, from the very beginning, from the original series with Bill Shatner and Leonard Nimoy, there has all been always been an underlying theme. In the first series, very modest reference to the world we're living in. There was not much of it in that first series, quite a bit more in Next Generation, and from about the fourth season on, the tone of Next Generation began to change and it took on issues that were problems in our daily 20th century life. And we all responded to that very strongly. And I had suggested that if ever there was a time when Star Trek might have something to say, or if not something to say, parallels to draw with the world that we find ourselves living in now because it's a very, very tough world indeed. And the character of the individual and the importance given to the individual and to society in general is a policy that you hear very little of these days. And Star Trek had always been broad and liberal and accepting. You know, the prime directive was observe that do not interfere and I always respected that. And so we've had situations and issues arise in this first season that I know will reflect times to anyone who's living in this very disturbing world that we're in right now. And I mean, in the broadest possible sense though, the whole international situation of refugees and how we help them. What can be done? What the whole attitude to endangered or even just unhappy people where they're living has to be addressed. And of course, the refugee problem, the Romulan refugee problem is one of the big storylines of this first season.

TOM POWER: Do you think that this current situation that in the world that we're in, like a pandemic that we're in right now, might seep its way into the storylines of Star Trek in the future?

PATRICK STEWART: Hi. I would not encourage that.

TOM POWER: No.

PATRICK STEWART: This is a disturbing and frightening and sad time for many thousands of people. And I feel I would feel uncomfortable if we were to make this a theme of the second season of Star Trek. It is too sensitive, too upsetting, too frightening, I think than some of the other issues that that we have dealt with, which are much more of a political nature. Although, of course, my word it is true to say that politics have even entered forcibly into the way the coronavirus epidemic has been handled.

TOM POWER: Speaking of it being political, I should mention that even though you're in Los Angeles right now, but I'm sure even paying attention to the news out of the U.K., where Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales, and Boris Johnson have both tested positive for COVID-19. Have you been in touch with your friends back home?

PATRICK STEWART: Friends and family, of course, most importantly, yes, I have. All my family, other than my wife and I are in the UK. But you just said something, which I cannot believe I have not heard. You say that the Prince of Wales was infected with the virus?

TOM POWER: The Prince of Wales has tested positive for COVID-19. Yes.

PATRICK STEWART: I had no idea. I'm embarrassed and shocked to hear that. And, well, I wish him well. I did hear the news this morning that our prime minister was now living with the virus and anyone in that situation must have one's sympathy. But it's there could not be a better way of saying that it has no respect for power when Prince of Wales and the prime minister can both be stricken like that. But they're public individuals. And I don't know how you carry out a public life, which they have to do and at the same time, protect yourself. I mean the prime minister cannot go into domestic lockdown like my wife and I have. We, I mean, apart from going out to exercise like I did this morning and I live in a very quiet neighbourhood, so it's very easy to avoid any sort of contact. But we are, no one has passed over our threshold for nearly three weeks, but my wife and myself.

TOM POWER: Science fiction often takes on the world's most pressing issues. I think a lot of us feel like we're in some sort of sci-fi futuristic movie right now as we deal with this pandemic, but what do you think Picard would be doing in this situation?

PATRICK STEWART: Well, Picard would have acted very much quicker than either the U.S. government or the U.K. government did, was that were good examples around the world of how best to handle this dangerous and difficult situation and it wasn't taken up. And I think that Picard would not have hesitated in finding, if not solutions, at least ways of minimizing the risk and the danger to individuals. It's all profoundly disconcerting and worrying. But little by little, there seems to be now a window that that could be help one to believe that the situation is now being handled as it should have been from the beginning and taken seriously and not just something to make political points with.

MG: Tom Power in conversation with Sir Patrick Stewart, a.k.a. Jean-Luc Picard. He is fantastic. Even if you're not a Star Trek fan, you cannot help but admire him and what he's done and the sonnets that he is bringing to these unsettling times. Well, coming up in our next half hour, a conversation with the best-selling historian Yuval Noah Harari, who's watching how technology is being used to track this pandemic. He is not sold on what he's seeing. We'll talk about why you don't have to choose between your privacy and your health and why he believes we will be different when we come out of this pandemic. He's coming up in about six minutes time. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current on CBC Radio One. Stick around.

