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The Current Transcript for January 21, 2022

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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SOUNDCLIP

This is going to be like World War Two style operation in scale and also in this brutality. Even though government said that such an operation couldn't deal at least 10000 casualties and date.

MATT GALLOWAY: much of the world is on edge watching Russia's actions at the border with Ukraine and wondering what's next. That tension is heightened within Canada's extensive Ukrainian diaspora in 30 minutes, what that community is watching for and what it wants from Canada. And we'll hear from the CBC's Briar Stewart, who's just back from the Ukrainian city of Donetsk, where conflict between the military and pro-Russian separatist forces has been simmering for years. Also this morning,

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There are people who are willing and wanting to work and be helpful to their communities who aren't being allowed to work and do what they are qualified and skilled at doing.

MG: There is a crisis in nursing as people burned out from the pandemic flee that profession. Now, some jurisdictions are drawing on a previously underutilised resource. Nurses trained abroad and living here in an hour. Why it's been so difficult for internationally educated nurses to be cleared for work in Canada and whether this crisis could change that for good. We start, though, with our series work in progress and how long COVID will change our workplaces. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

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How the lasting effects of COVID-19 are affecting survivor Jessica Sewell

Guests: Jessica Sewell, Simon Decary

MG: You know that catching COVID 19 could mean a mild flu or a trip to the hospital. It could mean you're off work for five days or a month, and it could mean feeling sick and staying home for much longer if you're unlucky enough to contract long COVID. Those who do deal with extreme fatigue, shortness of breath, brain fog and sometimes worse this week are a work in progress series is taking a look at the impact of long COVID on people and the places they work. Yesterday, we heard from Matthew Cardinal, a restaurant worker in Saskatchewan who is still feeling the effects after he was hospitalised last March. Today, we're continuing that series with Jessica Sewell story. Jessica was working as an administrative assistant in Burnaby, B.C., when she contracted COVID last May. Jessica, good morning.

JESSICA SEWELL: Good morning.

MG: Go back to when you got COVID there. Seven people in your home. Everyone tests positive. Everyone else recovers. What happened to you?

JESSICA SEWELL: We contracted COVID from somebody in our house who is an essential worker who works an essential job, brought it home. And for me, my actual acute illness was quite severe compared to everyone else's. I was completely bedbound the whole time. Just very, very ill. And then day 14 hits and I think, Oh OK, I'm able to get out of bed. This is nowhere near my my pre-COVID, but I'm, you know, out of bed. And then about three weeks after that, the long COVID set and that made the acute the acute infection seem sort of like a dream compared to the long COVID that set in three weeks later.

MG: What were the symptoms of the long COVID?

JESSICA SEWELL: So mile long COVID started out with an unexplained rashes and I was having rashes to hot water, so at first I thought it was kind of funny. I was like, Oh, now what? I'm allergic to water, ha ha. But then it started to progress into having near anaphylactic reactions to everything I would eat. It was very bizarre. I had no explanation for this. Then my heart rate started to get affected where my heart rate would just go up to astronomical amounts just by standing, it would go up to like 200 beats per minute, which is very dangerous, I found out. I was having dizzy spells, fainting spells. The littlest things would make me feel completely drained tremors. I was basically felt like The Walking Dead.

MG: Can I ask how old you were when, when all of this occurred?

JESSICA SEWELL: Yeah, I was 28 when I contracted COVID and I'm still at 28. I'll be 29 next month.

MG: And you're I mean, before all of this, just a healthy 28 year old.

JESSICA SEWELL: Yeah, very healthy. I love to work out. I love to be active with my two children. You know, I had a very normal life

MG: as all of this is unfolding. When did you feel like, you know, you should try to go back to work?

JESSICA SEWELL: So I went back initially that two week mark when I felt like I was kind of OK and then the long haul stuff set in and I kept pushing through. And, you know, my work is very supportive. They kept saying, You know, if you need to be off, be off. And I kept thinking, No, I had COVID. I don't have COVID anymore. I can't be off. What am I off for? So I kept pushing through, and then I actually went to a an appointment at the long haul COVID clinic, and they admitted me to hospital right from that appointment.

MG: They admitted you to hospital out of that appointment.

JESSICA SEWELL: Out of that appointment, yeah, I went right from that appointment to the hospital where I had a seven day stay. And at that point, I accepted that I needed to be off work.

MG: What did they say in that appointment that would lead you to go into hospital straight away?

JESSICA SEWELL: So my vitals were just very volatile. She could see what my heart rate was doing, and she could see what my blood pressure was doing. When I would stand, my blood pressure would drop so drastically that she didn't even feel comfortable with me actually walking over to the hospital, she said, You need a wheelchair like you, you're a fall risk. I don't know how you're standing with that blood pressure that you have right now.

MG: Can I go back to something that you said earlier you you tried to push through some of those symptoms? I mean, I think for a lot of us, maybe before the pandemic, you know, you little sniffle or cough or something like that, and we might think, well, well, I got to come into work. I mean, I'm not going to just staying home with it, you know, with a headache or a runny nose seems a bit silly. Why were you trying to push through?

JESSICA SEWELL: There's a sort of feeling of commitment that I have to my work and sort of that's how I've always lived. My life is there's an obstacle in my way, and if I just keep pushing and pushing, I will surpass this obstacle. So for me, going off work felt like defeat. So I kept going at it as if I. Just keep pushing, it will go away, and what I've learnt is this disease doesn't work like that. The more you push, the more it pushes back and and it always wins.

MG: Were you actually able to work when you were experiencing the symptoms that you were describing?

JESSICA SEWELL: So I was definitely trying. My work was suffering. My quality of work was suffering. So I've been on and off like I've been on medical leave and then kind of pushed back and then passed on medical leave and then pushed back. So, you know, it's been sort of a cycle of that.

MG: How does that work in terms of EI and disability payments? When you're on work and off work and on working off work, are you eligible for free or disability?

JESSICA SEWELL: So I am eligible. I did have benefits through my work that got me quite a few, you know, quite a bit there. This last leave, I did have to go on EI and actually that's another pain point for us. We are entitled to these benefits living in B.C., but it doesn't mean this is the last day I work and the next week I have a paycheque. You're looking at three to four months until you actually receive a payment due to different things. I mean, we had the floods in B.C., which also gave us a big backlog. So yeah, I actually have yet to receive a payment for this time that I was asked.

MG: So what does that mean financially if you don't mind me asking for the family?

JESSICA SEWELL: Yeah, I mean, it means we drained our savings. All of our savings were gone. And it's it does add an extra stress level into feeling like I need to go back. I need to go back.

MG: Can you tell me more about the emotional toll that all of this has taken on you?

