Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2021

The Current Transcript for May 25, 2021

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: There is a pattern and there is a culture of unacceptable actions in the military that have gone on for far too long. It is going to be a difficult process to transform its culture. But we know, everyone knows that it is time.

MATT GALLOWAY: The Canadian military has been shaken by a series of sexual harassment and assault allegations, many involving senior officers. As a second review of the armed forces by a former Supreme Court justice begins an exclusive interview this morning with the acting chief of the defence staff and the deputy minister for the Department of National Defence on whether it's possible to reform the culture of a Canadian institution. That's in just a moment. Also this morning, when he's not saving patients in the E.R., Vancouver Doctor Daniel Kalla writes thrillers and his latest is rather timely.

DANIEL KALLA: Free thinking doesn't apply to proven science, meaning gravity doesn't have two sides to the debate. Evolution isn't in doubt. And I don't feel vaccines are open to interpretation. They are really, our greatest weapon, we have in stopping this pandemic.

MG: In an hour, the doctor on vaccine hesitancy whether fiction can be stranger than truth in this pandemic and what our post-covid world might look like. We begin, though, with the Canadian military's me too moment. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

[Music: Theme]

Canada’s military needs a culture change to combat sexual harassment and assault allegations -Part 1

Guests: Lt-Gen Wayne Eyre, Jody Thomas

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: There is a pattern and there is a culture of unacceptable actions in the military that have gone on for far too long. It is going to be a difficult process to transform its culture. But we know, everyone knows that it is time.

MATT GALLOWAY: The Canadian military has been shaken by a series of sexual harassment and assault allegations, many involving senior officers. As a second review of the armed forces by a former Supreme Court justice begins an exclusive interview this morning with the acting chief of the defence staff and the deputy minister for the Department of National Defence on whether it's possible to reform the culture of a Canadian institution. That's in just a moment. Also this morning, when he's not saving patients in the E.R., Vancouver Doctor Daniel Kalla writes thrillers and his latest is rather timely.

DANIEL KALLA: Free thinking doesn't apply to proven science, meaning gravity doesn't have two sides to the debate. Evolution isn't in doubt. And I don't feel vaccines are open to interpretation. They are really, our greatest weapon, we have in stopping this pandemic.

MG: In an hour, the doctor on vaccine hesitancy whether fiction can be stranger than truth in this pandemic and what our post-covid world might look like. We begin, though, with the Canadian military's me too moment. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

[Music: Theme]

MG: Well, that pattern that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau referred to in the clip you just heard includes revelations of sexual misconduct at the highest ranks of the Canadian military, the former chief of defence staff who issued the order to stamp out sexual misconduct. His replacement, who lasted a little over a month in the job before allegations emerged about him, the military's head of personnel, the head of the vaccine task force, all accused of misconduct. Lieutenant General Wayne Eyre is the acting chief of the defence staff and Jody Thomas is the deputy minister for the Department of National Defence. Hello to you both.

BOTH: Matt, hello to you.

WAYNE EYRE: And thank you for the opportunity to be here with you.

MG: Lieutenant General, I think for a lot of Canadians, when they see the headlines of all of the senior military leaders and the allegations that are following of sexual harassment, sexual misconduct and sexual violence, it can really make your head spin. What is going on in the Canadian armed forces?

WE: Well, Matt, I've been asking myself the same question as well. And we're at this point where we're having a reckoning with our past. And the real tragedy here is we've got some alleged victims who have been carrying the weight of what happened some time ago and now feeling free to come forward, which is good to achieve some closure. So we're working our way through this. It's going to take some time to re-establish that trust and credibility with our people as we reconcile what has happened over the course of decades.

MG: We'll talk further about what's happened over the course of decades. Jody Thomas, several of these allegations came to light and people were removed from their positions after there were reports in the media. How many other investigations into senior military leaders are going on right now that we don't know about?

JODY THOMAS: That's a very good question. The NIS, the CFNIS is an independent police force and they don't inform me or the chief of the defence staff in most cases when someone is under investigation. They operate completely independently of us.

MG: And, just to be clear, explain what that body is?

JT: They're the investigative service, the police investigative service of the Canadian Armed Forces. And so a member of the Canadian Armed Forces can go to them, make a complaint. They will look at it and decide if they're going to investigate. And they have no obligation to tell us. And in fact, they would argue and quite correctly so, having the cases in the public domain impedes their ability to conduct an investigation in some cases. And so they work just as any police force does when somebody is being investigated, you often don't know, until charges are laid. And that is the premise they operate under.

MG: So just to be clear, we have no idea. You have no idea how many senior military leaders are being investigated for sexual misconduct right now?

JT: I do not

WE: If I could add, it's just so important that we protect the due process, the integrity of the investigation. That due process is both for the complainant and the alleged perpetrator so that the proper police integrity, the police investigation, can continue and the integrity of any judicial process can go ahead as well.

MG: I mean, the most recent certainly story in this vein that has surfaced is that of Major General Dany Fortin, who was recently removed from his post as the head of the vaccine task force. After that happened, the Globe and Mail reported that these allegations had been known about since March, but they were not immediately addressed because the military was dealing with so many other complaints. Is that the truth?

WE: So, Matt, I can't get into any details on any specific case. But I can tell you there's a number of factors that go into a decision whether or not to retain somebody in a position such as the severity of the allegations. The time elapsed since they were alleged to have happened, the separation between the alleged victim and the respondent, a workplace safety assessment which is conducted by the police, the integrity of the investigation and also of great importance are the views of the alleged victim. And do they want privacy or what degree of privacy do they want? Do they want this being dragged into the media where they could be potentially identified? These decisions they're not taken in isolation. And the views of other key stakeholders, especially outside, if it's outside of the department, are taken into consideration as well.

MG: But the allegation, again, in the Globe and Mail was that there were so many investigations underway that these issues around Major General Dany Fortin, these allegations couldn't be addressed because of a capacity issue. Is that the case that the military was so overwhelmed with other allegations that it couldn't investigate this allegation?

WE: So I wont speak to the specifics of any particular case, as I said. But the National Investigative Service takes every case seriously, prioritises them. Every investigation is different in terms of the numbers of individuals that have to be interviewed in the course of the investigation. But in terms of delaying this or any particular case, I cannot answer that on behalf of the police service.

MG: Government sources have told CBC that you did a risk analysis when it came to the situation of Dany Fortin. Did you know the substance of the allegation against him?

WE: So, again, I will speak in generalities and the factors that I mentioned, including a workplace safety assessment that the police conduct, all go into that decision calculus. And again, I will emphasise that the decision is not taken in isolation and key stakeholders are briefed and consulted.

MG: But you understand, again, there are questions as to whether senior military leaders knew of the substance of this allegation. You won't say whether you knew about the details of this or not.

WE: So as with any investigation as it's ongoing, I will not know the exact details. So those are not shared.