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Historian Yuval Noah Harari says we can choose what the world looks like when the pandemic is over

Guests: Yuval Noah Harari

MG: Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and you're listening to The Current.

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MG: Still to come, Chad Kimball stars in Come From Away on Broadway. He has now contracted the coronavirus, but he's finding hope in these very strange times. We'll hear from him coming up in half an hour. But first, you know that old saying history repeats itself? Well it doesn't have to be that way.

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MG: Long before the outbreak of this new coronavirus, humans had some colourful theories about where pandemics came from. During the Black Death, many blamed God's wrath or malicious demons for their illness.

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VOICE 1: Another theory was that comets brought on the plague, so in effect, God would be acting through some kind of other object that would bring on the plague.

VOICE 2: Others were convinced that the Black Death rose from the depths of the earth, blaming the plague on earthquakes they believed unleashed deadly gases into the atmosphere.

MG: That's from an old documentary on the bubonic plague. Of course, we now know a lot more than we did in the 14th century, but that doesn't mean the past has nothing to teach us. Quite the opposite. In fact, Yuval Noah Harari is an historian and professor at the University of Jerusalem. He is the best-selling author of Sapiens and Homea Deus. His latest book is 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. Yuval Noah Harari, good morning.

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Hello. It's good to be here.

MG: It's great to have you. As I mentioned, we clearly know more now than we did way back then. But do you think we're handling this outbreak that much better than they used two centuries ago?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Oh, certainly we're in a much better situation than in the Middle Ages. At least we know what we are battling against. Given the Black Death people never understood, what caused the disease and how it can be stopped for us, it took just like two weeks to identify the virus causing this new disease, to sequence its entire genome and to develop reliable test kits. So at least we know what we are fighting and what is the best way to prevent the spread of the disease. Of course, we could have done more. If you look at things especially in, say, the United States right now, they had ample warning and they did almost nothing. And we are still quite far away from seeing the worst of this epidemic, but luckily, we are not in the Middle Ages.

MG: The U.S. president, Donald Trump, says if the death toll in the U.S. can be kept to 100 or 200,000 people, that would be a victory. What do you think of his analysis?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Oof, maybe you should ask an epidemiologist for their opinion, I'm not an expert on that, but it is a bit worrying that he considers 200,000 to 100,000 people dying as a kind of success. And you see that in China, you had the initial outbreak and they had no advance warning and they managed to contain it with far fewer deaths. So if the United States eventually has even a hundred thousand deaths, this is, I would say, a big disaster and something which is really inexcusable given the kind of technology and the kind of knowledge that we today have.

MG: Let's talk a little bit about the technology in that knowledge. What do you think the most important weapons societies have in fighting this pandemic? What is it that we have at our disposal?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Information. That obvious. I mean, the big advantage of humans over viruses, at least today, is that we can co-operate and we can enlighten each other. A virus in China, a virus in Canada cannot swap tips about how to infect humans. But a doctor in China can give a lot of valuable information to a doctor in Canada. And the Chinese government or the Korean government or the Taiwanese government can also give a lot of valuable advice, the kind of dilemmas that, say, Germany or Canada or the US are now facing and have been faced before like a month or two ago by other countries. So if we really make use of this human superpower to co-operate and exchange information, that's our best advantage over the viruses.

MG: You've said that the antidote to this epidemic will be cooperation, not segregation. Are you concerned when you see border restrictions put in place, for example, between countries in a sense of greater isolation, of people putting those lines up?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: No, I'm not against quarantine. We certainly need it. But even to have effective quarantine, the basis is information, because, you know, when you quarantine against different diseases, you need different strategies. You need to understand how the virus infects people. For example, with AIDS, there is no problem shaking hands or talking with somebody who has AIDS. You just need to be careful when if you have sex with them to use a condom. But with coronavirus, it's very different. So even if you want to have effective quarantine, the first step is to understand what you're facing and to have reliable information. And you know, we now have all these conspiracy theories going around. And I will tell people, if somebody tells you a conspiracy theory about the coronavirus, ask one question. Ask the person who is telling their conspiracy theory, one question. Please explain to me what is a virus and how does it cause disease? If the person can't give you a reasonable scientific explanation, just discount whatever else this person is saying.