JESSICA SEWELL: I would say probably for the first time in my life, I'm dealing with depression. I've been in counselling and they tell me, Well, yeah, no wonder you're depressed. It's, you know, you were young and healthy. You get this disease. And I think what is hardest about this is what you see in the news is you get COVID. And if you don't go on the ventilator and you're not in the hospital and you survive, you survive COVID, this is so exciting. This is great. And you kind of think that that's going to be your story. I had COVID and I survived and not even realising that this wasn't an option.

MG: What about your relationship with work? I mean, one of the things that you said earlier was that you kind of tried to smash through some of the symptoms because you felt like you would be defeated if you didn't get into work. Has this changed how you think about work and the relationship that you would have with work in your career?

JESSICA SEWELL: I mean, with regards to my career, this has changed my outlook on my career. You know, right before I got sick, I had a plan. I was going back to school to try to get into the projects side of my work and working on a promotion. And that just seemed so far off right now. I enjoyed being the person who, if you asked me to do a b c, you know you would get ABCDE for P plus more I wanted to give. That's what I like to be known for when it came to my career. And it's at the point now where if you asked me for ABC, I'm going to give everything to get you ABC, but it may only be AB, and that's very, very challenging to accept because, yeah, it's a change in your identity.

MG: Given everything that you've been through. What would you say to employers who might be dealing with workers who are going through what you're going through when it comes to long COVID?

JESSICA SEWELL: I would just say, you know, have empathy and understand that if your employee is at work and working through this, that may be the only thing they're going to do that day. They may be sacrificing going to their kids activity or taking a shower or having a home cooked meal for their family. We pick one thing a day and that's all our energy envelope allows. So if we're choosing being at work, just understand what we may be sacrificing. And I would say to lead with empathy, that would be my biggest advice.

MG: I'll let you go, take care of yourself and be, well, thank you.

JESSICA SEWELL: Thank you very much.

MG: Jessica Sewell was working as an administrative assistant in Burnaby, British Columbia, when she contracted COVID last May. Simon Decary has been listening in. He's a professor of rehabilitation at the University of Sherbrooke. He studies health and long term care needs of long COVID patients. Simon. Good morning to you.

SIMON DECARY: Good morning.

MG: How do the symptoms that Jessica just described compare with the patients that you've been studying?

SIMON DECARY: I would say that it's a standard profile. So as she described, it's very debilitating disease.

MG: Do we know what it is about COVID 19 that causes the kind of rollercoaster that she described?

SIMON DECARY: Being on the biological mechanism of long COVID is yet unknown, but if if we focus on the clinical symptoms that she's describing the relapsing remitting profile of the disease. So this is well known. This is most likely linked with one of the very particular symptoms of long COVID, which is post exertional malaise. And what this symptom does is that when the person does some kind of exertion level, let be physical exertion or cognitive exertion, this person will have a crash or relapse of all their symptoms of the disease. So this is what explaining the symptoms that she's describing.

MG: how many people from the cohort that you studied were actually able to get back to their jobs, given that ongoing series of symptoms that they're facing?

SIMON DECARY: Yeah. So we had the pilot study, a small study in Quebec that we started last year and at the end of our pilot trial. So we had only a third of patients that were able to go back to work. And this this was with this was followed by exposure to trained physical therapists and occupational therapists for a total of three month duration. So even with this, multidisciplinary professional support, return to work remains something very complex to operationalise for. For many of these patients. What we draw from this, this pilot trial is that the symptoms like positional malaise or tachycardia syndrome in many patients, they take more than three months, perhaps six nine 12 months, to recover. It's possible to recover from these symptoms so you cannot tackle returned to work the same way as other disease that that you can have rehabilitation protocol within 12 weeks. It doesn't work that way for for long COVID.

MG: Psychologically, what does that mean? I mean, there's a financial impact if you can't work for a long period of time and we've heard about that, but psychologically given for better or worse that so much of our identities get wrapped up in the jobs that we do and the satisfaction of being able to go out and do that job. What's the impact of that?

SIMON DECARY: Well, what we know from the science of returning to work is that the worst thing psychologically is consecutive fail of free to work. So the best way to address the possible psychological impact of returning to work is to ensure a successful condition for a flexible and progressive return to work. That's the best thing we can do right now to to anticipate these patients, given that we know we can't accelerate the natural recovery of the symptoms. And so this is where our thinking is around returning to work right now, flexible and progressive.

MG: What is the role of health care providers in helping people get the accommodations and the support that they need at work? Some people's employee or employers are very supportive of what they're able to do, but that may not be the case across the board. So what do you need from health care providers?

SIMON DECARY: Well, from health care provider, it is the recognition. So if the health care provider. Recognised the relapsing remitting cycle of this disease, they recognised the existence because right now we have many care provider that still don't know about this disease. So the recognition from a care professional of different symptoms, the different some diagnosis. It's really it's really support. That's the best way to support the patient because the patient is is in a better position to discuss accommodation with his employer. This is where we are right now, quite honestly at the scale of the problem. It's beginning to become a public health problem, and the Public Health Agency of Canada is really well aware of of this problem. The other great research team who are very knowledgeable of this, but it's it's building up to be something that we will need to address at the national level.

MG: You mentioned that some health care providers are starting to recognise those symptoms and acknowledge what's going on. That is not the case across the board. We spoke with a woman who worked at a bank in Toronto. We aren't naming her because of concerns that this would affect her employment, but she's had a very tough time with the insurance company and getting on so-called long term disability. Take a listen to what she's gone through

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Because I hadn't had a COVID test when my initial symptoms started and when I'm on the long COVID symptoms started, I did have a covid test negative, so there really wasn't any way to prove what was wrong with me. But it was really just the stress of knowing that my employer felt that I wasn't ill enough to be off when I couldn't even get out of bed. My doctor had tried her best to support me, but she wasn't able to provide the evidence that they needed. So I did have to go to first an employment lawyer to assist me with my relationship, with my work. Eventually, they referred me to a disability lawyer who was able to help me get the disability approved.

MG: Simon Decary. What do you make of that?

SIMON DECARY: Well, it's a common story also. So the story here is the proof of the COVID infection with the PCR test. And we know that from the beginning of the pandemic, that many patients did not have access to the PCR test that links the symptom to a biological disease, having the infection from from COVID 19. So so this is a very complex situation because in in the process of recognition from workplaces and insurance, they can ask from patient to to have some kind of proof medical proof let that be a blood test or an imaging tests. So many patients did not have PCR, so they are fighting for for recognition. We know from so when our patients were within a clinical trial, the clinical team take care of all their care process, and we had specialist coordinators that did only that for many patients. Some of them, we didn't add PCR tests. So it's common and it's a problem that we need to address right now. Why? Because because of the Omicron wave, we know that across Canada, the testing capacity in most provinces has collapsed. Many provinces and many other countries in the world are now moving to no testing or at home testing, which is not recognised right now as the standard of care. So we are entering this new era with many cases without PCR tests who are going to have a lot of difficulty to get recognition. The solution to that is to train more clinician in the clinical assessment of long COVID. So we know from international experience that it's quite possible with the new W.H.O. definition to diagnose, to clinically assess patient. Without the PCR test, there are profiled that that we can find with clinical assessment. But this needs more training to be able to do this job. So this is something very important we need to figure out in 2022.