MG: Did you know the general nature of the details?

WE: I knew it was... ok, I'm not going to get into any specifics on this one, but in general terms, the general nature of the allegations will be briefed up if the police determine that that will not affect the integrity of the investigation.

MG: Are there other senior leaders that you have allowed to remain in their posts while under investigation?

WE: So I think it's important, again, to talk about the importance of respecting due process and the rule of law here as investigations unfold. We as a democracy absolutely have to protect that, not just for the alleged perpetrator, but for the victim as well, to make sure that we've got the right process in place to ensure the integrity of the investigation and any potential following judicial process.

MG: But is this not really about the integrity of the investigation, that if senior officers, despite these allegations and obviously respecting due process, but if senior officers are allowed to remain in their positions while perhaps investigations are unfolding behind the scenes, does that not question the integrity of the process itself?

WE: I would suggest not, as I mentioned, every investigation is going to be different. Sometimes the alleged respondent may not even know about the investigation, but these types of exact questions with respect to how investigations are conducted are probably best left to the National Investigative Service, who can explain in detail.

MG: This issue of integrity is really in many ways, and trust is at the heart of this matter. I mean, these concerns around sexual assault and sexual harassment in the military, you will know, are not new. Many people will remember the Maclean's cover story from 1998 that talked about rape in the military. There was a scathing report by former Supreme Court Justice Marie Deschamps six years ago that talked about this. What are you going to do now to finally address a problem that we in the general public certainly have known about for decades?

WE: So we have failed as an institution to properly address this over the course of the last few decades. We absolutely have to embrace external recommendations and not be defensive about this. We need to own this and view this as an opportunity to truly change our organisation. I tell you, with the threats out there in the international security environment, in the security environment writ large, if we don't change, if we don't ensure that we are ready for those threats, which means becoming an institution that can attract talent from all segments of Canadian society, wherever that talent may be, we are going to become irrelevant. And so the you know, I've said this before, this is an existential issue for the Canadian armed forces, because if we don't change of pace with the rest of society, we're going to become irrelevant for society and not be able to defend Canada as is our role.

MG: And so what are you going to do to address the issue?

WE: So we are approaching this, as I like to say, along two streams. So the first stream is the external, independent, comprehensive review of the board is going to bring in and have a good, solid look at our institutions. But at the same time, we have stood up another organisation, the chief of professional culture and conduct, to take more immediate steps in terms of looking at aspects of our culture, aligning our various internal organisations that are focussed on these issues. We have a number of stovepipes of excellence, if you will, that aren't properly aligned, integrated, including their data, including the reporting. So we need to, we need to get that very quickly squared away. But also we need it as a platform to be able to rapidly implement recommendations that come out from Madam Arbour as she gives us periodic monthly updates on things that we can more rapidly implement. We need to take a look, a real close look at our training, our leader selection, our leader development, our professional development writ large to ensure that we are getting to the right aspects of our culture, changed to address the exclusionary aspects of our culture that has harmed so many. To really make inclusion a part of, a part of our day to day life. I firmly believe that operational effectiveness is based on cohesion. Cohesion is based on teamwork. The face, the nature, the makeup of our teams are changing, especially as Canadian society changes. So we can no longer have a cookie cutter solution to dealing with the individuals on our various teams. We've got to treat them as individuals with their own unique backgrounds, skills, attributes, developmental needs, strengths and weaknesses. And as we treat them as individuals, they become much more willing to contribute. They need to have that full feeling of belonging, of being able to contribute to the mission, to be able to speak up and share their perspectives on what's going on. To speak up when they see something that is not right. It's just going to make us better.

MG: This is not certainly the first time that the military has tried to address this issue. Jody Thomas, Operation Honour was supposed to stamp out so-called inappropriate behaviour. The Department of National Defence recently shared new figures with parliament that showed there were 581 reports of sexual assault in the Canadian military over the last five years. This after Operation Honour. Why did Operation Honour fail so badly, do you think?

JT: I wouldn't characterise Operation Honour completely as a failure. Some things happened, the Sexual Misconduct Response Centre, which does really, really good work and is appreciated by the members of the Canadian armed forces, the civilian membership and some veterans who use it, it is a result of Op Honour. Increased reporting is a result of Op Honour. I think where Op Honour has lost its way is that the Deschamps report was not truly implemented. And I also think that it is now tainted by all of the cases that have come to light in the Deschamps report. I wasn't there when the report was received, but my observation would be that it was treated almost as a checklist. And I think it's time that we were just honest about that. It was not given the oversight it needed to be by the civilian part of the department, so my side of the department in terms of monitoring. And I think that as little was done as was possible to make it look like the report had been responded to without any real change, no structural change, no legislative change, no outside the department, outside the Canadian armed forces reporting those kinds of things that Madam Deschamps emphasised that said taking what exists and just moving it outside of the department won't fix some of the concerns. It won't fix concerns of reprisal. It won't fix some concerns with the chain of command still being involved. And that's what we are looking at going forward to ensure that victims of inappropriate behaviour, assault and harassment feel confident in the system.

MG: I just want to go back to the idea of it being a failure or not. I mean, if the operation was supposed to stamp out inappropriate behaviour and there are 581 more reports at least of sexual assault. Help me understand how that's not seen as a failure.

JT: Well, I would say that sexual assault is a societal problem and our responsibility is to ensure that we have a safe workplace for the civilians and the military members who work in the Department of National Defence, stamping out sexual harassment and sexual violence is the goal. It's not a failure if we don't absolutely get there, preventing it, ensuring that there are proper mechanisms when it happens and proper response, discipline and repercussions and responsibility for those who are perpetrators of it has to be part of this as well. It is absolutely the goal to stamp it out. Should be society's goal as well. It is something all aspects of society deal with. There's a greater responsibility, I think, in the Canadian armed forces because of what we ask people to do. And so you have to feel safe with your team-mates. You have to feel safe with that person on a ship with you. And so the consequences of sexual harassment, sexual violence are far more significant in the Canadian armed forces. This is a huge problem. And to think that Op Honour would be able to stamp it out in four or five years, may be too ambitious a goal. It doesn't mean that it isn't the goal we should be striving for.

MG: Wayne Eyre, you said something really interesting just a moment ago, when you're talking about addressing this and that was not being defensive, Louise Arbour, former Supreme Court justice, is taking on this new review. When I spoke with her recently on this program, she said that she was concerned about the culture of resistance in the military to oversight and appropriate accountability. What are you going to do to address that culture of resistance?

WE: So we've started already by making it very clear that we are going to welcome and embrace an external review of who we are. Our track record speaks for itself over the last quarter century and it's just not good. And so we need that external review to illuminate those areas that absolutely need attention and if an independent reporting mechanism, an oversight is the answer. Well, if that's what it's going to take to restore confidence not only amongst our members but with Canadians writ large will then so be it. We need to bring that in because it is so important to get right.