MG: You've talked about trust and you've written about this and how we need trust. People need trust. These are your words in science. They need to be able to trust public authorities and to trust the media. Where are we at now? How would you evaluate our sense of trust in those institutions now?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Well, we are in a much better situation than, say, a century ago or a thousand years ago. People, despite all the recent anti-science rhetoric from populist politicians, we still have enormous trust in science and in the medical profession. Our heroes now are the medical personnel and our real superheroes are the scientists working on medicines and vaccines. You see that even religious establishments generally follow the advice of scientists. In Israel, they close down synagogues. In Iran, they punish people going to mosques because they're scientists said so. So there is much more trust in science than in any previous time in history. And that's very good. Unfortunately, in the last few years, we did see the rise of populist politicians who deliberately undermined trust in science, calling experts, an elite which is disconnected from the people and we shouldn't listen to them. And also undermining trust in reliable media outlets. I wish this was not the case because we are not paying the price for it. I think we could have responded better to this epidemic if we had more trust. But from a historical perspective, we are still in a good situation.

MG: Tell me more, though, about how you think we could have responded better to what was unfolding if to your point, the governments hadn't, been calling the media fake news, they hadn't been undermining science or even that idea of international cooperation.

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: I mean, it's very obvious, I mean, the epidemic started in China, you know, in January. And the Chinese took quite drastic measures to contain it, and neighbouring countries in East Asia, which had previous experience with SARS almost 20 years ago. They also took drastic measures quite early. And you see the number of people infected in South Korea, in Taiwan, in Japan. It's quite small countries in the west, in Europe, in North America, or are far more complacent. They didn't act fast enough, partly because they lacked the relevant historical experience so that they thought that 'maybe this can't happen to us'. Partly maybe it was out of political considerations fearing to harm the economy. But did the end result is that we have now the focus of the epidemic shifted from East Asia to west into Europe and to North America. And it's likely to shift again. I think we haven't seen the worst of it yet. I think the real big problem will be when this epidemic hits developing countries in Africa, in South America, in South Asia, which are even less prepared to deal with it than the countries in Europe and North America.

MG: We are, by nature a social species. We love to be around people. We talk to each other. We want to be gathering in groups. How long do you think countries can sustain having people locked down? This is there's no light at the end of the tunnel in many of these areas.

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Yes. That's a good question. It's a very important question, because this is not just about the viruses and about the economy. It's also about human psychology. And the problem with this virus and with many other viruses is that they actually used our best qualities against us. Humans are social animals. We have compassion when somebody, especially somebody who is dear to us like a family member, is sick. We don't shun them. We don't run away from them. We want to come and help them and even hug them and kiss them. And this is exactly what the virus is using against us in order to infect other people. So we need to, at least to some extent, to be smart and rational, act from the head and not from the heart and resist some of our best instincts. But this is very difficult. It has a lot of psychological toll. And, you know, thinking off of going like this for months, it's it's very, very difficult. I don't have a magic solution to offer you. I hope that we do develop medicines and vaccines as soon as possible. But also the quarantine measures, they are not meant to completely prevent the spread of the epidemic, but merely to slow it down so that the healthcare systems will be able to cope with it. And again, if you look at the best examples that we have, which is in East Asia at the moment, you see that eventually, it is possible to relax some of these quarantine measures and return some sense of normalcy to human life and human interaction.