MG: Just finally, I mean, you'd said that this could be a public health crisis. How much would it help if Canada recognised long COVID officially recognised it as a disability as a form of a disability?

SIMON DECARY: So the current state of affairs is that the Public Health Agency of Canada recognised the disease in July 2021. The next step is a recognition that the Ministry of Health level, which would support all the care process across. Insurance recognition. So I think this is where we are. So in the United States, approximately around the same time, President Biden also recognised the disease and it activates process so that long Covid is recognised as a possible long term disability condition. So this is the kind of action that needs national intervention, but this is where we need to go right now.

MG: Professor, it's great to speak with you about this. Thank you very much.

SIMON DECARY: Thank you very much.

MG: Bye bye. Simon Decary, Professor of Rehabilitation at the University of Sherbrooke. We'd love to hear from you. We asked this yesterday and got a lot of response, so I'll ask it again. Are you suffering from long COVID? Perhaps had COVID and the symptoms continue for weeks or months after you were initially diagnosed? And if so, how has that affected you when it comes to a return to work? Let us know. You can email us thecurrent@cbc.ca. Tweet us at The Current CBC or find us on Facebook or go to the website. cbc.ca/thecurrent. The CBC News is next. And then,

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I believe what's going to happen if Russia crosses the line is one of the biggest refugee crisis, with millions of Ukraine US fleeing west loss of guerrilla warfare action. So this is going to be a huge war, a bloody war.

MG: The prospect of a bloody war is becoming more real by the day in Ukraine in six minutes what it feels like to live less than two hours from the Russian border. Right now, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio one.

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Watching the developments between Russia and Ukraine

Guests: Briar Stewart, Alexandra Chyczij

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

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MG: Still to come, Canadian health care is in the midst of a staffing crunch and hundreds of internationally educated nurses could make a difference. But administrative red tape is getting in the way. In just under 30 minutes, we'll speak with people calling for changes when it comes to the registration system for those nurses. But first living under the threat of war.

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[Sound: Explosions and missiles]

MG: Those are the sounds of Russian troops taking part in tactical exercises in the disputed Donetsk region earlier this week. Approximately 100000 Russian troops are currently stationed along the Ukrainian border, and the threat of military escalation is very real. It's been eight years since the last time Russia invaded that region, and the people of Donetsk have been living in the middle of an armed conflict ever since. Donetsk is an industrial city of about a million residents on the eastern edge of Ukraine. CBC's Moscow correspondent Briar Stewart recently travelled to the area, and she joins me now. Briar, hello?

BRIAR STEWART: Hello.

MG: I want to talk about what you saw. But just first off, how difficult was it to even get in to this region?

BRIAR STEWART: Well, Matt, it was very difficult. I mean, this is an area that is under control by Russian backed separatists still at war with the Ukrainian military and the authorities there billed themselves as the Donetsk People's Republic. But they're unrecognised by most of the world, but you still have to get permission from them to go in there, and it's a multi-step process. You also have to be approved by the security services, and they rarely give permission to foreign media. CBC has applied a number of times in recent years. Canadian staff were always rejected were Russian speaking Russian employees. Russian citizens were free to come and visit. And so really, after several years of hearing, no, we were given the approval to go working alongside a local Ukrainian producer. And I have to say, Matt, that getting the approval was one thing. But actually getting across what they call the control line was a different matter altogether because you also had to get approval from the Ukrainian military. The Ukrainian security services that we got on a shuttle bus basically drove across a dirt road into some sort of no man's land. Then we were picked up by another shuttle bus and taken to the next side and the next checkpoints. And I think the whole process and all took about eight hours for us to make that crossing.

MG: Once you got there, what did you see? Was there evidence that the city has been able to rebuild since the fighting of 2014?

BRIAR STEWART: Certainly, the neighbourhoods that sustain the most damage that were the hardest hit, a lot of them still lying in ruin. Some of the early battles in the area were centred around the Donetsk airport. It's still destroyed. We couldn't get that close because we were told it was still a dangerous area. There are concerns, of course, about unexploded landmines, but we could see it at a distance and the buildings that were still standing were just completely charred. And in that area and around that area in the neighbourhood of October Sky, there are just blocks after blocks of houses that are empty. They are all in various state of of destruction. I mean, you have some houses that have gigantic holes in the walls. Others clearly have been shelled and have shrapnel marks on them. And people just fled in a hurry because they feared for their lives and in most cases, have decided not to return.

MG: I said in the introduction that the people there have been living in the midst of an armed conflict. I mean, what is the state of that ongoing conflict?

BRIAR STEWART: Well, it's still going on, and it's been eight years now. I mean, certainly the fighting is not as intense as it was early on back in 2014 and 2015, but it's still a war. You know, you have people that are still caught up in it, people being killed. And there are, you know, there's been numerous cease fires that have been negotiated and put in place, and you have a monitoring team from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe that monitors the situation there. And sometimes they report hundreds of ceasefire violations each week by both sides. And they have also voiced concern this monitoring team because there are a number of areas where they're not getting access to go into to look around. And that's mostly on the dinette side, some obviously the side that's run by the Russian backed separatists. And another big issue I should say for the security team is that they do a lot of their their surveillance, they're gathering with drones and with cameras. And they say whatever they fly these drones, they are frequently frequently jammed with electronic interference and in some cases they have their their drone shot down by soldiers on the ground.

MG: Given that this is a disputed area and given everything that you had to go through even to get into it once you were there, were you able to walk around freely and sort of just talk to people?

BRIAR STEWART: I would say we were basically free, but only up to a certain extent. I mean, the very first evening that we were there, we were assigned an escort from the security services. We were only given his first name, but he was accompanied us wherever we went when we were working. And this included in villages near the front line. I mean, there were some places where we were told we could not go. They were off limits. We were told that's because it was still dangerous. There was shelling going on. But of course, you know, we don't we don't know if that was the actual reason. But when it was when it came to speaking with people in the villages in the city of Donetsk, we could speak to whoever we liked. The escort was always there, always listening to the questions and listening to the answers. But I do have to say he never did intervene. The one area that we did not get access to and you could speak to people was anyone involved in the fight itself. We had made a request to see if we could see where the military is stationed. Perhaps they were doing some training and we were told that we just didn't have the right accreditation for that.

MG: Tell me about some of the people that you met.