MG: But you can create structural change. And you've talked about those, the silos and the reporting mechanisms. But how do you create buy-in within the organisation itself so that people aren't defensive, so that people see that this is something that needs to be embraced, the change needs to be embraced.

WE: So I believe we need a fundamental shift in the frame that we look at this through. So instead of a compliance frame where we sink to the level of regulation, we need a commitment frame where we rise to our aspired values and weave them into our daily life and truly live them, including the inclusion piece I talked earlier about. I think that approach and incentivising that approach through leader selection, through what people are assessed on is going to be so important going forward.

MG: Jody Thomas, you said that the recommendations that came out of the Deschamps report in many ways ended up being treated like a checklist. How do you ensure that this is not a checklist? I mean, you've said that Louise Arbour's recommendations will be implemented. Why should people believe that if the last ones weren't.

JT: I understand the scepticism, so we encourage people like yourself, the members of the Canadian Armed Forces and the department parliamentarians, those we're accountable to, to call us on how we implement Madame Arbour's report. We've just received Justice Fish's mandatory review of the National Defence Act. We're working with him on how we will implement his recommendations. And that'll be a basis for much of what Madam Arbour does. We're still analysing his report, but we're doing it with him, as opposed to taking it and deciding what he said, what he meant and how we're going to do it. Madame Arbour was very clear in our many discussions with her leading up to the announcement that she wasn't going to take it on if we were not going to take it seriously. I would imagine she will be involved in the implementation, our implementation plan will be made public. Our results will be tabled and made public every year. And we expect Canadians to demand of us better and we will do better.

MG: I'm speaking with Jody Thomas, deputy minister for the Department of National Defence, and Lieutenant General Wayne Eyre, acting chief of the defence staff. We're going to pause here for the CBC News and then pick up this interview in six minutes to talk more about changing military culture and the military's response to covid-19. I'm Matt Galloway you're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One.

[Music: Theme]

Canada’s military needs a culture change to combat sexual harassment and assault allegations -Part 2

Guests: Lt-Gen Wayne Eyre, Jody Thomas

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

[Music: Theme]

MG: Still to come, what happens when an emergency room doctor is also the author of thrillers, Dr. Daniel Kalla is here to talk about his new novel, which deals with an epidemic of the future and the anti vaccine movement. That's coming up. But first, we're staying with the crisis in Canada's military.

[Music: Theme]

MG: We're back with Lieutenant General Wayne Eyre, the acting chief of the defence staff, and Jody Thomas, deputy minister for the Department of National Defence. If you missed the first part of our conversation about sexual assault in the military, you can find it on our website, cbc.ca/thecurrent. I want to pick up where we left off before the news talking about changing a culture and the difficulty in changing culture. There have been a number of reports over the years that have said that at the root of the problem we've been discussing is the military culture. I want you both to listen to Leah West. She was on this program a few weeks ago. She says she was sexually assaulted by a senior ranking officer while she was still in the military. And she spoke with us about that culture and how deep it goes.

LEAH WEST: You get rather desensitised to it when you're around it all of the time, you find yourself laughing along with the jokes. I remember being on training and there were people who are outside of the Royal Military College who were training with us. And one of the men was kind of speaking out in disgust over what was happening. And it was the first time I realised that I was laughing at jokes that were demeaning me and women, and it was just because I'd become so used to it. And what you become used to accepting. And when you start to accept that behaviour kind of intrinsically as kind of a coping mechanism, it becomes really hard to change it.

MG: Lieutenant General Wayne Eyre, you have served in the military for more than 30 years. Have you personally seen that culture that Leah West is describing?

WE: So what she talks about, the individual who stepped forward is exactly what we have to engender, having that psychological safety be able to put up your hand and say that is not right. That is what we have to change. And creating that sense of being able to speak up without repercussion. I question what I didn't see, I've reflected on this for a long time and I don't know what didn't register with me and those of my generation, myself included, now on top of this organisation, bear collective responsibility for not making this institution good enough. So we act. It's profoundly uncomfortable. It affects our collective sense of professional identity. Well, that degree of discomfort has to continue if we're going to make the change that is absolutely required. And we talked about culture change here, I got to emphasise that there are aspects of our culture that we do need to retain, aspects of our culture that involve leaving your families behind to go forth, to do good things for Canada and Canadians, especially in this period of the pandemic where the societal stress is so high, which is not lost or no different from our military families as well. But willing to leave your families behind to go help with doing such things as delivering and administering vaccinations in northern indigenous communities, in Manitoba or heading off overseas for the various missions that we continue to have our members in harm's way. Those aspects of selfless service, which is such a necessary part of our culture, has to remain. But the exclusionary aspects of our culture that absolutely have to be excised and removed.

MG: You'll forgive me for going back, though. You said something really interesting, which is that, you know, in the course of your career and in the generation that you are, that you don't know perhaps what you didn't recognise and what you didn't see. I mean, are there things when you look back at your career that you wish you had handled differently?

WE: So I wish I had asked more questions. I wish I was armed with some of the questions that I have now. To be able to better understand the climate and culture of the various organisations that I was part of.

MG: In addition to your role at the Department of National Defence, Jody Thomas, you have been a veteran of the Naval Reserve. You joined when you were, what, 17 years old.

JT: Yep.

MG: Does Leah West's description of the military culture ring true to you?

JT: It absolutely does. And Leah has been very generous in speaking to General Eyre and myself about her experiences and her view of how we can move forward. We've had a number of really courageous women talk to us. And I think one of the things that is the most striking about all of them is their willingness to work to make the institution better because they believe in it. What Dr. West described is the same environment I joined and I'm significantly older than her. I joined thirty five years ago. In the first year, women were allowed to go to sea in the Navy, and it was a small little group of naval reservists who are allowed to go to sea in what we're called hard sea trades. And I have in my time at Defence spoken about how much things have changed. I mean, every... there's not a job not open to women. And so that part's changed the integration, but not the inclusivity. And there is very much a sense of who is entitled to this institution and who is not. And there is a culture that festers of who's in and who's out and who is privileged and who is not. That manifests itself in the jokes and the behaviour that Dr. West describes and I think rose in violence up to the sexual assaults we've heard about. I think we have to stop hiding behind words like harmful and inappropriate sexual behaviour. It's inappropriate behaviour, period, or it's criminal activity and it's rape. And we have to start calling things what they are because that changes the culture. It's too easy to hide behind something like harmful behaviour. And I think that the difference between integration and exclusivity is something we really need to look at, because as a warrant officer told me, she wasn't ever physically attacked, she was never physically touched. But the daily struggle to be heard, to have a seat at the table, to be part of the team, to really be considered equal is exhausting. And I think the negativity of the culture that others have experienced up to criminal acts grows out of that sense of who's in and who's out.