MG: The measures are widespread and there are a number of different things being done all at the same time at a blinding speed in some areas to try and come to terms with this. And you've written that people are basically guinea pigs in some sort of social experiment that would have never been possible without this pandemic. What do you mean by that?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: We are now reluctantly, inevitably conducting immense social experiments on billions of people. So it's things like moving entire universities online. In my university, they have been discussing doing some courses online for, I don't know, 20 years now. And they never did anything. And now in one week, they move the entire university online because they had to. And this is basically a huge experiment. Nobody knows what the outcome will be. Some things are working well. Other things are not working so well. But whatever the results, when this is over, we probably won't go back to where we were half a year ago. Things will change. And it's the same you look at the universal basic income idea. So it's been going around for quite some time, but it wasn't implemented by any government, not on a large scale anyway. And now you see the US government, a conservative Republican administration, basically adopting universal basic income, at least for the duration of the crisis. The results of this experiment will change the economic and social system maybe for years to come. I think therefore, we should be very focussed not just on the epidemic itself, but also on the political situation, because in the next month or two, politicians are going to make extremely important decisions allocating billions and billions of dollars changing the basic rules of the job market, of the education system. Whatever comes after that, like if you're elected prime minister in 2021, it's like coming after the party is over. And the only thing you have left to do is to wash the dirty dishes. I mean, the big decisions will be taken in the next one, two, three months and they will shape the world for maybe a decade or many decades.

MG: What about the use of technology? We have been talking on this program and people have been talking around the world about and the way that technology could be used because so much data is collected on us everywhere we go, every time we turn the phone on to figure out where people are, how they're congregating, if they're congregating, where the virus might be spreading. And there has been a question as to whether we can have that information, which might lead to better health outcomes, but also privacy. Has privacy gone out the window in an epidemic like this?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: I hope not. I mean, I think one of the big problem is that people are presented with the wrong question, with the wrong choice. People are asked to choose. Do you want privacy or health? And obviously, in most cases, people will choose health. But it's wrong to frame the question like that. People can have both privacy and health. Yes, we need to use the new surveillance technology to fight the epidemic better. But it doesn't mean creating a totalitarian system or giving all the power to the government. There are many other things we can do. We can, for example, establish an agency which is not the governmental one, at least not the police, to track down and make use of this data and make sure that this data is only used to fight the epidemic. And other government agencies, especially security apparatus, cannot have access to this data. We can, of course, rely on the people themselves. Give the data to the people like alert me and not the police. If, for example, there is a change in my medical condition or if I'm around somebody with the Corona. We saw experiments with this also in democratic countries in East Asia. Again, we don't have to follow the Chinese example. There are other examples like Taiwan and South Korea, which did things quite differently and no less effectively. And most importantly, I think whenever you talk about surveillance, you should remember that surveillance can always go both ways. You can use it for the government to monitor the citizens, but you can also use it for the citizens to monitor the government. We need surveillance in times like this, not just to track sick people, but, for example, to see what the government is doing in this time of crisis, like allocating resources. In the US, they know just voted about a $2-trillion health package to the economy. And it's very important that ordinary citizens can easily see where the money's going. Who is the government? Which businesses the government decided to save and which businesses not? So yes, I am in favour of surveillance, but only if it goes both ways.

MG: This idea of a pandemic fast forwarding the historical process is fascinating because to your point in whether it's technology, whether it's the universal basic income or how we think of work, those decisions are being made and the rules are being rewritten as we go. How do you think we will look coming out of this? People can even see, as I said, the end of the tunnel. But when we get there, how different will we be?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: We'll be different. But it's not predetermined. It's up to us to decide. Again, we need to make decisions, but we shouldn't think that there is just one right answer. For instance, we need to decide between totalitarian surveillance and citizen empowerment. I hope we choose citizen empowerment, but I don't know. Similarly, if you look at the entire international system, we can choose to face this crisis with nationalist isolation, with countries fighting one another about access to medical equipment and things like that. Or you can deal with this epidemic by greater global solidarity, for instance, having global cooperation in the production and distribution of essential medical equipment. Make sure that the equipment goes to the countries that need it most and not to the richest countries. Now, this is a choice. It's not predetermined. I hope that we choose solidarity over egoism. But I don't know. It depends on the politician.