BRIAR STEWART: Well, that first neighbourhood that we went into [unintelligible], I mean, it was absolutely deserted and we were driving down this snowy street and there was just this lone man walking down, carrying two buckets of what turned out to be food to feed some chickens. And his name was Mikhail Kravchuk, and he used to live in this neighbourhood and his house was still there. But he and his wife fled, and they are basically now living an apartment in the centre of Donetsk, and that's where we met up and chatted with them both.

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[Emotional foreign speech].

BRIAR STEWART: Well, Matt, that's Natalia Kravchuk speaking there. And you know, you can hear the emotion in her voice as soon as you ask her anything about the current situation. Really, the both of them, they they break down and you can tell that the pain for them is still so raw. You mean a little bit of bit of background with their situation. They were living in their family home. They had their whole three sons living in the same neighbourhood. You know, things were great. And then the war started and pretty much right away they had to flee from their house. They took cover in one of their son's basements. They lived there for a while. Then eventually they had to flee to Donetsk, and they had three sons. Their oldest son died while trying to flee one of the shelling. So I mean, it's been an extremely difficult eight years for them. And how we met Mikael, why he was in that neighbourhood in the first place is that he routinely comes back. He takes care of these chickens and a garden plot that he still has, but he's trying to make repairs to the home. He's trying to fix the roof that partially collapsed. He's trying to repair the windows, hoping that someday they can move back there. But the longer this goes on, the more doubtful he is that they'll be able to return.

MG: And do they have allegiances to one side or the other? I mean, again in this disputed region? Tell us more about that.

BRIAR STEWART: Yeah, and it's definitely complicated. But overall, I would say, you know, Mikhail kind of the more most forthright about that, and he would say he would side with Russia, but he would like to see Donetsk be independent, guided by Russia. That's how we kind of describe the arrangement he would like to see. But at the same time, they have very close connexions to Ukraine. His two sons and their grandchildren live in Kiev. They have other family living there. And as we visited their apartment, they had laid out this spread. They had baked a cake and made homemade vodka. And when we walked in, they said, Well, we want to show you some Ukrainian hospitality. So that kind of just speaks to just how complicated that situation is and where allegiances lie, because on the one hand, he was talking about how he would like this closer relationship with Russia. And on the other hand, talking about Ukrainian hospitality,

MG: you talked about the restrictions you were under in terms of where you could and couldn't go. What about for people who live in Donetsk? Is it easy for them to come and go over that control line?

BRIAR STEWART: It's very difficult, and it has become more difficult because of COVID. To begin with, any time someone was going to come and go, you had to get all the permissions that we had to get. And of course, people are under more scrutiny. And we were told by some people who didn't want to speak with us on camera that for young people, particularly young men, they face a lot of questions if they are looking to leave Donetsk. The other thing which is an issue for everybody around the world when it comes to freedom of movement is COVID. But it's made the situation there that much worse because you have these checkpoints that people have to go through, and some of them have partially closed during COVID. And the barrier for getting permission to leave, you know, became that much, much higher. So the monitoring people put out a report looking at this whole issue. And back in 2019, they said there were almost eight million crossings in and out a year. And in 2021, between January and September, there were twenty eight thousand. So just significantly less so. You do have people that feel like they are cut off. And in some extraordinary cases, you have people living in Donetsk who need to get to Ukraine so badly, need to see family or need to see a doctor that they go west or so they go east. Rather, they keep going east and they go through Russia and then back through Europe and around again, of course, at a great time and expense to do that.

MG: You spoke with with the head of state of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic. What did he tell you about the situation there?

BRIAR STEWART: That's right, and his name is Dennis Chauhan. And of course, we asked him about Russia's involvement about Russian support with the Russian weapons on the ground. Were there Russian troops? He denied all of that, saying that all they get is political support and humanitarian assistance. But when we asked him about the future of the region, he said that he really wanted and that's to go the way of Crimea. And what he was referring to was he wanted to see some kind of referendum like the referendum held back in Crimea in 2014. But of course, that's a referendum that is disputed. Most of the world doesn't recognise it. You know, instead, it's it's recognised that Russia annexed and occupied Crimea. But it was interesting to hear him say that he wished that Donetsk would formally become a part of Russia.

MG: The future is embodied in those young people that you mentioned when you spoke with young people in the region. What did they say about what they're looking for?

BRIAR STEWART: Yeah. And we really wanted to speak to young people just about the future and how they're managing with the situation. And I should say that in Donetsk itself, four days a week, there's a curfew and that's lifted on the weekends. So we were there over weekends, so we thought it would be. Great opportunity to go out to a bar where young people hang out and and speak with people. And we met a young woman named Juliana. Take a listen.

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[Foreign speech]

MG: Now me stress that the mood summer would not breach the commitments within the day that you were my bourbon at Miramar Stadium once it was clear. Now what she's talking about there is how she feels that there really are no opportunities in Donetsk, and she wants to leave, probably in the next couple of years. She works for a Russian company. She has dreams of moving to Moscow, and she feels like she's in a situation where Donetsk is is not recognised as an independent republic, so she feels like she's cut off from the rest of the world. And she says it's a tough situation to be in and that most people who have opportunities elsewhere who can they would leave if they could.

MG: This is a city that has already lived through these grinding years of war. And I mean, right now there's this diplomatic frenzy Russian and U.S. foreign diplomats have been meeting today. They're going to meet again next month. Are people there resigned to this conflict continuing? Are they are they concerned that things could escalate given everything that is happening around them right now?

BRIAR STEWART: Resigned is a good way of putting it, because nobody we talked to thought that this conflict was going to end any time soon. And they said it's basically become a backdrop of their lives and and they can just see it continuing as far as the escalation goes. No one that we spoke to was too panicked by the prospect of an invasion. They were all expressed doubt that Russia would move to invade. But at the same time, they didn't. They didn't see, you know, any situation where there would be a peaceful resolution soon. And you know, I think maybe the clearest answer we got around that was when we talked to Mikhail because he was trying to rebuild his house. And originally he and his wife were hoping to move back into their their war torn neighbourhood this summer. But because of the talk of the troop build-up and you know, the uncertainty ahead. He doesn't think they're going to be able to move back in prior.

MG: This has been great. Thank you very much.

BRIAR STEWART: You're welcome.

MG: Briar Stewart is CBC's Moscow correspondent. Ukrainian Canadians make up one of the largest ethnic communities in Canada, and many, as you can imagine, have been watching developments between Russia and Ukraine very closely. Alexandra Chyczij is the national president of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. She joins us now. Alexandra, good morning to you.

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Good morning, Matt.

MG: What's it like for you and other Ukrainian Canadians watching these tensions grow between Russia and Ukraine?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Well, Matt, this is a very real war for our community. We have many recent immigrants from Ukraine who are concerned for the safety of their families, particularly those who live along Ukrainian borders with Russia and Belarus and certainly along the Black Sea, because we know the invasion could come from anywhere. And we have many friends who have served on the front lines and who are facing the prospect of almost certain conscription should this invasion occur. But mostly our hearts go out to Ukrainian soldiers who are under high alert. They're under no shoot orders, but they don't want to provoke what could be World War three. But at the same time, they know that any minute this could be it. But mostly, our community is grateful to Canada that Canadians understand the right of Ukrainians to defend their territory and sovereignty and to choose their own path for the future, and that's enshrined in international law.