MG: And so just to be clear, Wayne Eyre, in the 30 plus years that you have been in the military, given what Jody Thomas just described, you didn't see anything that would fall into that category. You didn't see anything that would fall into that range of inappropriate behaviour and more.

WE: And so, as I mentioned, I've been racking my brain, and it has not... I've questioned what I didn't see, I question what didn't register, and as I said earlier, I wish I'd been armed with the questions, with some of the sense and understanding that I have now.

MG: These are difficult questions, in part because in March, I spoke with Christine Wood, who's a former reservist, she was drugged and sexually assaulted by a former soldier. She said that she believed the military would be hard pressed to find a new chief of defence staff or a large number of senior leaders who didn't have some experience of sexual misconduct in their past. Given that and given what we have been talking about, why should Canadians trust that you're different.

WE: Well, I'll tell you that I'm not in love with this job and I will continue to serve as long as I think I can, I can contribute as long as the government has his confidence and more. And as long as the members of the armed forces have that confidence, we need to move forward. We need to lead our way forward to make this institution better. And that's what I'm striving to do each and every day to give back to this institution that has been so good to me.

MG: Why do you think that sexualised culture persists in the Canadian military despite all of the revelations over the years and the attempts to change it? What is it that people value about that?

WE: You know, that is a fantastic question that I don't have a complete answer for. I don't know, is it a question of power dynamics, that we need a much better understanding of, of the use and abuse of power? Is it the exclusionary aspects of parts of our culture that I've talked about before? I don't know.

MG: Jody Thomas?

JT: I think it's about power. I think it's about the abuse of authority. And I think that there are many officers, male officers and male leaders of all ranks in the Canadian armed forces who don't abuse their power. I think it is a small proportion. It is disproportionately weighted to senior officers right now in the media. And I understand why people would question men, senior leadership. They've just been around the longest. Everything that's been in the press has been historical, and that doesn't excuse it. I'm not excusing it at all. But I think that there is a large cadre of ethical officers, leaders, senior non-commissioned officers who are trying to do their best and they are evolving as society evolves. When I joined the military there were still nude calendars and nude photos on ships and in offices, that doesn't exist any longer, but it was certainly accepted as normal and you just put up with it. I think many officers have evolved as the institution has evolved. They understand jokes now that were appropriate and said 15, 20 years ago, no longer are. It doesn't mean that there aren't problems and it doesn't mean that there aren't situations we have to take seriously. We believe the complainant. We believe in due process for the respondents. That has to function in that manner. But there are a lot of very good people doing a lot of very difficult things, serving in the armed forces and as senior leaders in the department, because the department is not, is not excluded from poor behaviour. We've heard stories. So, there is lots to learn, and I think as has been described to us by a couple of people, including some academics, if you're in the environment and you're part of it, you don't even know what to look for, it's if you're not part of the environment, if you're not part of the majority, the mass, the leaders that you feel the otherness of not belonging, and you see what's inappropriate and you see that the joke isn't funny. And I think it is incumbent upon all of us to call out that behaviour. At the same time, I mentioned that to Madam Arbour and she said to me, "right then, every time you call it out, you're going to be told you're weak, you're too sensitive, you're thin skinned". So what we have to do is really change the institution and our approach to leadership and inclusivity.

MG: And are you confident that the institution can be reformed?

JT: I am. I believe in the Canadian Armed Forces and the Department of National Defence. I do. I think much work has to be done. I think the leadership team to do it is in place. The chief, the vice chief of the defence staff, all the senior leaders, my ADMs. Yes, I believe the right team is in place.

MG: Wayne Eyre what would you say to survivors of sexual assault whose trust in the military is broken right now?

WE: Personally, I would say I'm profoundly sorry. Secondly, I would say whatever we can do to support you, please ask. The care, the agency for victims has got to be our first consideration as we deal with these cases.

MG: And you're confident in the face of what we've been talking about, that the institution can be reformed?

WE: We're going to need help, and we've tried to do this ourselves for far too long, and so the outside expertise looking in to make us better, to make us relevant, to be an organisation that can address the challenges of the security environment. Yeah, we absolutely have to get better. We have to be seized with the imperative of doing this and not just seized at the top, seized at all levels in all parts of the institution.

MG: We know that the military in the midst of all of this has been playing a key number of roles during the pandemic. Jody Thomas, part of it is supporting long term care homes in the midst of the pandemic, providing field hospital support, military personnel being involved in vaccination campaigns. Is that a good use of the Canadian military or do you think?

JT: Well, I think the ability to step into any situation says something about the positive aspects of military culture and domestically, the military has always stepped in, in terms... in natural disasters. We see it in floods, we see it in forest fires. We see it in any number of situations when the government has decided this is what the Canadian armed forces should do. And there is a need and there is a gap. Absolutely, I think what the Canadian public doesn't know is they've seen northern communities, the Canadian armed forces, delivering supplies, administering vaccines. They've seen the long term care facilities, but they haven't seen the massive logistic support that has gone in assisting P-hack behind the scenes and looking at PPE distribution, vaccine distribution, all of those things. There's a massive team there because logistics experts and logistics expertise in the federal government does rest in the Canadian armed forces. So it's a national crisis. I think it is a very good use of the Canadian armed forces supporting this country.

MG: If a crisis were to develop overseas, given everything that the military is involved in right now, would it have the capacity to respond?

WE: That depends on the nature of the crisis. We have our high rating forces that we have continued to train, continue to ensure their readiness, despite all of the complications imposed by the pandemic. You recently saw an exercise, a larger scale exercise and Wainwright, Alberta, to ensure that readiness to respond to overseas contingencies. But we stand ready as well for domestic, further domestic emergencies with fires, floods, natural disasters. We've got units on standby across the country. Should they be necessary? So we can... despite the pandemic, despite everything else going on, we continue to be that force of last resort, that ultimate insurance policy for the people of Canada.

MG: Vaccines are top of mind for so many Canadians. And there is a new head of Canada's vaccine task force. What does Brigadier General Krista Brodie bring to this role, do you think?

WE: So I have served with her for 23 years and I'm the one that selected her for that position. I have absolute faith in her abilities to deliver, a very seasoned logistician. In fact, I was just chatting to her earlier on today about the role that she is going into. So the great thing about the military is there's not one of us who are irreplaceable. And so there is depth that we can continue to build upon to ensure that the operation continues to function.

MG: What do you love about I mean, you've been in this for thirty plus years, what do you love about being in the military?

WE: So I've got, I'm two weeks away from 37 years doing this, it has been absolutely fantastic with the best of days but at times the worst of days as well. But the opportunity to serve your country, to travel and serve around the world. I've been so fortunate to have some amazing experiences. But at the same time, be in places where I've seen the thin veneer of civilization ripped off and see some really ugly situations as well. So the ability to go forth, represent Canada, do great things for the country. It is just so rewarding.

