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The Current Transcript for April 1, 2021

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

MARGARET LEISHMAN: If you're in a community, you should be there till you leave this world, be taken care of in a really good way. Because I really believe that elders need to be honoured and respected. [voice shaking]

MG: This pandemic has been a reckoning on how we treat our elders. In 30 minutes, as part of our "Canada's Road Ahead" cross-country tour, we head to the Northwest Territories, where the issue of senior care and being able to grow old in your own community is top of mind. Also, this morning, it has been a decade of civil war in Syria. The CBC's Margaret Evans is just back from that country. She'll tell us what she saw and what the fate of Canadians in camps there is. Plus, Zebras, you think you know what they look like. You might be wrong.

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BRENDA LARISON: They're mostly black, and they look like they're black with white stripes on the legs and then more of a polka dot body. And those things I don't have any samples of as yet, but those are probably the most rare ones to see.

MG: How human behaviour may be changing the zebra stripes. We start, though, in long-term care homes. Residents have been vaccinated. So why are they still being kept inside? Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway. And this is The Current.

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Vaccinated long-term care residents face lockdown due to outbreaks among staff

Guests: Emidio Galea, Sandro Galea, Susan Mintzberg

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MARY ELLEN MCSWEEN: I feel almost speechless. It's pretty exciting. It's going to, you know, make a huge difference for the family, and it's going to not only impact Mum but just the mood for all the residents. It'll just, you know, make it more lively and such a better environment for everybody, I think.

MG: Mary Ellen McSween is thrilled. For the past year, she has been the only family member allowed to visit her 97-year-old mother, Evelyn, at her long-term care home in North Vancouver. That changes today. The BC government is now allowing two adults and a child to visit residents in long-term care.

SOUNDCLIP

MARY ELLEN MCSWEEN: Letting it sink in that they can actually come in and visit, I think it's going to be pretty amazing for everybody. It's a wonderful gift. I was talking to my daughter to try and to organize getting the baby over to see Mum, because that's kind of been my wish since he was born nine months ago that she gets to hold him.

MG: That baby is Evelyn's great-grandson. As excited as Mary Ellen McSween is, there are still seniors and families in other provinces not yet able to see each other. Emidio Galea knows about this all too well. He lives in a long-term care home in Toronto with his wife, and they're vaccinated. But they were put into a lockdown again recently after a caregiver tested positive for COVID. His son is Dr. Sandro Galea, a physician and epidemiologist and the Robert A. Knox professor and dean at the Boston University School of Public Health. Good morning to you both.

EMIDIO GALEA: Good morning.

MG: Emidio, how are you doing?

EMIDIO GALEA: I'm OK right now. We were given permission to go out yesterday after 14 days. This was the third quarantine in 11 months.

MG: The one in 11 months! That's a lot.

EMIDIO GALEA: Yes, we are allowed now... now to go outside. But limit our visits to special, you know, people like the doctor. But now we can go out in the corridors. We go down for lunch and supper because we were dispatched for 10 days. They were giving us lunch and supper in our rooms. We were not allowed to go outside, you know?

MG: How much of a difference has that made in your life, being able to... to get out of the room?

EMIDIO GALEA: Oh, for me, sir, [chuckling] I'm not used... I get claustrophobic, you know? Anyway, it's... it's very, you know, depressing. And thank God it was 14 days this time because the second time was a period of 22 days we were locked in. And when I say locked in, I mean locked in. Because nurses apparently and staff here at one time, I went out for doing some exercise in the corridor just to walk the corridors. And one of the staff said, Mr. Galea, Mr. Galea, please go indoors. You are not allowed to stay out... out of the room. But, sir, my concern is this, this time we were vaccinated, you know? The first and second time, we were not vaccinated. We wear masks, and that's what makes me, you know, what got me frustrated. But my... My concern now is that this thing can happen any time. My wife has Parkinson's. A nurse comes to... for the dressing. She has a pump to push the medication into her brain.

MG: Right.

EMIDIO GALEA: And the hole where the tube comes into her stomach has to be dressed twice a day. And the nurse comes in the morning, and the caregiver does it again in the evening, you know? So these people have not yet been vaccinated can get the virus. And because of that, then they will tell us, listen, there was a person who was tested positive, came into contact with your wife. And whether you like it or not, [chuckle] you have to stay indoors.

MG: What do you... what do you miss about being able to get out? I mean, you know, an active man, hobbies, things like that. What do you... what do you miss?

EMIDIO GALEA: Sir, I like to go out and visit some stores, you know, like Canadian Tire and Home Depot, all those, although now they are closed, too. But, yeah, it's a very small, you know? When all of a sudden, you find yourself, hey, as small as it is, and you have to stay there, you cannot go out, not even to the corridor.

MG: Dr. Galea, how does it feel listening to your dad talk about what life is like for him right now?

SANDRO GALEA: Well, I think it's been really difficult. I think it has been really difficult for them. And I think it's been difficult for thousands of other elders across Canada like them. In my estimation, the quarantine made sense at the time when people were not vaccinated. There was obviously a lot of concern about the fact that the older you are, the greater your risk of having severe COVID. I think the challenge has become, and I think it's become particularly difficult to take with the quarantine after the residents have been vaccinated, which is the case right now. And I think it's been... I think it's depressing. I think, you know, I would I would challenge any listener to think what it's like to be locked up in your... in your room, really, not being able to get to the corridor. And, I mean, in many respects, it does feel like imprisonment.

MG: You wrote in an op-ed that... that this lockdown is cruel and runs counter to the science. So what does... and I ask you this as a doctor, what does the science tell you about what could be possible for your father?

SANDRO GALEA: I think what's possible is to be careful and cautious and to make sure that people who are vaccinated are... are in social contact with others who are vaccinated. And in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control guidelines are exactly that, that to people who are vaccinated can be gathered together in small groups with others who are vaccinated. So we know... we know that that is what makes sense. We know that the risk of transmission among people who are vaccinated with each other and in contact with each other is very, very low. And so to my mind, there is here a a very straightforward, practical solution, which is to create... if there's somebody is positive within congregate living facility to make sure that there is congregation only of people who are vaccinated, and not to impose what really are beginning to feel like more and more draconian lockdowns that keep elders who frequently don't have a voice locked up in their room in the name of keeping them safe.

MG: Well, and that's what the province has said. The province of Ontario has said that it's keeping elders safe, that it needs they are the most vulnerable population when it comes to this virus, and they need to be kept safe. And that, unfortunately, requires them to be kept within their residence while the this third wave continues. What do you say to that?