MG: The Ukrainian president has asked citizens to remain calm, saying Now isn't the time to panic or inflame the situation. Do you believe that the president is striking the right tone to the people of Ukraine, given what you have just articulated?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: I think the president was trying to stay safe, stay calm, but get ready just in case. What we see is lists of bomb shelters being posted publicly so that people can orient themselves. But we also know that provisions are being assembled. The store shelves are bare and that many are making evacuation plans. At the same time, we also have civil territorial defence units, which are provided for under Ukrainian law, preparing to mobilise local defence units.

MG: You also have Russian authorities who are saying that Russia poses no threat to Ukraine, that it has no plans to invade Ukraine. What do you make of of that narrative coming out of Russia and coming out of the negotiations between Russia and the United States? Conversations with the members of the European Union and beyond?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Well, we know that Putin is not a principled negotiator. He did not enter these talks with good faith or with any intention of reaching agreement. He immediately set up insurmountable obstacles to a negotiated settlement, which he knew would be rejected. He has struck at a time where he believes that it's a now or never moment for him. He is afraid of Naito in one sense, but he's more interested in undermining that Western alliance. What he's really afraid of is a strong and democratic Ukraine on his border. He fears that the virus of democracy will infect Russia and undermine his despotic power. And we see that internally where he's suppressing political dissent, the attempted assassination of Alexei Navalny, his successful elimination of Boris Nemtsov, Anna Politkovskaya and other Russian dissidents. But what he can't contemplate is not an entire country full of navar in this Nemtsov and Politkovskaya's. And he's had enough of those coloured revolutions in neighbouring countries the Orange Revolution, the rose revolution. And he's been preparing for the last 10 years. He's built up a war chest. He's succeeded in getting Nord Stream two built. And he knows that the moment is now that his oil and gas, which he sells now to the West and holds hostage, will in time with climate change and carbon reductions will be a worthless commodity.

MG: The Canadian Defence Minister Anita Anand had a virtual briefing with members of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress about this crisis. What did she tell you?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Minister Anand was very well briefed. She listened to our concerns and took note of them. We had asked in that meeting for defensive weapons for Ukraine. Ukraine needs anti-tank and terror, artillery systems, naval and air defence because, as I said, Ukraine doesn't know where the attack is going to come from. And of course, it needs real time satellite imagery and intelligence in order to give Ukraine a fighting chance so that they can at least see it coming. Did she say that?

MG: Did she say that Canada would provide that weaponry?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: At that time? She was noncommittal, but I think that you have seen the media yesterday that reported that through unidentified sources, that cabinet is considering various options. And we were told at a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland and several members of Parliament in the Toronto area that nothing is off the table.

MG: Do you worry that those sorts of requests could escalate the situation? If Canada and other allies you know that the U.K. is sending anti-tank weapons or is, as has confirmed, that it would send anti-tank weapons to Ukraine, that that could escalate tensions?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Well, we know that several of the Alliance International Alliance members have taken unilateral action to send aid that includes the U.K., which did send we watched, you know, on air flight tracker, the military flights coming into Ukraine. They have broken ranks, if you will, with with that thinking around provocation. Other countries have joined the Poles, the Baltics, Turkey and others. So the sky did not fall when those arms were sent. And we want Canada to be on the right side of history.

MG: What does that mean on the right side of history?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: To act now, to act in time, not to be seen, to be coming to the table too late? This is a very important issue, not just for Ukrainian Canadians, but for four and a half million Canadians of Central and East European ancestry who are watching this very closely because they all know that all that stands between them and Russia is Ukraine.

MG: Is there a role for Canada to play in a diplomatic way to help turn the heat down where again, we're seeing these negotiations? Antony Blinken meeting with Sergei Lavrov today the conversation, which we're told will continue between the United States and Russia next month. What's the place for Canada in diplomatic negotiations here?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Well, Canada has a great record of diplomacy, and we believe that Canadian diplomats and ministers are seen as somewhat of an authority on Ukraine. You know, other countries understand that Canada has a very large Ukrainian Canadian diaspora. And of course, they know that our deputy prime minister, Chrystia Freeland, can speak directly to Ukrainian ministers in their own language so they understand the advantage that Canada brings to the negotiation table.

MG: Just finally, if Russia were to go ahead with some sort of military offensive. How would you want Canada and other natal countries to respond?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Well, we would hope that first and foremost, they would provide significant defensive aid, but we we call this in our community. The budget put on this scenario that God forbid, it should happen. So Ukrainian Canadians rose to the occasion in World War Two, when there were Ukrainian refugees flooding into Europe, and we will do so again. The Ukrainian Canadian Congress, in partnership with the Canada Ukraine Foundation, has formed a humanitarian relief committee and we will be looking to the government of Canada to assist in providing humanitarian aid and also aid in resettlement of refugees should the unthinkable happen.

MG: One of the guests we spoke with earlier this week said that this could trigger a huge refugee crisis in Europe. You believe that?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: I believe it would, because if the assault is extensive, Ukraine will not be able to contain refugees internally the way it has to date. We currently have one and a half million internally displaced persons within the borders of Ukraine. But if this war is extensive and prolonged, and particularly if Russia through an airstrike destroys major infrastructure in Ukraine, that would have devastating consequences for the population.

MG: We're just about out of time. But are you confident that the heat can be turned down here?

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: We are ever hopeful, Matt.

MG: We will take that hope. I appreciate speaking with you, Alexandra. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Matt.

ALEXANDRA CHYCZIJ: Alexandra Chyczij is the national president of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. The Russian Embassy released a statement regarding Canada's role in this conflict. It reads in part, the Russian side expects that Canada and other Western partners of Ukraine will stop turning a blind eye to the numerous crimes of the Kiev regime. It goes on to say the only way to peacefully resolve the conflict is to return Kiev to a dialogue with the representatives of Donetsk and Lugansk and the unconditional compliance with the package of measures for the implementation of the Minsk agreements. We also received a statement from the National Defence Minister Anita Annan's office. It reads in part, Canada is steadfast in our support of Ukraine, especially in the face of unwarranted Russian aggression. Canada has been supporting Ukraine through Operation Unifier since 2015, training thousands of members of Ukraine's security forces to help the country remain sovereign, secure and stable. Well, coming up after your regional update,

SOUNDCLIP

I'm sitting at the front desk and people come in and need some help with something that I could clearly help them with, and I can't. I have to send them away because I'm not legally allowed to help them.