MG: And so you started our conversation by saying that the armed forces are in the midst of a reckoning right now, 37 years in. Congratulations. How do you personally process that reckoning?

WE: I tell you, it's been difficult because it's an assault on one's professional identity to think that the organisation that one thought they were part of is, well there's aspects to it that you didn't completely understand. And so, you know, my personal view on this is, OK. It would be quite easy to retreat into retirement or advance forward and try to make a difference, understanding that I've got a diminished sense of moral legitimacy, given that I'm part of the generation and the generation that came before us, that didn't make necessary change. So we need to move forward. We need to see this as an opportunity and we need to make a difference.

MG: I hope we have the chance to talk again. In the meantime, I really appreciate you both taking time to speak with us today. Thank you very much.

WE: Thank you.

MG: Thank you.

JT: Thank you.

MG: Lieutenant General Wayne Eyre is the acting chief of the defence staff. Jody Thomas is the deputy minister for the Department of National Defence. If you have comments about what you have heard, let us know, especially if you are a serving member of the military or someone who has served in the armed forces. We would love to hear your reaction to what you've heard, what you're seeing unfold in the military and your own experience. You can send us an email. The email address is thecurrent@cbc.ca or on Twitter @thecurrentcbc or you can find us on Facebook.

[Music: Electronic music]

MG: You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One, my name is Matt Galloway. Speaking of your mail, we love to hear what you have to say about the stories on this programme. We heard from a few of you this week about your hopes and fears about what the prime minister has called a one dose summer. Before we get to those letters, though, we would like to talk about trees. Many of you wrote in with concerns about tree poaching and logging on Vancouver Island. The Current senior producer Karin Marley is here to help us sort through the mail. Karin, good morning.

KARIN MARLEY: Good morning, Matt. We'll start with Andrew Park. He's a professor at the University of Winnipeg and he wrote, The recent tree poaching on Vancouver Island isn't the first time trees have been logged illegally in B.C.. When I worked as a forest technician in B.C.'s North during the 1990s. I often came across old stumps and stands of supposedly virgin timber. Timber poaching, as far as I'm concerned, should be treated as a serious criminal offence with sentences to include jail time. But focussing on the relatively few trees that have been poached distracts from a more serious ecological issue. Old growth rain forests of B.C. are being logged far faster than they can be replaced and provide important habitat for thousands of species, not to mention massive stores of carbon acquired by the trees over hundreds of years.

MG: Here's one from Dan Bill from Kelowna, British Columbia, who says he has seen the waste that comes from logging. I spend hundreds of hours travelling back roads in the B.C. interior. Every year around every corner is another blank space where trees used to be. Thinking about a few individuals taking a tree from the woods would be preferred to those companies hauling lumber out of our forests. The piles of waste are often 30 to 40 feet tall by 40 to 60 across, and that lumber is simply burned. I'm also a builder, so I appreciate the need for logging. But like most things in Canada, we sell our raw materials to other countries that refine and sell it back to us at a small fortune. It is time to invest in creating ways to develop finished products here.

KARIN MARLEY: Laura Bonga from St. John says the solution starts with education in schools I tree planted for three years in New Brunswick and in British Columbia. What I witnessed as a tree planter was softwood monetisation. I saw entire old growth, massive yellow birch forests cut and left to rot just to be replaced with spruce. Forests surround us and add incredible value. Yet I only know a few people who could differentiate a spruce from a fir tree. When I was in school, I learnt next to nothing about our local environment, resources, consumerism, indigenous history and land conservation. But these are all things that could influence a more sustainable generation.

MG: We also had letters about what a one dose covid vaccine summer might look like. Gale Extence from the Rainbow Point Lodge in Perrault Falls, Ontario, writes, My husband and I have owned and operated a fishing, hunting and vacationing lodge in northwest Ontario for 38 years. This region has been totally forgotten throughout this pandemic. We and our neighbouring lodges, outfitters, fly-in businesses and stores all rely on the business of U.S. guests for our livelihood. Residents of Canada typically don't visit given our distance from populous areas or when they realise that we are more than a 20 hour drive away. Manitoba is our best bet geographically. But with the Ontario border closure and the Manitoba mandatory quarantine in place, it is currently impossible. A one shot summer amounts to nothing to any of us in tourism in northwest Ontario. For a second year, we may run at zero to five percent of our usual revenue. Many of our beautiful lodges will not survive without meaningful financial assistance.

KARIN MARLEY: Our last letter today is from Chad Vachon, who works in the restaurant industry in Toronto. This summer will be filled with unprotected exposure to covid-19 variants without my second dose of vaccine, a potential for making less than minimum wage and more abusive experiences from customers. Come mid-June, the restaurant/bartender job will be the only one where people will come face to face with hundreds of people all day without wearing masks. Yet I will wait until August to get my second dose. In the past year, we celebrated essential workers, yet ignored people such as restaurant workers.

MG: Thanks to all of you who wrote in to the program and thanks to Karin for helping us read through the mail. Karin, thank you very much.

KARIN MARLEY: You're welcome.

MG: Karin Marley, senior producer of The Current. Get in touch, we love to see and hear your comments. We read everything that you send us. And as I mentioned, some of those things end up on the radio. You can email us thecurrent@cbc.ca Or on Twitter @thecurrentcbc, or you can find us on Facebook. Coming up after your regional update, the dangers of vaccine hesitancy explored during a fictional pandemic dreamed up by a real life emergency room doctor. Dr. Daniel Kalla, author of medical thrillers, is with me in 90 seconds. I'm Matt Galloway you're listening to The Current.

ER physician Dr. Daniel Kalla on his new novel about vaccine hesitancy and misinformation

Guest: Daniel Kalla

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current. I think it's safe to say that we are living through a time that is both historic and tragic. Writers everywhere will be exploring this period with all of its drama and heartbreak for many years to come. Few of those writers, though, are both best selling novelists and emergency room physicians at the same time. Meet Daniel Kalla. When he's not writing novels, he is teaching medical students, treating patients and running the emergency department at Vancouver's St. Paul Hospital. His new and timely thriller is called Lost Immunity. Dr. Daniel Kalla is in Vancouver. Doctor, good morning.

DANIEL KALLA: Good morning, Matt.

MG: We spoke at the beginning of this pandemic and we were talking at that point about how the books that you'd previously written dealt with things like a pandemic and the Black Death and other things that, you know, perhaps at one point in time seemed far off and far fetched. Has truth been stranger than fiction for you this year, do you think?

DK: Absolutely. I mean, all those things came home to roost. But, you know, as you said in my latest book, I don't think I've ever had such a coincidental convergence of fiction and reality in one setting.

MG: How are you holding up after a year plus right in the cold face of this crisis?