SANDRO GALEA: There is no question that the safest thing that we can do for all of us is never to leave our room. But, Matt, if you never left your room, if I never left my room, our chance of acquiring COVID is zero because COVID is transmitted person-to-person. So there's no question that that's the case. Now, in all of society, ever since COVID has hit, we have been making these trade-offs. This is what we've been doing for the past year-plus now that we have been saying, well, yes, there will be zero risk of transmission if we all stayed in our room, but society doesn't function that way. So how do we... how do we maintain societal functioning, and in such a way that we also reduce risk? And that's what we have been doing collectively, and that is exactly what we should be doing. Now, in the context of the older population, particularly older population in nursing homes and in congregate facilities, we know that this group is at high risk. And that is... that is entirely correct. And that is why in many respects, the quarantine's when nobody was vaccinated, there was, I think, a good logic behind them. But they were hard. They were hard quarantines. But now, the situation has changed. Now we have large numbers of elders who are vaccinated, which means the risk of acquiring COVID and their risk of getting severe COVID is really, really low. So that should change our risk calculus. That should change our willingness to explore ways in which we can allow people to get on with their lives, to do the things that they are they're doing, be it exercise, be it socializing with other people in their congregate facility with those who are vaccinated because of the risk equation has now changed.

MG: How worried are you about your parent's mental health and the effect of the continued isolation on their mental well-being?

SANDRO GALEA: Well, we... our research team has done quite a few papers about mental health in the context of COVID-19. It happens to be an area which I study. And we have shown, as have other groups, that we have about a threefold increase in depression in the population since COVID has started. So I do think it's worrisome. And I think it gets at least part of we should be thinking about the whole of our health, the whole of our health. And our health is not simply being free of the virus. Or health is, yes, we need to make sure that we're free of virus. Our health means making sure that we protect people who are most vulnerable. But our health is our capacity to live life fully. And living life fully means not imposing undue or unnecessary restrictions that are threatening people's mental health.

MG: Emidio, how much attention do you think has been paid to your mental health over the course of this pandemic?

EMIDIO GALEA: Mental health? [chuckle] I don't know it has affected me, no, you know? But I can say I'm not a doctor. I cannot say whether it has [chuckle] affected my mental health. It's certainly depressing. My main exercise is... physical exercise is walking. Walking, you know?

MG: Yes.

EMIDIO GALEA: I used... when I was in the other building, we had a swimming pool there. I used to swim. But with things as they are, you know, when you are in quarantine, you cannot walk.

MG: Do you think... Just, I mean, your son was talking about risk. Is being out and seeing other people. Is that a risk that you would be willing to take, given the benefits of that?

EMIDIO GALEA: No, I don't think there is a risk here at all. I mean, I wear a mask all the time, you know? I'm very careful. I mean, what are we vaccinated for, you know? What's the use?

MG: When this is over and done, and you're allowed to leave your residence, what's the first thing you're going to do?

EMIDIO GALEA: To begin with, I started to dream of walking like I was doing before... before this happened, you know? Walking and go up to see a friend, to the cinema, you know? But of course, we would like to see our children and our grandchildren when the airlines are open, you know?

MG: I think what you're both going through is a familiar story to so many people. I hope that you are able to see each other soon. And Emidio, I hope you're able to get out for that walk and that swim and also see your children and grandchildren. Thank you very much for speaking with us.

EMIDIO GALEA: Thank you very much.

SANDRO GALEA: Thank you very much, Matt.

MATT GALLOWAY:: Dr. Sandro Galea is an epidemiologist and the Robert A. Knox professor and Dean at the Boston University School of Public Health. He was in Boston. His father, Emidio Galea, is in a long-term care residence in Toronto. Susan Mintzberg has written about the impact of loneliness on seniors. She is a PhD candidate in the School of Social Work at McGill University in Montreal. Susan, good morning to you.

SUSAN MINTZBERG: Good morning.

MG: As you listen to the Galeas talk about the situation they find themselves in, what goes through your mind?

SUSAN MINTZBERG: The first thing when I heard Emidio starting to talk, it almost makes you want to cry, listening to sort of this idea of seniors being locked away. But the other thing that really struck me listening to his son, Dr. Galea, is this whole sort of discussion around risk, and which has been central to throughout the pandemic. So protecting seniors from the risk of COVID. And one of the things that I think really stands out and what he's saying and understanding generally what's been going on in the last kind of year is this idea that we... we look at risk from a physical perspective, right? So the risk of getting COVId and potentially dying of covid obviously is important. But what about the risk of what happens with mental health when we put in some of the kinds of restrictions that we've had, especially with seniors in the last year. So it makes me think of, you know, when we removed families right away at the beginning and the huge impact that had on seniors mental health and... and the enormous risk that that caused.

MG: Do you think... we'll start with risk. Do you think that the balance has been off when it comes to how governments have understood risk, particularly when it comes to senior populations that have now been vaccinated?

SUSAN MINTZBERG: Absolutely. I think from the beginning it's been... I'm not sure misunderstood is the right word, but sort of a misbalance or unbalanced. But I think it really comes down to just a general sort of idea in in society generally, that we really separate mental health from physical health. And these two things go hand in hand. So, you know, this idea that, of course, we had to protect seniors from COVID, especially when it first started and we didn't understand what was going on as well. But to just dismiss the mental health aspects of what was going on with some of the decisions we were making, I think, is a huge imbalance. But I think that's an imbalance in society, not just with seniors, but just across society generally. I mean, it feels so incredibly stigmatized.

MG: What do we know about the mental health challenges for seniors who are living with no personal contact from friends and family members, but also can't get out and do the things that they are used to doing, the things that... that they might say make life worth living, In some ways?

SUSAN MINTZBERG: You know, we can talk about it with seniors, or we can talk about it with anybody, right? I mean, if we... if we remove that part of our lives that kind of makes us sane or makes us happy or gives us joy, how are we going to feel, you know, good about anything, really? So I think the impact has been huge. I just... I think it's devastating.

MG: We learned, I mean, the Canadian Institute for Health Information has been reporting on what's happening in long-term care homes, reporting that more seniors died last spring from causes other than COVID than in previous years, the worst example in Ontario, where 28 per cent more seniors died in long-term care last spring. And that is with covid taken out of the equation. What does that tell you?