MG: There are hundreds of nurses in Canada who are ready and willing and able to help in a system that desperately needs it. But they can't because those nurses were educated in another country and 90 seconds what some provinces are doing to change that. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current.

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How the nursing crisis could clear the way for internationally-educated nurses to work in Canada

Guests: Chandra Kafle, Bukola Salami

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current nurses across Canada are burned out. They are working overtime, cancelling vacation plans and getting sick. And now some provinces are turning to an untapped workforce to help ease the staffing shortages in health care. Internationally educated nurses, or IE Ends Ontario, announced earlier this month that foreign trained nurses will be allowed to work in hospitals under supervision. New Brunswick has pleaded for anyone with nursing experience to help on its front lines, and Quebec has launched recruitment campaigns to attract nurses working abroad. And yet getting the qualifications to work in Canada still is not easy or quick. Chandra Kafle is an interim advanced practise nurse at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, where she's worked for nearly six years. Before that, she was a nurse in Nepal. Chandra, good morning.

CHANDRA KAFLE: Good morning, Matt.

MG: I want to begin just by getting you to describe what you're seeing. You're now, as I mentioned, a nurse in a major hospital in Toronto. We hear about the nursing shortages right now. How desperate is it for more nurses to be available to work on the floors of hospitals?

CHANDRA KAFLE: The situation is really critical right now, not just health sector. I think every sector is affected, but mainly health sector. We are affected by this COVID. It's been long, it's been more than two years and we are seeing that our co-workers are sick, their family members are sick. So we are really facing the human health, human resource challenges. You know, at this difficult time right now.

MG: In the conversations that you have with with nurses, how are they feeling? I said earlier the people are burnt out that we know that there are people who are leaving, leaving the profession, for example. What are nurses telling you?

CHANDRA KAFLE: So our nurses are feeling tired, they're just tired, it's been so long. So I hear you during my informal conversation when I'm sitting with my staff. They tell me that there are burnout. They want to. They are looking for different ups, and even some of them are talking about leaving the profession and moving to something else. So it's been challenging.

MG: That's got to be heartbreaking. I mean, people enter nursing for a lot of reasons, but they'll often say that this is a calling in some ways. Yes.

CHANDRA KAFLE: Yes, it is heartbreaking.

MG: And so given that we are seeing there is a move toward bringing in internationally educated nurses and people have been saying there is a whole cohort of nurses who are here in this country who can't work. You were educated in Nepal and you worked there for years before coming to Canada. Tell me what you faced. How did you go about trying to get your qualifications recognised in this country?

CHANDRA KAFLE: So I haven't been a registered nurse since 2004, so when I moved to Canada in 2012, I was already practising as a district nurse for almost eight years. But when I came here, the registration process was so complicated because I started my application with CNo even before coming to Canada.

MG: CNO being?

CHANDRA KAFLE: College of Nurses of Ontario, licencing body. So to hear from them about the eligibility was so long. So it took almost three years to get that decision from CNN saying, No, you're not qualified to write. I had an exam date, so it was a long process, so I had to choose a different option, for example. I was already working as a nurse in Nepal, but I had to go through the AP Asia Typekit exam. Detective McBeath. We finished this programme in [unintelligible] College and then I had to redo my bachelor's degree from York University. So it was definitely challenging because I had to forget that I was a nurse and I had to start from, you know, from [unintelliglbe].

MG: You had let me, so let me stop you there. You had to forget that you were a nurse.

CHANDRA KAFLE: Yes. So that was the main, I think hard breaking point because I felt like I lost my identity as a nurse because I was no longer a nurse in Canada, right? Even though I had been a nurse, states. So that was a little bit challenging, but not just for me. I think for most Afghans who are in their struggling face, that is one of the major challenges that we face mentally because you are no longer a nurse. Even though you have this knowledge and skills, you won't be able to practise that, so you wouldn't be able to do anything for your patient.

MG: Let me just make sure that I understand the process here. So you had to wait three years for them to tell you that you would have to go back and do the qualifications again. Then you went to college, then you went to university.

CHANDRA KAFLE: Yes. So what happened is when I was waiting for them to give that decision, I myself went to college and did the programme because when I came here in Canada in 2012, I was lucky enough to get a volunteer position at the U.S. sending Toronto Western Hospital. When I got there, I myself realised that there are some areas I need to improve. You know, I like myself, we have to improve on some aspect of the care that we do, right? So because of that reason, I went to those phone calls and dictate that academic pathway for nurses, which has taught three component and been clinical for a full semester. So I was hoping that after completing that, I will be able to write the exam. I'll be, you know, I will be eligible because I had my bachelor's degree. I did this whole programme that took almost two years. But no, that wasn't enough. I had to go back to the university again to to redo my master's degree.

MG: Did you feel that you were qualified having come out of that college programme indefinitely?

CHANDRA KAFLE: Yes.

MG: And so I mean, you've hinted at this. But but how frustrating was that having to jump through those various hoops to try to get to the point where they would say, OK, now we believe that you are qualified to work in hospitals here?

CHANDRA KAFLE: It was very challenging. As you know, moving to a new country is not easy on top of that, like going through all these processes. And there was never a clear answer because some of my classmates from Nepal who had the same programme, they were eligible to write the exam, and I wasn't. And it was the same qualification, you know, and there wasn't anything different. It was very fascinating. So it's a long process.

MG: Why did you stick with it? You could imagine that a lot of people perhaps would leave the profession and go and do something else.

CHANDRA KAFLE: Yeah, people have done that too. But nursing is my calling. That's my passion. I was very passionate to be a nurse, and I and I still am I. I love being a nurse, so that's why I couldn't give it up because I cannot imagine myself doing anything else. I loved being in it. So no matter what I had to move forward, I had to, you know, keep going.

MG: Given what you are seeing on the floor of the hospital that you work in now, what do you make? Of the fact that there is a huge untapped pool of internationally educated nurses who could help but face the same hurdles that you did.

CHANDRA KAFLE: I think my things have been a little bit better now, especially at Sunnybrook. I think because of the programme that we have for aliens, it's been way easier now because our internationally educated nurses can work as clinical action, which seems like they will be working because as often as they will be able to, you know, involved in patient care, they will learn at the same time. And there are so many other opportunities right now for and it was different back then in 2012 when I started.

MG: What do you make of what the government in Ontario but other governments are doing now in bringing in some of those islands to help fill the gap? Given what what COVID has has done to the nursing cohort here in Canada?