MG: Has history shown you that that's possible in crises past?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Certainly. You look at the two last big crisis we faced of this kind -- we had the Ebola crisis in 2014 and we had the global financial crisis of 2008 --in both these cases, the international community cooperated and succeeded in preventing the worst outcome. Ebola was contained and the worst fears will never materialize because countries from all over the world sent help to the most affected countries in West Africa. And with the global financial crisis, even though it was very severe, again, the worst outcomes were prevented because the major economies, the leading countries cooperated to formulate a global plan of action. And we can do it again. But for this, we need leadership and we'd need global solidarity. And so far, we haven't seen enough of it.

MG: You talked about the changes at your university and said that that's you think that they'll stick. You think that that kind of change in so many of us are working from home now. There are a lot of people who are trying to figure out what teaching is going to look like from home. Those are changes that aren't just going to exist within this window that we're in right now?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: I think things about some things will stay. It's impossible to tell in advance. Yeah. You know, universities suddenly discovered, 'Hey, you can do that.' And then they can make decisions like, 'OK, so now we can hire a faculty in India and pay a tenth of what we pay Canadian academics and they can teach online,' or they can decide that overseas students can be accepted, but they don't actually have to come to Toronto, Vancouver. They can stay where they are and just take courses online. Personally, I think these two decisions would be wrong decisions, dangerous decisions. Certainly in terms of students, part of the experience of going to university is the community. When I went to Oxford, meeting the other students and going clubbing in London was at least as important as going to the classes. And I don't want to see it disappear, but it could happen. We have to be aware that this crisis could change the face of education. The job market, everything.

MG: How are you coping with this?

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Me and my husband are in self-isolation in our house on the outskirts of Tel-Aviv, and we work harder than ever before. I mean our work is just via a phone like right now on the Internet. So other people are far having much, much worse because their livelihood is harmed, is at stake. Businesses are collapsing. So we can't complain, at least economically. We are fine. Of course, socially we also suffer from the isolation. We want to meet our friends, our family, and we can't. We can just talk with them on the phone. So I hope this is over soon. But I really hope that the Israeli government and government all over the world will do what is needed to help the people who are affected in the worst ways from this epidemic, both medically but also economically.

MG: Yuval Harari it's a real pleasure to talk to you. Stay well and be safe and thank you.

YUVAL NOAH HARARI: Thank you. You too.

MG: Yuval Noah Harari's newest book is 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. He was in Tel Aviv.

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MG: This is The Current on CBC Radio One. I'm Matt Galloway. Can we talk about Dolly Parton for a second? She's having a moment. She's the subject of a great podcast. It's called Dolly Parton's America. There was a Netflix documentary on her called Heartstrings. And now here she comes again with exactly what we need right now.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Hello, I'm Dolly Parton. The Book Lady from the Imagination Library. I want you to join me. April the second when I start Goodnight with Dolly. I'm going to be reading some stories from the Imagination Library.

MG: Yes, that's right. Starting tomorrow, Dolly Parton will read the Internet bedtime stories. Goodnight with Dolly. A ten book video series happening weekly. The first book is The Little Engine That Could. She says it was carefully chosen for this moment in time. We could all use more Dolly Parton at this moment in time. In the meantime, here's something else that was carefully chosen. This is Dolly Parton, "Two Doors Down."

[Song: "Two Doors Down" by Dolly Parton]

MG: Feel better? A little Dolly Parton. The CBC News update is next and then to wear a mask or not wear a mask? We'll look at some of the competing advice and the value of masks to protect you from COVID-19. It's coming up in 90 seconds. I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current and Dolly Parton on CBC Radio One.

[Music]

10

Come From Away star recovers from COVID-19

Guests: Tom Power, Chad Kimball

MG: Tom Power, host of Q is back. Perhaps with his cat.

TOM POWER: They say that neon lights are bright on?

MG: Broadway.

TOM POWER: On Broadway. My cat is nowhere nearby, though I'm terrified that he's going to start banging on his food bowl. But I'm here to talk to you about Broadway, Matt.

MG: All right.

TOM POWER: So I want to talk to you about Come From Away. Of course, you know, one of the biggest success stories in Canadian theatre history, telling the story of September 11th, tell the story of the planes being rerouted to Gander, Newfoundland. Have you seen the show, Matt?