SUSAN MINTZBERG: It tells me, I mean, it tells me that we're not paying attention properly. It tells me that, you know, the way that we went about this, I think, again, completely missed the train on like taking mental health into the into the bigger picture, into the full equation. And I think, you know, I wrote a piece kind of quite early in the pandemic, an opinion piece about seniors dying... Dying of a broken heart, I think is what I called it, or of a lonely heart. I'd like to see... I don't know if we have statistics on this, but we talk a lot about, you know, the number of seniors that died in the long-term care home, which is, you know, horrible. And we sort of talked about the, you know, lack of funding or the lack of investment in long-term care, which I think is a huge problem. But are we paying attention to how many of those people didn't die of COVID? That died because they were, you know, whether it's lonely, whether it's just kind of almost broken, right? I mean... I mean, my work really looks at the role of families and mental health care. And when we removed families, who to many people are, I mean, a lifeline. They bring the humanity. They bring that personal piece to the person's life lives. And when we just cut that out like boom, right at the beginning, the impact on mental health was huge. And have we been paying attention to that? So, yes, the numbers are very high of seniors that died in long-term care home. But how many of those people died not of covid and not of necessarily natural like, you know, they would have anyhow. But how many of those people actually just, you know, gave up, got depressed, didn't know what was going on and just, you know, couldn't keep going?

MG: You use the word lifeline. I mean, the tendency often is to refer to someone who is coming in to visit someone in a long-term care home as just a visitor.

SUSAN MINTZBERG: Yeah.

MG: It sounds like it's semantics, but it's not. There's something more that those who are visiting are offering rather than just being there in the space.

SUSAN MINTZBERG: Yeah, it's one of the things that's really sort of bothered me throughout... throughout this pandemic. And this idea we keep referring to families as visitors. Some families are just visitors, and some family members are just visitors. But families aren't just visitors in the health care system often. They're part of the system. They're collaborators in the system. The families, often, have a huge role in providing what the system just doesn't invest in. So, you know, that personalized care, that really knowing that person, you know, well, to be able to identify changes, or what do they like to eat, what don't they like to eat, what makes them happy, what you know, makes them sad? But to just, you know, unanimously or across the board say families are visitors. Therefore, when COVID strikes, we must remove visitors is really missing the full picture. Families are not just visitors in our health care system. They are part of the system. And if we take them out, I mean, we see what happens, I think.

MG: We asked to speak with health ministers in Quebec, British Columbia and Ontario. None were available for an interview. But we did hear back from Dr. Merrilee Fullerton's office. She's the Ontario minister of long-term care. And a statement from her office reads, in part, "Until more people have the opportunity to receive the vaccine, we must continue to be vigilant in following public health guidance, especially as we are seeing the spread of variants of concern. That goes back to that idea of risk. What's your response to that?

SUSAN MINTZBERG: I mean, listen, obviously, we need to be vigilant. I don't think anyone sort of thinks differently. I mean, just watch the news and, you know, with the variants and the numbers are going up again. So for sure, vigilance is important. But what do we mean by vigilance, right? You know, is vigilance simply about, you know, keeping people away or apart or masked or whatever with regard to, you know, the risk of catching COVID? Or can vigilance also involve paying attention to people's mental health? Because I think at this point, we're a year in, right? Let's maybe start to bring the whole mental health discussion a little bit more to the forefront in this... in this whole dialogue.

MG: Well, practically, what would you want to see now? I mean, just finally on that, British Columbia is going to allow more family members in the long-term care homes. What should other governments across this country be doing?

SUSAN MINTZBERG: I think other governments should be really paying attention to just the full picture. So the fact that people are vaccinated so that maybe the risk of catching or getting severe COVID symptoms is kind of lowering. Let's take that into the equation, and then let's sort of put that, you know, back to back with how are people doing with their mental health? And if you put all of those together, can we start allowing family members, visitors, like... like Emidio said, letting people maybe get out in a safe way so they can get back to some kind of normalcy where, you know, they can just start feeling better about life, and seeing their family, and enjoying what senior should be enjoying in life, but doing it carefully, you know, doing it in a way that's safe. But safe, physically and mentally.

MG: And not being told when he's walking down the hall to get back into his room.

SUSAN MINTZBERG: That to me, is like it breaks my heart. And I may also, you know what? It's interesting because I was just seeing on the news yesterday in Quebec, we allowed families in, right, after disaster. And... and supposedly what I've seen from the statistics, things have started to go a lot better with regards to, you know, fewer deaths if we look at Quebec as an example, you know, compared to the rest of Canada. From that perspective alone, just, you know, allowing those family kind of visitors in and sort of giving people more access, and sort of helping their mental health is that.. is that maybe something we should be looking at across Canada?

MG: It's great to hear from you about this. This is really important. Thank you very much.

SUSAN MINTZBERG: Thanks.

MG: Take care. Bye.

SUSAN MINTZBERG: Bye-bye.

MG: Susan Mintzberg is a PhD candidate in the School of Social Work at McGill University in Montreal, focussing on the role of families in mental health care. Your thoughts on this would be welcome. You can email us: thecurrent@cbc.ca. The CBC News is next. And then,

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Around the corner is this little island there. I lie at bottom of a canoe in the in the grass. I've been doing that all my life. I can't breathe if I'm inside. I have to be outside.

MATT GALLOWAY: Margaret Leishman's community in the Northwest Territories is her sanctuary. It's where she wants to be for the rest of her life. But as she ages, that's not so simple. We stop in Kakisa, Northwest Territories for our series "Canada's Road Ahead". It's coming up in six minutes. I'm Matt Galloway. This is "The Current" on CBC Radio One. Stay with us.

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CANADA'S ROAD AHEAD | N.W.T. seniors often move vast distances for care. Some elders want support to age in place, with loved ones

Guests: Margaret Leishman, Angela Grandjambe

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

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MG: Still to come, there are Canadians in camps in Syria and no clear plan to do anything about that. The CBC's Margaret Evans will join me in 30 minutes to talk about the women she spoke with who want to come home. But first, the road ahead leads north.

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MG: Well, for the past few months, we have been speaking with people about the toll this pandemic has taken, but also the hopes they have for the future. This is part of our series, "Canada's Road Ahead". Today, we are in Kakisa, Northwest Territories. It has a population of about 40. The territory hasn't had many COVID cases, but communities here are still dealing with an issue that resonates from coast-to-coast to coast during the pandemic, how to care for our elders and seniors as they age? Up here, there is rarely enough support for them, forcing many seniors to leave. We'll hear more about this in a moment. But first, elder Margaret Leishman showed our colleague, Lawrence Nayally, one of the reasons why she wants to stay in Kakisa.

SOUNDCLIP

[footsteps crunch]

MARGARET LEISHMAN: These are the best snowshoes that my son gave me.

LAWRENCE NAYALLY: Oh!

MARGARET LEISHMAN: So I have this one at home. I have one in my car when I travel.

LAWRENCE NAYALLY: Uh-huh. This keeps you fit and active.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Yeah. You have to be. Otherwise, as an elder, you need to be active and in good health. So your mind is always healthy.