CHANDRA KAFLE: I think it's a great initiative because, you know, our nurse to patient ratio is way higher than it used to be. If we are taking care of one or two patients now, we're taking care of two or three or sometimes even more eight. So having that support from aliens is a great help, even though they have not gotten their licence yet. But they can help with other, you know, activities of daily living. They can help with a lot of other respect. So it is fairly amazing that that until you are doing this programme,

MG: what do you think internationally trained nurses bring to the table

CHANDRA KAFLE: that there are so many things that agents can offer that extensive clinical practise? You know, as I was talking earlier, I work in our educational preparedness and is a little bit different, but our clinical exposure as a lot better than here. And so they have a lot of experience that they can offer the their knowledge. I think they're one of the few things that international music nurses need to know, for example, communication skills, learning about different policing procedures within the hospital, for example, like patient confidentiality and things like that. But there are so much I can offer, especially at this time.

MG: So what needs to be done to better support internationally educated nurses who are now sitting on the sidelines waiting to do the job that that that they trained to do and perhaps that they did elsewhere?

CHANDRA KAFLE: I think facilitating the registration process, making it a little bit quicker because if if CNN is taking almost three years to tell them that you're not qualified, then this practise will be expired in two years and they have to go back to school again. So I think making that time train and then facilitating the process for further evaluation,

MG: what would you say to fellow internationally educated nurses who like yourself feel as though some of their identity is disappearing when they can't do the work that they love to do?

CHANDRA KAFLE: Yes. So I think that my message sort of fellow agents is have this position you are committed for your profession. Keep going. It's it's not an easy road when I'm reflecting on my own path how far I have come. It hasn't always been easy, but what kept me going as my aim, my goal to be a nurse here. So there are resources available. Sunnybrook is also hiring so and so keep going it. Stay positive. That's what I want to say.

MG: And what do you love about being a nurse?

CHANDRA KAFLE: Everything, everything. You know, the patient care is the most important thing. Whenever you know, patient can get sick, we help them get better. And then there's the smile I see of my patients. These are whenever I'm providing care, the communication with them, I love them.

MG: I think these are really busy times for you and you're under a lot of stress. I really appreciate hearing from you. Thank you. Take care of yourself and and thanks for talking to us.

CHANDRA KAFLE: Thank you.

MG: Matt Chandrika is a nurse at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto.

SOUNDCLIP

In the US, I was a nurse practitioner, I worked in a gynaecology office and now in Canada, in Ontario, I work in Thunder Bay. I was hired as a medical assistant and I'm doing admin scheduling, answering the phones, taking money, scanning things into charts. Oftentimes, we don't have providers at the walking clinic I work at and I'm sitting at the front desk and people come in and need some help with something that I could clearly help them with. And I can't. I have to send them away to find help elsewhere because I'm not legally allowed to help them.

MG: U.S. trained nurse practitioner, Cristy Tashjian, moved to Thunder Bay, Ontario, two years ago. Ever since, she's been working to get her licence in Canada, and there are thousands of internationally trained nurses like her who are kept out of the workforce as they wait. Bukola Salami is a nursing researcher and associate professor at the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Alberta Professor. Good morning to you.

BUKOLA SALAMI: Good morning.

MG: You just heard Cristy and before that Chandra talk about their experiences as internationally educated nurses. Chandra went back to school first to college. Then she had to go back to university to be able to practise. How common is something like that to have to take those multiple steps?

BUKOLA SALAMI: And I think for most internationally educated nurses, what the vast majority, they usually would have to go back to school to take one course or another and experience is actually quite consistent with some of the research they have done. The time it takes to become registered may take two to four years to become registered. And also, one thing that you didn't mention is passing exams. So some nurses will take a while in terms of class and English exam, clinical exam, oral exam, and all of this all contribute to the integration. I interviewed some nurses that came to Canada through the caregiver programme and some of those nurses being able to demonstrate evidence of safe nursing practise. And one of the challenges is in Ontario, you need to demonstrate that you worked within the last three years as a nurse and thinking about the fact that it would take three to four years for you to to be able to get into the profession. There are some people that while waiting, they're just not able just because of the length of time they're not able to demonstrate that they've practised within the last three years.

MG: What do they end up? What do they end up doing in the meantime if they're waiting all of that time?

BUKOLA SALAMI: A lot of the nurses that I interview, many of them will work as personal support workers, and some of them will work outside of the profession and some don't work at all. So some get discouraged in the process and just stop working altogether. There's a lot of nurses, although there no data on how many nurses out there are working outside of the profession. But there is a lot of nurses from my experience interviewing that I know work outside of the do.

MG: Some of them just leave the profession entirely while they're waiting?

BUKOLA SALAMI: Many of them leave the profession entirely while they await.

MG: I want to take you to something else that Christy Tashjian, the American nurse practitioner now living in Ontario, said about the process. Have a listen to this.

SOUNDCLIP

I was trained in the US. I speak English and I've also been quite an activist for myself, and I just can't imagine what someone who does not speak English as a first language, how they would get through the process of registering or even applying. The application process is fairly cumbersome and requires a lot of back and forth and document retrieval. It's very challenging.

MG: What sort of support is there to help those internationally educated, internationally trained nurses?

BUKOLA SALAMI: So some of the support available are bridging programmes. And for example, there's Care for Nurses in Ontario, [unintelligilbe] Institute in Alberta that helps internationally educated nurses in terms of training in education support. The only thing is, you know, some of the bridging programmes and also operating programmes out there are there are too many people that want to- there's a waitlist list, people that want to get into some of those programmes so, there's a need in terms of investing in some of those programmes that can improve access to the profession.

MG: So you have to do so, you have to go into a retraining programme, but there's a backlog to even to get into the retraining programme.

BUKOLA SALAMI: Yes, so many internationally educated nurses get access by by the colleges of nurses of Ontario, of Alberta, the different provinces that they need to go and get more education. The only thing is that 500 may be assessed that they need to get education and there's only 200 spaces available. So what about the others? So I know of nurses that they have to wait years on the waitlist to be able to actually get into some of those programmes. I mean, this is one policy option that the government have to do to increase integration of internationally indicated nurse, that is to expand access to training programme. I also know some people that geographical access is a problem. So for example, in Edmonton, there's limited access to training programmes in Edmonton. It's available in Calgary, but not in Edmonton. So some nurses will have to leave Edmonton, go to Calgary to complete their programme to be able to actually get into the profession.

MG: I was going to say is a long process in some ways inevitable because there is a concern that Canada needs to ensure that nurses who may have trained or been educated elsewhere are qualified to work here with different processes or different technology.

BUKOLA SALAMI: Well, the long process is I don't think it's inevitable, but I think it's, you know, it's very important that internationally educated nurses pass the steps that are positive and they also pass language exams to be able to ensure that we have competent nurses working in Canada. But of course, more can be done in terms of ensuring that the process is faster and people can actually be able to get into programmes that would help facilitate the access to the profession.

MG: There are nurses who said that perhaps something else is going on here. You've hinted at this as well. You tweeted that nursing is like cappuccino. What did you mean by that?