MG: You know what? Of all the things I've seen, I've never seen Come From Away. I've seen people perform Come From Away in various things, but I've never actually seen the whole thing before and I've meant to and now I can't because Broadway's suspended and theatre everywhere around the world is on hold.

TOM POWER: In the words of the GooGoo Dolls, Broadway's dark tonight. But I got to talk to Chad Kimball, one of the stars of Come From Away. Matt, also one of the actors on Broadway who has contracted COVID-19.

MG: We heard that last week on the program. How's he doing?

TOM POWER: He's doing really well. He's feeling a lot better and he's also just incredibly optimistic. He's doing a fundraising campaign for hospitals in Seattle. And given that Come From Away is the spirit of a community coming together, he's found a way to take his own experience and really, I think, inspire people with it. Here's here's our conversation.

SOUNDCLIP

TOM POWER: Hi, Chad. How are you?

CHAD KIMBALL: Hi Tom, I'm doing a lot better than I was.

TOM POWER: Well, can you tell me about it?

CHAD KIMBALL: Yeah. You know, we went dark, like you said, about two weeks ago. It was a Thursday and my wife and I, we had been disinfecting and a hand sanitizing and we've been cordoned off part of our apartment for dropping things that came into the apartment that were that could possibly be infected. So we were following all protocols. And I was supposed to go to the Poconos and do a concert for a friend. It was cancelled, but we had already rented a car to go up there. And so we decided to go to Target in New Jersey. And on the way to Target, I started to not feel well. Started to get those flu like body aches that are all too familiar. We got to Target and I started to have a little bit of a dry cough. But that coupled with the body aches and what I had heard from the news, I didn't touch anything in Target. And so I went ahead and put on a mask. And the next day I went in for a test. My doctor said to come in because I had a fever and body aches were worse. I went in and got my test. And unfortunately, it took, you know, three days to get the positive result. But in that time, I did self isolate as much as they could here in the apartment. And then the COVID-19 coronavirus just kind of took its course. I kind of liken it to an indecisive kidnapper. You know, once you think you're free, it drags you back in. And the scariest part of it, though, is the feeling of of someone stepping on your chest and holding you down.

TOM POWER: I can't imagine how scary it also must be to see this thing on the news every day and feel it happening to you.

CHAD KIMBALL: Yeah. I mean, to be honest, I kind of felt special. I mean, wow. Not to not to make light of it, but this thing that we've all been looking at and just scared of and then to know that I have this thing inside of me kind of just felt like, wow, this is insane. I'm one of these people who've got this deadly disease.

TOM POWER: How are you feeling now?

CHAD KIMBALL: Well, now is actually my last day of quarantine. So I have been in this apartment for 14 days. Luckily, I had a wonderful dog and a wonderful, wonderful wife who has been an incredible nurse taking care of me. Later, I will venture out possibly to see the sky.

TOM POWER: I'm glad. I want to play a clip for you before we go. Take a listen to this.

[Clip of song from Come From Away]

TOM POWER: That is a clip of different actors from Come From Away and fans of Come From Away singing "Me In The Sky" from the show.

CHAD KIMBALL: It sounds familiar.

TOM POWER: Doesn't that sound beautiful? I was talking to David and Irene, the folks behind the show recently and you know, even, you know, even though that show's about something very different. It's about 9/11. It's about the response of Gander and humans taking care of one another. It still feels like such an appropriate show for people to be coming back to.

CHAD KIMBALL: You know, more than ever. It is so heartening to see so many people just coming together and maybe this disease is teaching us a little more about ourselves and not just being sick.

TOM POWER: Chad, I can't begin to tell you how grateful I am for your time, but most importantly, how happy I am that you're feeling better.

CHAD KIMBALL: Thank you, Tom. I really appreciate you guys having me on.

MG: That's Tom Power in conversation with Broadway actor Chad Kimball, one of the stars of Come From Away on Broadway, recovering now from the coronavirus. We will leave you today with some music from Come From Away. This is a tune called "Blankets and Bedding." I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current. Take care of yourself and we'll talk tomorrow.

[Song: "Blankets and Bedding" from Come From Away]

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Apr. 1, 2020 episode transcript

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