[more crunching footsteps]

MARGARET LEISHMAN: I just walk out the back door I'm already in the bush. And then in the summer, I paddle across right there, and I'll pick cranberries all on that point.

LAWRENCE NAYALLY: And do you paddle out by yourself?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Yeah. Around the corner is this little island there. I lie at the bottom of my canoe in the... in the grass and I'm just there.

LAWRENCE NAYALLY: Oh! that must feel so good just to --

MARGARET LEISHMAN: It is beautiful. I've been doing that all my life. I can't breathe if I'm inside.

LAWRENCE NAYALLY: Yeah.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: I have to be outside

MG: That's Margaret Leishman keeping fit on her snowshoes. Margaret is one of five elders living in Kakisa. She's a residential school survivor and an advocate for seniors to age in their communities. Margaret Leishman, good morning.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Good morning.

MG: That video, I saw a little bit of you snowshoeing. It looked beautiful where you were.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: It is. You know, it's so fresh in the wintertime up here. And, you know, that's the only way I know how to live, born on the land. I'm used to that all my life.

MG: For people who've never seen or been to your community, describe what Kakisa looks like?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Kakisa is a very small community, and we're situated at the mouth of the river. And I think there's at least 12, 13 houses. And it's a very small community. And traditionally, we're very active in our way of life, you know? And we try very hard to keep it that way, to keep our people healthy.

MG: I mentioned in the introduction that you've done a lot of work around housing and around the rights of elders. There's a phrase that gets used often and it's aging in place. When you hear that, what does that phrase, aging in place, mean to you?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Ageing in place mean that if you're... If you're in a community, your own community, you should be there from till... till you go, till you leave this world. And that you'd be taken care of in a really good way because I really believe that elders need to be honoured and respected. [voice breaking]

MG: How common is it for elders to be able to do that, to be able to age in place? And as you say, to... to be respected in their wishes?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: That was a long time ago before a residential school came into our area. The elders were kept at home till... till the goal. And every... the whole community used to take care of our elders. After residential schools, that way of life stopped, you know? And it needs to continue because our elders are very valuable.

MG: What happens when they have to leave? I mean, given all of that and how important they are to the community, when they aren't able to age in place, what happens to them?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: They usually send them to larger centres where they have units for... for elders. And because of loneliness and not familiar with the place, they don't usually last very long. And now, I'm really stressing and very serious about communities to have units built for their elders, even two or three units that could be built in the communities where we could help our elders be active. And we use them as teachers till the goal.

MG: That's heartbreaking, as you say, that they would end up in an unfamiliar community, and that that would have a real impact on them.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Yes, it's so true because, you know, as an elder, your wisdom, your traditional and wisdom keepers, the knowledge you need to pass on all the time on a daily basis. So what happens is when you're shipped away to another community, that way of life stop, you know? And the way that the elders used to describe knowledge and wisdom is that you get to a age in your life where you have to share that knowledge. And if you don't do that, then it gets very heavy a load. And you and you think about it a lot. And that's a really serious problem for elders.

MG: Tell me about the situation that you're in... in terms of a living situation. What sort of supports do you have that allow you to stay at home?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: My son and grandson live with me, you know? And I'm really happy for the... for the company because they provide the support. And my son even cook meals for me and looks after all the maintenance. And then when harvest time come, they make sure that they get me food from... from the land. So that... that really keeps me going. And I'm really happy to to have my family with me.

MG: And has that, you know, kept you in Kakisa. Has that support allowed you to stay in your community?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Yes, it has. I've been really active. You know, at 77, I'm still very active and very independent. But, you know, the support that is there from my family, I really appreciate it because this is the land of my ancestors... and this is why I am here because I'm so much part of this territory. And all the people in the community were somehow related to one another.

MG: Can you ever, I mean, you've talked a couple of times about how important that land is. And I mean, having left and then come back, can you ever imagine having to leave again?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: It never entered my mind, you know? Because ever since I was little, I was told that the land and the water was my teacher, my guidance for life because of the stories and legends that were passed on to me from my ancestors. So I could never see myself leaving. I have to be here.

MG: I mentioned that Kakisa is about a six-hour drive from Yellowknife, and about an hour and a half away from the next city centre in Hay River. I want to take a listen to how the chief in Kakisa, Lloyd Chicot, describes the impact that this distance has had on elders. Take a listen.

SOUNDCLIP

LLOYD CHICOT:: You know, we're out here in the middle of nowhere. And it's hard for a lot of our elders, especially the ones that don't speak English and things like that, to, you know, to go make doctors appointments, or even simple things like getting groceries, getting their money and that kind of stuff. So it's a struggle for a lot of them.

MG: Does Kakisa feel isolated? I mean, it's beautiful. And you talked about that connection with the land, but given your distance from groceries and from doctors and what have you, does it feel isolated?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: I feel the isolation because, you know, every community should have services in the communities to accommodate people. Myself, I have to drive an hour and a half, once or twice a week. It's tiring, you know, to be sitting in a car for an hour and a half each way. Kakisa is like centre area, but it is trouble for the... for the elders, especially the ones that don't have vehicles and have to... they can't even use a cell phone or use online banking. It's a real problem for elders and technology. And I really feel for my elders. That's why I keep advocating for them that services will be better. You know, even by tomorrow, something will start working for my elders.

MG: Tell me more about those services that are needed. I mean, aside from an easier access to buying groceries are going to the doctor, what else would elders who want to age in place, who want to age in their community, what else do they need?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: They need a fluent interpreter that will provide the communication for them. They need a unit that's well built to withstand the cold in the winter and that a safety plan is in place so that they don't have to worry about anything that even caretakers that should be in place also. And the elders should be used at every event so that they just don't sit idle at home and feel useless. They need to be part of the community involvement. And by creating these services in the communities, it will provide some income for our communities that have no employment.

MG: I know that that there weren't many cases in the territory, but in southern Canada in particular, there's been a real reckoning around how we as a society have, many people believe, abandoned our elders in long term care, in particular, where those communities have been devastated by the pandemic. Do you see an opportunity coming out of this for us to learn about how we might care for elders and seniors across this country in a better way, given what we've all gone through?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Yes, in in my traditional way of life, the elders, no matter what race or what where you come from, the elders are the teachers and they're the keepers of our society. Almost like, you know, when you're building something infrastructure to me, that's what the elders look like. And we need to be really careful and give a lot of support to the elders in our country, because I think that without them, we cannot go forward in a good way.

