The Current for April 28, 2021
Today on The Current:
Provincial premiers are trying to navigate the pandemic's third wave, which is hitting hard in parts of Canada, and trying to win a tight race between the variants and the vaccines. We discuss provincial politics and the fallout from COVID-19 with our national affairs panel: Robson Fletcher, a reporter for CBC Calgary; Vassy Kapelos, host of CBC's Power & Politics in Ottawa; and Jean Laroche, the CBC's legislative reporter in Halifax.
Plus, how do you harvest swarms of locusts? A new project in Kenya is figuring out ways to turn them into animal feed, in the hopes of turning a pest into a seasonal crop and source of income for local communities. We hear from Scilla Allen, project manager with The Bug Picture, a regenerative agriculture company; Achegei Abdi Adan, who works with local NGOs in Kenya; and James Egonyu, a research scientist with the Insects for Food, Feed and other Uses program in Nairobi.
And there are calls for patents on COVID-19 vaccines to be lifted, to ensure equitable and faster access. Would it get the shots to the places that need them? We ask Siham Rayale, Oxfam Canada's policy and advocacy lead on humanitarian and refugee issues; Andrei Iancu, the former director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office; and Gian Gandhi, COVAX co-ordinator at UNICEF's Supply Division.