DK: You know, it's been such a, it's been such a surreal year, you know, a year of highs and lows. And I think I'm holding up pretty well. There's been the kind of burnout phase. I think that everybody, you know, medical, nonmedical people have felt the grind of this pandemic. But on the other hand, you know, I've had a bit of renewed faith in medicine and some inspiration from so many colleagues for the battle that we've been through. So in a way, I've found I've been reenergized as an emergency doctor this year.

MG: I mean, there are a lot of us and we're not, you know, working in an emergency department who find ourselves unable, you know, to summon up the energy to go out for a run or a walk. We're just wiped out by this. How have you found time not just to work but live your life and also write a new book?

DK: Well, for me, it's essential, right? I needed an escape. It was a very intense year. And so the writing has provided the perfect outlet for me to vent, for me to release another part of my brain. So, actually never have my two careers been more complimentary than during the pandemic.

MG: Tell me about this new book. I mean, we don't want to give too much away, and it's not about covid-19, although covid-19 does surface in conversations in the novel. But this is about an outbreak and about a race to get a vaccine. The outbreak is of what?

DK: Yeah, so it's a book about this dreaded new strain of meningitis, meningococcal B, which is a very real and scary bacteria that rips through Seattle and it's targeting older children, killing some within hours. And there's this new, unproven vaccine that could be the city's only hope to escape this epidemic. And implementing the vaccination campaign falls to the chief public health officer of the city, Dr. Lisa Dyer, whose own family is anti-vax. But after a few people die after receiving the vaccine, Lisa suspects that sabotage, not science, is to blame that somebody might be tampering with it. But will she uncover the Trojan horse conspiracy before faith in the vaccine plummets and the epidemic spirals out of control?

MG: That's the thing that keeps us right on the edge of our seats, right to the end of the book.

DK: Thank you. And it truly is. I've never written a novel that's more of a cautionary tale than this one. And it's all about vaccine hesitancy and the dangers of what can happen when people do lose faith in the vaccine.

MG: Why would you think that in the middle of a public health crisis, people would want to read about a public health crisis?

DK: That's a great question. Well, A. because it's presented in a post covid world, which, you know, as I'm sure we'll talk about, I think we're nearing and they're using the lessons learnt from covid and the mistakes made from covid, during covid to inform their response. So I think people, a lot of reviewers and stuff I've already seen have mentioned that they like the fact that it's post covid but still deals with all the issues about covid.

MG: How did you settle on this strain of meningitis, that type B meningococcus, as the one disease that would threaten the community? I mean, there could be any number of things, but you settle on this.

DK: Well because it's one of the very scariest bacterias we know. It's basically the meningitis equivalent of flesh eating disease. It kills people often quicker than antibiotics can work to fight it off. And moreover, it tends to target young and teenagers and youths. And so that makes the stakes even higher. But most importantly, there's no real great vaccine against this particular bacteria, whereas we have lots of good vaccines against many other bacteria and viruses, as you know. So it just for me, it was the ideal vehicle killer. It's not the only killer in the book, but it's the ideal killer to set the stakes very high.

MG: How does the fact that it's, as you say, it hits hard on children and teenagers, how does that change how we think of disease spreading?

DK: Well, don't you think we've already seen it to a degree with covid? You know, at first it was tragic that covid was decimating the nursing homes. But I don't know about you. But amongst some of my friends and some of, especially laypeople I knew there was this attitude. Well, that's sad, but it's really them, you know, older people who are near the end anyway. And then as covid move towards affecting younger people and we started to know people personally who were in hospital, I had two friends in the ICU. It made it so much more immediate. It makes everyone feel even that much more vulnerable. So I think it's always scarier when a disease targets younger people than older.

MG: Personally, I mean, is that your biggest fear? Again, we want to believe that we would be equally concerned with anybody who gets this. But as parents, we often think differently when our kids could be in the crosshairs. Is that your biggest fear?

DK: Totally. I mean, I don't mean to minimise the tragedy of older patients and nursing home patients. It was devastating. But as you said, the worst fear in the world is losing your own kid to some kind of terrible incident or tragedy like this. And it really does up the stakes. And, you know, and for future pandemics, for instance, the Spanish flu tended to target younger, not older. That's what made it so horrible even compared to the current pandemic. I really think it does matter.

MG: Your central character, as you mentioned, is the public health officer in Seattle. What have we learnt about public health officials over the course of these last 14 months that perhaps we did not know or people more broadly did not appreciate before this pandemic?

DK: Yeah, isn't that incredible that so many of them have entered into the pop culture? You know, in D.C., Bonnie Henry has become famous and Theresa Tam in the country. It truly, you know, but they've also entered the spotlight and, you know, you see them being glorified and idealised one day and, you know, villainize the next. You know, I really think they are heroic and they're easy people to make protagonists in the novel because of that. But of course, they make mistakes, particularly in an evolving pandemic like covid, where we were literally learning information from one week to the next that often contradicted what we previously knew. So it makes the decision making so difficult and the stakes that they're deciding on, you know, not just about health, but about schools and businesses and they make such vital decisions. And, you know, we would be lost with a great public health response. And I have the utmost respect for them. And, you know, and I feel badly for the pressure that they're under. And I don't think any group has been more exhausted, but just the leaders of public health, but all the nurses who do the contact tracing and everybody, it has been an exhausting job for the last 15, 16 months.

MG: Tell me more about that and how you see how their role and in some ways, how we see them has changed. Because to your point, I mean, Bonnie Henry or Teresa Tam, Vera Etches or Dr. Deena Hinshaw all celebrated, lionised, put on, you know, a pedestal, shoes made after them early on in the pandemic. And that narrative changed, I mean, to different degrees, depending on where you happen to be in the country. But people ended up saying really awful things about many of those public health officials. How did you see that?

DK: I mean, I see it as very unfair. You know, they really do an impossible job at times and they have to, you know, there's no way they're going to please everybody. Often they're going to just anger everyone with the decisions they make. But they make decisions based on, you know, absolute science and statistics that matter when it seems like people said, well, we don't have that much covid we don't. But they were looking at the ICUs and they were projecting three weeks ahead. Our hospitals might be overwhelmed if we don't institute some lockdown measures. I think, you know, for the most part across Canada and in all the provinces, as best I can tell, they've done a really great job.

MG: How much of this book was written before covid emerged?

DK: That's the irony. Basically, the first draft was entirely written before covid emerged. And I finished it on basically the day that I heard about this new virus that was coming out of Wuhan, China. And then as subsequent rewrites came the second and third draft. I had to incorporate covid on the fly as it was evolving, but it just fit so organically. It made it, made the story so much more impactful. And, you know, I had to make some guesses about how successful the vaccine might or might not be, but to move it to a post covid world was easy. And as I said. And then they could use the experience and the mistakes that they made or lessons learnt, I wouldn't say mistakes that's not really fair, during covid. And it just made the story. It just added so much more flavour to the story.

MG: Why do you distinguish between the two lessons learnt and mistakes made?