MG: Just before I let you go, you have taken a real responsibility to address this issue. And you're working really hard with your community to raise these issues as an elder yourself. What do you see as your responsibility in this?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: My job is to continue to provide wisdom and knowledge to my people and share with them. I do that already on CBC and I do that on my Face page I have a page that I provide a lot of additional information and it's always gearing towards younger generation for them to know who they are because it's really important for identity to be restored again. And for me this time a difficulty because of this big illness. And we don't call it by name in my tradition. We just call it illness because we don't want to attractors, it's an opportunity for people to reassess their present situations and also to look at other things to make it work again.

MG: When are you heading back out on the land for another snowshoe?

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Once I'm done, I guess I usually like to go before lunch and so that I build an appetite. And all winter I've been looking. There's no animal tracks around our community. And just yesterday when the lines for drive, I saw maybe about three. So the animals are slowly coming back and animals, the scent, when there's illness, the stay away.

MG: That's a good sign that they're coming back.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: Yeah, very good sign. And the days are getting longer, too, so something to look forward to. And the next coming is the geese and ducks. Well, that will really distract people from difficulties. I was going to the winter.

MG: Margaret, it's a real pleasure to speak with you. I really appreciate you taking time to talk to us. Thank you very much. And take care.

MARGARET LEISHMAN: OK, you too. Be safe.

MG: Margaret Leishman is an elder living in Kakisa in Northwest Territories. She spoke about getting homes built for elders and seniors. The territorial government has made housing for them a priority and has been building supported independent living complexes in the flying community of Fort Good Hope. There are now nine of these units waiting for seniors to move in. Angela Grandjambe is the housing manager in Fort, Good hope, Angela. Good morning to you.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Good morning.

MG: For somebody who has never seen Fort Good Hope. Can you describe what your community looks like?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: It's a beautiful community, it's a flying community, and we get flights four times a week and we have the winter access where could drive out the community during the winter, and that's from mid-December to in a march. And then after that, the ice goes on the river. Then we can and go on the river. We can go up and down the river to visit other communities.

MG: Tell me about your job. I mean, you're the housing manager there. What does that mean? What do you do?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Well, for my position, we have 73 units. We take care of public housing. Public housing is for low income families. And then we also take care of market housing, which is for professional people like nurses and teachers, and then also help. It's and those are for people that they qualify to get houses and then they pay like a rent or mortgage payment for three to five years. Eventually they get to own the house. So we take care of 73 units in the community.

MG: I mentioned in the introduction the nine units that have been created as part of the independent living complexes. And Margaret was speaking about that as well, the need for those elders and seniors to have somewhere in their community to live. What does that independent living centre in Fort Good Hope look like?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: It's nine units, there's a unit for the caretaker and eight units are for elders. They have their own room, they have appliances, they have their kitchen and their sleeping area and a little sitting room. And then the building has a main common area, I guess, where they can gather together. There's going to be TV in the room. And then that common room also has the kitchen.

MG: And the goal of this is so that those elders can be in the community. They can age in place, as they say.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Yes, it's really important for them.

MG: When you take a look at those at the nineplex, those nine units that are there, I know that people haven't moved into them yet. But what are you hearing from the Elders about this facility? Are they excited about this being in the community?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: I would say the younger elders, the ones that are not like in their 70s or 80s, the younger ones that are excited to move in there, but there's some elders are older elders that have lived in their homes all their lives and have woodstoves. So they're used to working under wood. They work on their wood. They bring wood into their homes and then they keep the fire going all day. Those are the ones that are saying, please, don't take that away from me. I want to do that. I want to continue to do that. If I move into that home, I won't be able to work on wood or keep the wood stove going. And the other one is the older ladies. The elderly ladies. They work on hives, the traditional hides. They said we won't have an opportunity if we move into a home. We won't have a chance to work on our hives, to smoke our hides. We want to keep that. We want to keep working and be active.

MG: So just to be clear, I mean, those units don't have the spaces, don't have that kind of set up that that those elders would be familiar with from the woodstoves and as you say, the area where they could work on the hives.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Tt's absolutely not available for the woodstoves, for them, but there is an opportunity once they move in and then the ground work done, the surrounding areas where it's done, that they could put up like 30 police to work on the hives and then that could be done. But there's no woodstove in that place.

MG: Do you see do you see that as a missed opportunity? I mean, again, you're trying to create supportive housing, but at the same time, if it's not the setup and the arrangement that people are familiar with and that they want, they may not move in there. Do you see that as a missed opportunity?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: This 92 year old elder, I know his words, I remember his words, he said, don't take that away from me. Don't take away my ability to work on wood and to keep the fire going every day. That's what keeps me going. That's what keeps me active.

MG: Were they consulted on that? I mean, in terms of the kind of housing and what they needed in the housing that was being created?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: No, there was no consultation with the elders on what they would prefer. But I would say a majority of the elders will be happy to move into the night place.

MG: What about yourself? I mean, you've lived in Fort Good Hope your whole life.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Yes, I lived in Fort Hood over all my life. And for myself, my hope for myself is to stay in my home as long as possible.

MG: And again, I mean, it sounds like a simple thing, but it is really important to be to be in the place where you want to be.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Yes, it's really important because to be taken away from where you've known all the love and support and we're all your relatives are your family, your community to be away from where your language has spoken to for your traditional food, to have access to your traditional foods, traditional activities. I would say that would be really hard. Your spirit would slowly die taken away from your home.

MG: Do you think we have learnt about the importance of that or been reminded of the importance of that over the course of this pandemic?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: I think so. When covid came, the elders, they couldn't understand that. They couldn't understand. They couldn't go to the stores. They couldn't visit each other. And it was hard for them, even though there's no cases here, how it affected us in a small, isolated community.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: You love your community. And so let me end by asking you about hope. Spring is in the air and it's arriving in different parts of the country, perhaps at different speeds. But it's coming and the sun's up and the days are getting a bit longer. What's giving you hope right now?

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: I hear just about every day, we hope with a vaccine that's going around, it's going to end soon, covid is going to come to an end and everybody looks forward to spring. The snow is slowly melting and everything will be coming back to life and the river will open up and people will be on the river. They'll be visiting family and setting their nests and going fishing and that. So I have great hope for that. You know, we will see the end of this covid, especially for our elders. It's hard for them during this time.

MG: That's a beautiful scene that you painted of the river opening up. And I hope that happens sooner rather than later and that you stay. Well, Angela, it's great to talk to you. Thank you very much.

ANGELA GRANDJAMBE: Thank you.

MG: Stay safe. Bye bye. Angela Grandjambe is the housing manager in Fort Good Hope in Northwest Territories. Next week, we continue Canada's road ahead. Our virtual RV will be in Alberta coming up after your regional update.

SOUNDCLIP

In the beginning, I really was imagining like going back and my kids going back to school and having a life going and going and finishing college and going to university and going back to life as normal. But I'm actually losing hope.