BUKOLA SALAMI: Yes, so, the nursing is like a cappuccino. It's black underneath and it's white on top. And that really points to issues related to discrimination in the profession. So we know many internationally educated nurses and many racialized nurses work in the lower sectors of the nursing workforce in [unintelligilbe] sector. So if you go to- when internationally educated nurses come into the profession, some of them continue to experience challenges being able to rise up in in the profession to leadership positions. So I mean if you look at the big data on the mortality and morbidity rate from COVID 19 amongst nurses, you'll find that many of those that you know are contracting COVID are more, it's more common in racialized populations, and there's some data in the UK to support that. And that's because, you know, racialized populations are more likely to be the ones actually being the one on one care with patients, while Caucasian white nurses are more likely to be in a leadership position. This is one thing that we have to address in terms of upward carrier mobility. Once racialized nurses, immigrant nurses, internationally dedicated nurses get into the profession.

MG: what do you make of the response from the province of Ontario, for example, in the midst of the Omicron crisis, where some internationally educated nurses who have applied to practise in the province are now being brought into hospitals to help deal with staffing shortages? What do you make of that?

BUKOLA SALAMI: Well, it's I mean, they are treated as a minister on hand, and the main thing is that we need long term solutions. So not just, you know, when you know, when the system needs them, but also we need a long term solution to ensure the integration of international dedicated nurses. We also need to attend to the training that nurses we seek to ensure that they are competent and able to actually provide the care that they need when once they're integrated. And also, we still need to address issues related to discrimination and racism once they are in the profession in terms of ensuring the career mobility.

MG: What needs to happen then to accelerate the accreditation? When you have a group of people who are trained, who want to go through the other processes that they might need to ensure that that training meets Canadian requirements, but they're willing to work, they want to work. This is the job that they feel called to, but they can't work. So what needs to be done to accelerate that?

BUKOLA SALAMI: So, so one of the things that need to be done is we need evidence in Canada. We need evidence related to know we need Evidence-Based decision making. So for example, why is it that some provinces require internationally educated nurses to demonstrate three years of state nursing practise, while some other provinces require international nurses to do to demonstrate five years of recent state nursing practise? The other thing is we need to address some access to bridging programmes, so we need more bridging programmes created in different cities to be able to ensure that international nurses can actually access region programmes. Once you assess that, they need to complete courses. And also, we need to ensure a faster process in terms of the processing of documents internationally educated nurses.

MG: There is a crisis in the profession right now, with an exodus of nurses from the profession, people worried about low pay burnout and again, just the stress of daily life in addition to living through a pandemic. Are you confident that the response that you're seeing in Ontario and some other jurisdictions will be enough to spur the changes that you're talking about, that that this this is going to be the moment to ensure that those nurses who are on the sidelines are going to be recognised and brought into the system.

BUKOLA SALAMI: Well, I I am hopeful, but honestly, I am not confident because I think that all that has been done now are just short term solutions and there's no long term policy that's been implemented. So. So I don't see, for example, bridging access to bridging programmes being widely expanded. So we need we need the government to implement more long term solutions that would actually ensure that this is a permanent fix rather than a temporary Band-Aid.

MG: So this is to say, if not now, then when if we're if not now in the midst of a crisis, then when would government do that?

BUKOLA SALAMI: Yes. And yeah, so. And that's a good question. I think right now the government is just so focussed on fixing the crisis that, you know, long term solutions have not been put in place.

MG: What would you say? Just finally, we're almost at a time of what would you say to those internationally trained nurses. Chandra talked about feeling like her identity was being erased in some ways because she couldn't do what she felt called to do. What would you say to those nurses who are waiting to be able to do that work here?

BUKOLA SALAMI: Well, I would say that, you know, you know, to internationally educated nurses do not give up. I know a lot of people give up because of the process, because of the stress. Do not give up focus on your long term goal and prioritise that goal of becoming a nurse in Canada. And if you continue working on that note, taking the exams that you need, passing the exam that you need studying hard by, hopefully you would be able to reach some of those goals.

MG: Professor, good to speak with you. Thank you very much.

BUKOLA SALAMI: Thank you so much for having me.

MG: Bukola Salami is a nursing researcher and associate professor at the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Alberta. She was in Edmonton. We'd love to hear your thoughts on this. If you are going through this process, perhaps you have gone through this process as an internationally educated nurse. Get in touch. thecurrent@cbc.ca is the email address. This is the current on CBC Radio one. My name is Matt Galloway. Kathryn Schulz is a journalist with The New Yorker Pulitzer prise winner as well. She's also a daughter and a wife who brings all of those roles together in her new book, It's Brilliant. It's called Lost and found it's about relationships and above all, how she thought about relationships in the wake of the death of her father. You'll hear my conversation with Kathryn Schulz next week on The Current. Here's a sneak peek of what we talked about.

SOUNDCLIP

I feel grateful every day to have been my father's daughter. He was a remarkable person. He was a refugee to the United States. Born in Tel Aviv, back then, it was still Palestine and then had a kind of nomadic childhood until he landed with his family in Detroit. And, you know, he came from a background of both emotional and financial poverty. I would say a lot of familial trauma. And yet somehow, despite that, he was just one of the most joyful and ebullient people you could ever possibly meet. He loved life. He loved being a parent. He she was just full of curiosity about and love for the world. And it was wonderful to grow up kind of proximate to that curiosity and that joy. The truth is, it's a funny thing about life for many years prior to his death. I had been interested in the experience of losing things. I thought about kind of the strangeness of just the future of life is stuff vanishes, you know, trivial stuff like our car keys and and very important things. You know, our minds, our marriages, what have you. And so it always kind of wanted to write about this. And I think every writer has a list of like fantasy projects that know sort of lurk in the background and menacing us with our failure to write them. And pretty quickly after my father died, I realised this is why I could not write that piece before and why I'm ready to write it now. Because because this has the gravitas, right? This is the emotional heart of it. And now I really do have something quite urgent to say on this subject. Loss is interesting to me because it is the fundamental bargain of our existence. You know, we get to be here because we get to be in the world and be amazed by it and fall in love with parts of it. And and what we don't get to do is keep it, you know, it's all sooner or later ephemeral. And either we leave it or it leaves us. So I'm interested in the fleeting nature of life, partly because I I think it's what helps us remember to take it very seriously. Well, we have it.

MG: Kathryn Schulz, the author of Lost and found it's a beautiful book about wonder and amazement and losing things and finding things and the role of and in our lives. And you can hear my full conversation with Kathryn Schulz next week on The Current. That is The Current for this Friday and for this week. Coming up next on CBC Radio one, it's cue the brilliant Tanya Tagak singular talent in the world of music has been busy during the pandemic. She has a new song called Pick Up, which is all about the fierce desire to protect her children. She'll join Tom Power to talk about the inspiration behind it. In just moments from now, I'm Matt Galloway. Happy Friday! Thanks for listening to The Current over the weekend, and we'll see you Monday.

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

Friday January 21, 2022 Full Transcript

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