DK: Well, because what looks in retrospect like mistakes were sound decisions based on the information we had at the time. You know, it's easy to look back and criticise, about everything. Why didn't we shut down travel? Why didn't we do X, Y and Z? Why didn't we put masks on right away? We just didn't know if the science was consistent at the beginning, it would have been easy. But it was... they were literally learning on the fly.

MG: I ask about the timing in part because, again, I mean, this is about a disease that is ripping through parts of the community, but it's also about the promise of vaccines and an experimental new vaccine in particular. What to you is so intriguing about that idea of a vaccine that could come to the rescue, having written this before we got into, you know, the current vaccine situation that we're in right now?

DK: Yeah, it's so ironic, Matt, that my publishers in Toronto, Simon & Schuster, we were having lunch. You know, I think about two, two and a half years ago talking about my next novel. And they were asking me what's the most hot button issue in medicine right now? And I said, without even thinking about it, I said, there's no more controversial or important issue than vaccines. And I was thinking at the time of how the measles was making a resurgence and, you know, how powerful the anti-vax movement had grown and what an impact it was making. And so even then, it seemed relevant and now it seems 100 times more relevant.

MG: You say in the bit after the book, in the epilogue. I mean, this is a sort of you speaking not as a novelist, but as a doctor, that you believe vaccines are one of the great, if not the greatest public health achievement in history.

DK: I totally support that. I would go further and say they are one of the greatest achievements in medical science, period.

MG: How then do you understand the anti-vax movement? I mean, it's clear that you very strongly disagree with them. But the way that you talk about them is really interesting. Through your characters but also, as I say, you at the end of the book speaking as a doctor. How do you understand that movement?

DK: Well, I understand it is a very heterogeneous movement. You know, when you talk about vaccine hesitancy, I think there's so many people who are legitimately anxious about vaccines, about the newness of them, about allergies, about the long term effects. And I think that's so legitimate. And I think those people are reachable. And that's where I make such an effort to you know, for us, I think it's our duty to show compassion, but also to try to influence them, to help them, to help society reach herd immunity. But on the fringe, you know, on the extreme of the vaccine hesitancy is the anti-vax movement. For them this is a religion. You know, this is pure tribalism and they're not reachable. They just want to hear how bad and dangerous vaccines are. And, you know, so I try to convey that in the novel, the sense that there is a bit of a spectrum, a big spectrum when it comes to vaccines. But it's... for them at this point, you know, after having had some feedback on a Globe and Mail op-ed I wrote a week ago, I think it's best quite frankly, to ignore the most strident voices, because my opinion, Matt, is that free thinking doesn't apply to proven science. I mean, gravity doesn't have two sides to the debate. You know, evolution isn't in doubt. And I don't feel vaccines are open to interpretation. As I said, they're amongst the most miraculous medical feats and they're really our greatest weapon we have in stopping this pandemic.

MG: Dr. Peter Hotez, who is a strong advocate for vaccines, he's developing a covid vaccine that his initiative will give away. They're working in the United States. He was on this program and he has described the most strident elements of the anti vaccine movement as comparable in some ways and should be treated in some ways like domestic terrorists are treated. Do you believe that?

DK: Well, to a degree, I actually compared them in the piece I referenced to the rioters on January 6th in the capital, because I think there's a lot of overlap in that group and they're both driven by a big lie. You know, the US has the Trump's big lie, the machination. But in the anti-vax movement, we have the big lie of that autism study that came out in the late 90s that has been so discredited and disproven and proven as fraud. But it just it literally launched the anti-vax movement into the stratosphere of social significance.

MG: That you say in the face of that, that in many ways that fringe should be ignored?

DK: I think so, because I don't think you can have a conversation with them. Right. And as I said, there's so many vaccine, hesitant people who legitimately have these concerns about proceeding with the vaccine. But I think if you can, first of all, you need to listen to them and hear what their worries are and you need to validate those concerns. But once you do, I think you can approach them with science and just show them the data. You know, to me, the most overwhelming unrefuted evidence is what's going on in Great Britain and Israel and other countries right now. I mean, Great Britain had sixteen hundred deaths a day in mid-January when they started the AstraZeneca campaign, much maligned AstraZeneca campaign. And now, as of May 3rd, they had a day without a single death in the country. I mean, to me that is beyond any success that anyone imagined with the vaccine.

MG: As a doctor, how do you talk to your patients about that? I mean, you talk about it in the book and, you know, whether it's dealing with the stigma around vaccine hesitancy and the suggestion that people might view them as far out in the field. But there's a compassion that you bring to this. And this is what you wrote about in the book. You wrote about it in that op ed as well. So as a doctor, how would you speak to your patients about hesitancy?

DK: Well, it's so important. And I think there's doctors all over the country every day having this conversation multiple, multiple times. I think the family doctors are doing a fantastic job. You listen first and you hear their concerns and then you present them with some truths and evidence and you debunk all the myths, all the ones that circulate on social media. I mean, it's easy to point to things like smallpox and polio and other horrible diseases that were completely basically eradicated by vaccines. And then talk about the current success of the covid vaccine. You know, to me, Matt, the Pfizer vaccine in particular, which has been given out to hundreds of millions of people without a single death directly attributable to it. And the success rate in the 90 percent, mid-90 percents is just astonishing. Nobody, I bet you even the scientists, Pfizer and everybody didn't have this kind of expectation of a performance for a vaccine like this.

MG: What about AstraZeneca? I mean, one of the things that comes out in this book is the importance of communication and accurate and timely communication about new vaccines. What do you make of how the federal government and public health agencies communicated information around the AstraZeneca vaccine?

DK: Yeah, I think it could have been done a lot better. I mean, I think that's one example. You know, you talk about you know, we talk about lessons learnt and mistakes because clearly it emerged that there was an incredibly rare, I mean, lightning strike rare, kind of side effect, but it was serious and tragic for the people that it affected. And I think the messaging was just inconsistent from various governments at the national and provincial level. And it scared people. And I imagine it had a bit of a detrimental effect because I think people should have understood how rare it was, but also that there was maybe a certain risk group of younger women or whatever where the risk to benefit ratio should have tilted, perhaps to the side of waiting for the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.

MG: And as a novelist, I mean, again, this comes out. What happens if you lose control of that message and the message gets overtaken?

DK: Exactly. That's when the conspiracy theories spin out of control. And then and that's what, you know, the extreme Anti-vaxers always point to. They find the one chink in the armour and say, look, this is what happens. This is... they're manipulating, they're lying to you. They're not being forthright with you when I think there's been incredible transparency about the vaccine rollout and the phase three testing and, you know, and all the reportable side effects and stuff. But if you do that, if you say contradictory things, it just stokes the fires of people who are dedicated to undermining this vaccine.

MG: How confident are you that these vaccines will be the key to get us out of this situation that we're in right now, that they will be the thing that will get us to the post pandemic world?