MG: The Canadian women and children left in limbo in Syrian detention camps, all while that country's civil war drags on. That story in 90 seconds. I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

Margaret Evans visits a detention camp for families of ISIS militants

Guests: Margaret Evans

[clip] [/clip]

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current. More than three years after ISIS was chased out of Raqqa, Syria, the question of what to do with the families of ISIS fighters who have Canadian citizenship has still not been answered. There are women and children still detained in camps in northeastern Syria. Last month, Canada's federal government provided travel documents for a four year old girl to enter this country. But others, including the girl's mother, are still living a life in limbo. Margaret Evans is a CBC senior correspondent based in London. She was at the al-Roj detention camp where she spoke with some of the Canadian women there, including that girl's mother. Margaret has just returned and joins me now from London. Margaret, good morning.

MARGARET EVANS: Hi, Matt.

MG: What is life like inside this camp?

MARGARET EVANS: Well, it's dismal, by all accounts to the to the women we spoke to. We weren't actually allowed to visit them in the tents that they're living in. But it is, as you might picture, any refugee camp, you know, behind barbed wire, armed guards. And there are about 2500 people in this particular camp. That's 784 families of suspected ISIS militants. The women we spoke to talked about basically the lack of a horizon, but also living in a camp in these cramped conditions. And they worried about money, food, being able to have medicine for the kids, that kind of thing.

MG: How many Canadians are there?

MARGARET EVANS: It's hard to tell precisely. The estimates are that it's between 30 and 35, with most of them being children and many of them kids under the age of six.

MG: One of the Canadian women who is there, as I mentioned, is the mother of that four year old who was brought to Canada in March. What can you tell us about her?

MARGARET EVANS: Well, all of the women we spoke to, I should say, asked that we not identify them so that that it would protect the identity in particular of their children, but they also wanted to guard their own identity. I think they're all aware that their plight is not viewed with sympathy by a lot of Canadians. They also have court cases pending. They have lawyers in Canada acting on their behalf. And they were all women who seemed really frightened to me. They were frightened of saying the wrong thing because they have lawyers acting on their behalf. They were frightened of speaking in front of their Syrian Kurdish jailers, and they were frightened of being stuck in that camp forever and frightened for the future of their children. And this young woman took the decision to basically get her child out, even though she knew that she couldn't get out. And so she, with the help of a former U.S. diplomat named Peter Galbraith, actually managed to get this done. He helped her sister travel to northern Iraq and then across the border into this region of Syria, which, of course, is is an autonomous region by the Syrian Kurds. So state players can say it's a state, in this area. We can't go. That's what Canada always says. But in any case, you asked about this young woman. She's like any woman you might meet. She was concerned about her child. She was friendly. She is not wearing a full niqab, the uniform of many ISIS women. Of course, she's now wearing a tight black jeans. She had a ball cap, sunglasses says she's been going through a lot of change. She's worried about these changes she's made because there are radicalised women in the camp. There are still people who are very strongly supporting ISIS. And she says that that decision to change the way she looks puts her in danger. She's been labelled an apostate.

MG: And she felt, again, that the situation that they were facing in that camp was desperate enough that she would take this dramatic step of letting her daughter come to Canada without her.

MARGARET EVANS: Yes. And I mean, again, Peter Galbraith is a former US diplomat, described it as a selfless act. And, you know, all of the women that we spoke to, you could see that because, I mean, they're living in this camp and they're sort of a huge part of their identity is the fact that they're mothers. She talked about having to pack the bag of her daughter as she left, you know, putting it in her her favourite teddy bear, her rabbit. And basically she called it sugar coating, but, you know, saying to her daughter, you go ahead, I'll come come later. But and she talked about sort of swinging between hope that that might actually happen and despair, but knowing that life in the camp is so miserable and and right now so without a horizon, that it was a chance for her daughter to have a life that she feels that she might be denied.

MG: Does she realistically think that they would be reunited?

MARGARET EVANS: I think she does. I think that, yes, I think that there's still hope alive in and certainly the four women that I talked to, I mean, like I said, sort of swinging between despair and hope. But, you know, she talked about trying to make amends. She said she joined a radicalisation programme that's available in the camp and saying she felt remorseful. She said, I don't know what I can do to show people how remorseful I am. You know, sort of sense that everybody makes mistakes. She says, I asked her, what were you like when you left? Like, how did how did this happen? And she described herself as someone who was quite easily led, that her circumstances were almost like she was being groomed. You she met someone in Canada who introduced her to this man she married and then came. She insists she committed no crimes while living within the Islamic State. She described herself as a housewife and said that actually things have been tougher for her since she was transferred to the camps. I mean, she went first to a much larger camp called al-Hol, which has 60,000 people. And it's a much, much harder place than al-Raj, which is where we think most of the Canadians have now been moved. And the Syrian Kurdish authorities say that they've been moved because it's a less dangerous camp. They're less likely to be targets of radicalisation there, and that the women themselves are less radicalised than people in that larger camp.

MG: Let's take a listen to another Canadian woman that you spoke with in the camp.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I'm talking mostly to my mom, and she's the one trying to push things over there, but it's not easy and she have a lawyer for me and everything, but is not really moving first. I was believing what she was like soon, soon, soon, things are moving. But after three years and a half, I'm just like, it's been too long. It's been too long.

MARGARET EVANS: So when you imagine your future, what are you thinking?

VOICE: In the beginning, I really was imagining like going back and my kids going back to school and having a life, you know, going and finishing college and going to university and going back to life as normal. But I'm actually losing hope.

MARGARET EVANS: When you left Canada and you came to be a part of the Islamic State, presumably, what were you hoping for then? What did you envisage for your future?

VOICE: [Whispers indistinctly]

MARGARET EVANS: OK. OK, you heard about the young woman in the camp who managed to send her daughter.

VOICE: Yes.

MARGARET EVANS: With her sister back to Canada.

VOICE: Yes.

MARGARET EVANS: How did that make you feel? What do you think about that decision?

VOICE: I wouldn't send my kids. I'm like they've been already through a lot, being here. And they were in prison. They went through fear and they're still going through fear right now. And I cannot let them go, I can't. For them, it will be hard. And for me also, I'm not the only reason here. I'm still coping and going, still going on with my day every day is because of them. Once they're gone, I wouldn't have anything else to do here.

MG: Margaret, that speaks to that despair that you were describing in the camp.

MARGARET EVANS: That's right, you know, and in that interview was interesting because we went through the interview and. And she said she didn't want to answer all all of the questions and she was very polite and her kids were very polite, too. She had two kids and with her and she she had a pair of glasses on and one of the lenses was broken. And I asked her about that. Well, that's not so much the issue. It's just I can't get enough meat to feed the kids and medicine. But at the end of the interview, she asked me, she said, do you mind if I ask you some questions? And of course, the question she asked was, is there any sign that the Canadian government is moving that they might be willing to bring us back to Canada? And I answered her honestly, which was, you know, at present, I don't see any signs of that. I obviously don't know for sure. And she started to cry after after that, very quietly and turned her head away. Didn't want her kids to see that. Yeah.

MG: Let's take a listen to another Canadian mother that you spoke with in the camp.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: [Crying[ You know, when you have sickness you can't do anything, I can't do anything, I cannot I wish [unintelligible], give me the judgement. Why you judging my kids? They have nothing to do with this. Why? Why? give me a sentence. I will accept it with pride. But my kdis, why?

MG: When she says, why are you judging my kids? Who does she blame for them being stuck in this camp?

MARGARET EVANS: Well, she blames the Canadian government for not bringing them home, not allowing the mothers to go home if they do send the kids out. I mean, there are only two instances we know of. This last woman we've been listening to. She came running up towards us as we were about to leave. She heard there were Canadian journalist in the camp and she begged us to take a picture of her daughter, who was around six, who was suffering from some kind of skin lesions on her forehead and saying, you know, my child is sick. Please take this picture. Please show it to Canadians that to show that the conditions that are happening here and it's the kids that are suffering, she obviously herself was extremely distraught and seemed emotionally exhausted and basically said, take me home. And if you want to put me on trial, I'll happily do that. But don't make my kids pay for what you're accusing me of, which was, you know, a common sentiment amongst the four women we talked to.

MG: Do you have a sense as to why Canada hasn't brought these women and children back to this country? Obviously, I mean, we've spoken about this on the programme. It is a politically incredibly sensitive issue and beyond politics as well. But what's your sense of it?

MARGARET EVANS: Well, it's hard to figure it out because, I mean, obviously the line from Ottawa has been consistent. They haven't changed it at all. They insist that it's too dangerous to send their consular officials to this part of Syria, even though, you know, several other nations, including the United States, have repatriated not just some of their citizens, the wives and the families, but the actual ISIS militants or those accused of being ISIS members. So you can do it. The Syrian Kurds say that Canada was actually the first country to approach them after the fall of Raqqa before the final act in the Islamic State in Syria, but said 2018 Canada actually approached them about repatriating not just the women and children, the family members, but those accused of being ISIS militants themselves, the Canadian men. We think they're probably about eight of them. They're kept in in prisons. And the Kurds say they went through this process where wherein they actually were getting travel papers ready, documents, all of that. And then something changed, the Canadian government just backed out and said, we're not doing it. And one of the women that we were talking to, and you just heard the woman who was talking about what she dreamed of when she went home, she confirmed that she was actually taken. When she was arrested by the Syrian Kurds in 2017 when she was trying to escape Islamic State territory or leave, her husband was a fighter, she says, who had sent her on. And she was taken to a prison and then taken to al-Roj camp for a couple of months and then sent back to the prison with the understanding that she and another Canadian woman were going to be handed over to the Canadian authorities. And she said, and then something went wrong and we don't know what. And they took us back to this camp and they've been there ever since. And she was one of the first two Canadians to be taken to that camp. And that was 2017.

MG: And so obviously, there's real desperation to get out of the camp and get home. But is there a sense that those women realistically think that that's going to happen?

MARGARET EVANS: I don't think they know. I think certainly they're trying. As I said, a number of them have lawyers. The Syrian Kurdish authorities, I should say, have, you know, at the beginning they were saying to Canada, take everybody back. They kind of change their tack a little bit lately, saying, take the women and children. We're ready to hand them over. And especially the women. We know for sure that they haven't committed any crimes beyond being a part of the Islamic State through their family or their husbands. But now they're saying, look, Canada, if you're not going to take your men back then help us set up some kind of a tribunal and we'll try them here because we do have the evidence to convict them. That becomes difficult again for Canada because they can simply say, how do you set up a tribunal, an international tribunal in a part of a country where it's not recognised as being a state? So I think there's a long way to go before this issue is resolved. But the Syrian Kurds are begging other countries, Canada not alone. And we've consistently heard recently the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross saying you must take your citizens home. It is an unfair burden on this part of the world. We've seen the U.N. secretary general calling out Canada for failing, especially to take the women and children home and criticism by human rights groups of forcing women to make a decision where they might have to choose to send their children when they know they can't go with them. So you're separating, basically, families.

MG: Margaret, I really appreciate hearing from you about this and from what you saw there in those camps. Thank you very much.

MARGARET EVANS: It's a pleasure, Matt. Thanks for having me.

MG: Margaret Evans is a CBC senior correspondent based in London.

[Music: Theme]

Some zebras are developing odd stripes, and humans could be to blame, says biologist

Brenda Larison

MG: You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One. My name is Matt Galloway. OK, picture a zebra. What do you see? I'm guessing that you see a horse like animal with those distinctive black and white stripes. It turns out that not all zebras are striped. Some of them have polka dots, for example. But you didn't picture that a biologist started noticing more of the funky looking zebras in certain populations in Africa. And so she did some digging. Brenda Larison is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at UCLA and affiliated faculty in the Centre for Tropical Research. She is in Los Angeles, California. Brenda, good morning.

BRENDA LARISON: Good morning.

MG: As I say, I think a lot of people have an idea of what a zebra looks like. So describe what a zebra without those stripes looks like.

BRENDA LARISON: Well, there's a few different varieties. Sometimes there's, some people have probably seen the blonde ones in the news, as we call them, which just have blonde coloured stripes instead of black. The ones that we studied have spots on the saddle or kind of faded area on the saddle instead of stripes. And also another type is what we call pseudo melanistic, because melanism causes a pure black animal. But these animals look as if the stripes kind of started growing in the middle of their of torso and tried to spread outward to the extremities, but got stuck. And so they have these odd, mottled, weird looking stripes, a lot of black on their body and their legs and face are almost all white with just the tiniest strips of black. So they look very strange.

MG: I think I remember a few years ago seeing, I want to say it was in National Geographic, a photo of a foal that they were describing as having polka dots rather than stripes.

BRENDA LARISON: Yes. And that's another one that tends to have stripes on the legs that the bodies, they're mostly black with kind of, they look like they're black with white stripes on the legs and then more of a polka dot body. And those ones I don't have any samples of as yet, but those are probably the most rare ones to see.

MG: How does one go about studying these zebras?