DK: You know, I don't think that the only thing, Matt. Like, obviously social distancing, you know, and all the restrictions that have been put in have made a difference. And the seasons, the fact that we're heading towards summer has made a difference. But they are the biggest things that have already gotten us out of. The vaccine, you know, because a lot of countries are a bit ahead of Canada. I mean, The U.S., which had such a difficult and I would say mismanagement of their pandemic. It's just the cases are melting away and the deaths are melting away there and that's almost exclusively because of the vaccine. So, yes, I'm fully confident. I see us in a post pandemic world sometime in 2021. I don't think we'll be in a post covid world. I think that's going to linger and we may or may not need booster shots and everything, but the kind of pandemic and the way it's paralysed the world and caused so much death and tragedy, I think is... I'm, maybe I'm on the optimistic side, but I see it soon.

MG: What would that post pandemic world look like?

DK: Yeah, it's interesting, you know, because as you know, I've written a lot about pandemics. I'm a big student of pandemics and life is always different after a pandemic and sometimes for the better. There would have been no renaissance without the Black Death. There would have been no Roaring Twenties without the Spanish flu. So I think there'll be sort of a celebratory, positive mood, but I think it'll be burned into our memories for all of us who are adults will take the memory of covid to our graves. And I think, you know, every time we get on a flight we’ll think twice. I think a lot of us will continue to wear masks for the rest of our lives on flights, or at least we'll be wiping down the seats and stuff. I think it's going to change our approach to communicable diseases and public health and who knows, maybe there'll be less flu seasons going forward because people will just be more careful.

MG: What do you hope, having seen, again, the, you know, the sharp edge of this in the emergency department, what do you hope we learn about public health and the importance... there was this idea that we're all in this together at the beginning of it, and that was proven not to be true, that many people disproportionately felt a greater weight of this. So what do you hope we've learnt from a public health perspective?

DK: I hope we've learnt to listen to the warning signs and to take it seriously. I hope, as you said, we've learnt a bit more compassion towards our fellow man. These pandemics, these tragedies and crises always disproportionately impact the lower socioeconomic groups. And certainly that's been incredibly true of covid. But I hope for a more... we've gained a bit of humanity by all the tragedy and suffering we've gone through and God willing, we'll be more prepared for the next pandemic. I think even amongst the medical community, I think we kind of dropped the ball a little bit because it's been so long since there's been a true I mean, we've had technically pandemics, but not the kind of pandemics that impact everyone's lives, like the Spanish flu. And now covid.

More humanity, I mean, what do you mean by that? We're human beings. You would think we would have all the humanity we need. But what would you want to see when it comes to more humanity?

DK: Well just some more kindness and compassion. I'm really worried Matt, that after this is all over that we're going to see a crisis of mental health. You know, I think PTSD, it's post-traumatic stress, right? You have to wait for the trauma to be over. And I think once the pandemic ends, I think a lot of people who've lost, you know, health, family, you know, suffered financially, I think the wounds will be more experienced. And I think it'll take a lot of support from friends and family and just the community at large to support the people afterwards.

MG: What are your colleagues saying about your writing? I mean, I'm assuming the doctors and nurses, nurse practitioners would be reading this and they know of the world that you're writing about. So what do they say about your work?

DK: Well, their biggest fear is that they're going to be included as a character in my novel and so once I dispelled that myth. For the most part, they're positive. You know, it is a thriller and it is fiction. But I really, really feel a responsibility and maybe never more so than this novel to get the science and the medicine right. I never mess around with that. I turn, you know, the chief public health officer in Vancouver, Patti Daly, I thank her in my book because she gave me such great insights into what a pandemic would look like and what an emergency vaccine rollout would look like. It's very important for me. I really make the effort to try to entertain, but to inform and potentially educate. And even my medical colleagues, they don't generally find, the nurses and doctors who read it, don't generally find fault with the writing. They think it's authentic. And so for the most part, they're supportive or they don't tell me.

MG: I'm not going to suggest that you're some sort of oracle, but you have been able to look around the corner a little bit with your writing and predict things that are coming like a pandemic, like an opioid crisis. So what horror awaits us down the road that you're getting set to write about now?

DK: Yeah, my next book is, you'll be relieved to know, is set in the most northern town in the Arctic, the most northern town in the world, really in Alaska. And it's about an epidemic of suicides. Speaking of mental health, that may or may not be suicide, it's a bit of a dark psychological thriller. But as I said, my biggest immediate worry is the mental health impact of what we've just gone through. And I think the world's in for a bit of an awakening on that front.

MG: What should we be doing to address that? Do you think? I mean, that's really scary to think about. And I think, you know, the word resilience gets tossed around a lot. But in some ways, people say that it's being used so that we don't have to address what's unfolding right now and what might be coming down the road.

DK: I'm sorry to answer that I have no idea what exactly we should be doing. But it just seems to me that staying connected I mean, we've been so disconnected the last 16 months, you know, living off zoom and now we're only just starting to see people again. And I think that's, I think human connection and support is going to be very important. I think loneliness has been epidemic during covid as well. And I think reaching out, especially when you suspect a friend or a loved one is suffering, is going to be very important.

MG: What are you most looking forward to when this is done and when we can put this to bed

DK: My very first concert, I go to or sports, you know, to be at a hockey game or to be at a concert, just to be, you know, what we all took so for granted for all of our lives and was taken away from us. I think that's for me.When I will feel like this pandemic is officially over.

MG: You wouldn't expect that reading about an epidemic in the middle of a pandemic would be a distraction. But I really enjoyed this book. And it's a real pleasure to talk to you again, Daniel. Thank you very much.

DK: Thank you so much.

MG: Dr. Daniel Kalla heads the emergency department at St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver. His new novel is Lost Immunity, a thriller. That is The Current for this Tuesday. Coming up next on CBC Radio One, it's Q. Over the next couple of weeks, the four remaining members of The Tragically Hip will be by to introduce songs from their brand new album called Saskadelphia. That's coming up on Q, which is next on Radio One. We're going to leave you with a taste of what's coming up tomorrow on The Current. You know his name already, I'm sure author Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie's new book is called Languages of Truth, and we will delve into it tomorrow. I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current and we'll talk to you tomorrow.

SALMAN RUSHDIE: I think writers are familiar with solitude because in order to write a book, you need to be good at being on your own. So I think maybe novelists have had some training in how to conduct yourself when you're by yourself. I just think the force of the event overwhelmed everybody and certainly for a while overwhelmed me. I was really not able to work very much. You know, also the other thing people said, oh, well, this must be a great time for you because you've got lots of time to write, you know? And I thought, yeah, you know, half a million people are dead. But it's a great time to be a novelist, you know? So it felt sort of like Wrong-headed, that idea.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

Tuesday May 25, 2021 Full Transcript

More Stories Like This