BRENDA LARISON: So what we do is typically in wild populations in particular, is you go out with an air rifle. It's this air powered dart gun. And you have a dart. It's sort of like just what people have probably seen the vets do when they're going to immobilize an animal. So you have a syringe, so the gun shoots a syringe. But this syringe, instead of having a needle with medication that puts the animal to sleep, it has a hollow needle that takes a biopsy. And so it just shoots into the animal, takes a little chunk of skin and drops out and then we can go find it.

MG: And where are you doing this?

BRENDA LARISON: Wherever zebras occur that we can get permits to do it, basically. So we've done it from Kenya and Uganda and Zambia and South Africa.

MG: How common is it that there would be these aberrations in the coats of zebras?

BRENDA LARISON: It's not very common. It's fairly rare to see, but in some populations it is increasing. So if you think about Etosha National Park in Namibia, which has probably 30,000 zebras, you can go on a trip and spend a week, as I have done, going throughout the entire park and see one or two. Whereas if you could go to a park in Uganda called Lake Mburo, which has maybe about a hundred and fifty, two hundred zebras, and see five or six of them. You know, so you've got maybe five percent of the population. Rwanda that maybe has 10 percent of the population with these spotted type of patterns.

MG: And so, in simple terms, that your humble radio correspondent might understand what is going on here with these zebras?

BRENDA LARISON: So the pattern, we think, we don't know exactly what causes the pattern. Our long-term suspicion and what we've been searching for - so we've been trying to figure out what genetically causes the pattern. And so our suspicion has been that it's a recessive trait. In other words, you need to have two copies of the same version of the gene that causes it in order to see that expressed in the individual. An individual could have one copy of it and be perfectly normally striped. But if they have two copies of that version of the gene, then they're not normally striped.

MG: And how so? How would that happen?

BRENDA LARISON: So what's happening in places where you see more individuals that are showing this pattern, these odd patterns, is that those populations have higher levels of inbreeding. So we all know that we have, we get a copy of the same genes from our mother and our father, right. But if our mother and our father are brother and sister, then we have a good chance of having a lot of the same genes that both came from grandpa, and a lot of the same genes that both came from grandma, right. And so we might get exactly the same gene, the same copy of the same gene from your grandparent - either one of your grandparents. So that could happen across like twenty five percent of your genome, which would be a huge amount. So that just increases the likelihood that any one of these genes in which there's a recessive trait is going to be expressed.

MG: Why is it that the zebras might be inbreeding?

BRENDA LARISON: Small population size and fencing and human populations surrounding all the parks. So plain zebras are very widespread. But they're often in very tiny little reserves that are fenced and they don't they don't go out. There's no exchange of genes between reserves. And so over time, the population can become more and more related to each other. And so that's what's happening there. And that's not to say that you can, so, you know, you see a few of these in Etosha National Park. Etosha National Park is like I said, thirty thousand zebras. There's not an inbreeding problem there. But nonetheless, individuals, some individuals could by chance just get the same copy of the same gene, and in small parks, there's an inbreeding problem as well.

MG: What concerns you the most about what you've learned when it comes to this?

BRENDA LARISON: What concerns me is that the plains Zebra, were, are very widespread. So we tend to think of them and many animals that are very widespread as not being of concern. And when you actually look more deeply at some of these animals, you realize that, you know, they're not in that great of shape throughout that entire range where they exist. Just because you can see them throughout the half of Africa, a lot of those populations may not be that healthy. So that concerns me, you know. And the fact that it seems like from our research that a lot of that is happening because of fragmentation, because of human population.

MG: I was going to say, how much of that is about human interaction and the human impact?

BRENDA LARISON: So we think a lot. We certainly in our paper saw a correlation between human population levels and the degree to which there was inbreeding. But again, that's something that we're looking into more deeply now, just trying to find out what's the history of the inbreeding, is how much of it is ancestral, how much of it is human caused. So we're going to try to figure that out.

MG: Not to mix metaphors, but do you see this as sort of like a canary in the coal mine situation, that this gives us some sense, some early sense as to as to what might be happening with these populations?

BRENDA LARISON: Yes, I think so. I think it's important for us to think about and I think it's important for us to think about, you know, all the other species that we really don't think are having any issues.

MG: So if you step back from this a little bit, I mean, the bigger picture of this in terms of what you're learning and what you're learning about human interaction and the effect of human life on these these species is what?

BRENDA LARISON: Well, it's not good. I mean, and there and there are so many ways in which it's not good, right. It's not only just our populations and we're sort of shutting animals in. It's climate change, all these things. And another problem, in fact, if you think about climate change and this habitat fragmentation together, animals are going to need to be able to move. And with climate change. And they're not going to be able to. And so they're either going to perish in the parks where they're, where they exist, where the climate change is, to where they can't survive, or we're going to have to be doing facilitated migration. I mean, plains zebra populations have already blinked out in some places because of fencing, because, I don't know if you know, but plains zebra go on these huge migrations. If you've heard of the the Serengeti migration and the Okavango, and so plains zebras are part of that. And in some places where they've been fenced in, they're not able to migrate. They need to migrate because they need to follow the food. And when they're fenced in, in some populations, they haven't been able to move and follow the food where they where they need to, especially in some desert areas like the Kalahari. And those populations have gone extinct.

MG: You said something just and this is pure dumb question, but really interesting. You said something about how initially you started doing this to figure out why zebras have stripes. Why do zebras have stripes?

BRENDA LARISON: Well, there's two sides to that. There's the question of the function of stripes, which I've done a little bit with. And then there's the question of the genetic basis which we've been trying to work on and have absolutely zero idea at this point. So if you're interested in the functional question, there's a bunch of hypotheses. Some of those that have the most traction have to do with predator confusion and avoiding biting flies. And there's a slight amount of evidence for stripes acting as a cooling mechanism. But that's very far from proven as yet. But there is some small amount of evidence for it.

MG: This is so interesting. I really appreciate speaking with you. I mean, you think of zebras and we think we know, because we see them, there's a zebra. It's just fascinating to learn more about the species. Brenda, thank you very much.

BRENDA LARISON: Thank you very much for having me.

MG: Brenda Larison is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and affiliated faculty in the Centre for Tropical Research at UCLA. She was in Los Angeles. That is The Current for this Thursday. Coming up next on CBC Radio One, it's Q. Patrick Hunter is a true spirit. Ojibway artist from Red Lake, Ontario created the digital artwork that accompanies the first ever land acknowledgement for the Chicago Blackhawks. We'll talk to Tom Power about his designs, indigenous representation in sport and the controversy surrounding that team's name and logo. You can hear that coming up in just a few moments on CBC Radio One. In the meantime, that's it for us. I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current. We'll talk to you tomorrow.

Thursday April 1, 2021 Full Episode Transcript

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