Brits in denial over 'insidious' racism directed at Harry and Meghan, says U.K.-based writer

Guests: Stephen Bates, Carolyn Harris, Amna Saleem

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VOICE 1: The royal family is tonight facing the biggest rupture to the firm in decades.

VOICE 2: There's a family crisis, but one that involves Queen Elizabeth and heir to the throne.

VOICE 3: We know the Queen is said to be very upset. Prince Philip, he's reportedly, "spitting blood."

VOICE 4: After the wedding and the honeymoon period was over, I was quite dismayed. You know Kate cradles her bump and it's like, oh, it's a lovely, warm maternal thing. Meghan cradles her bump, it's like ooh, look at the way she's cradling her bump.

VOICE 5: Meghan genuinely cradled her bump in a weirder way than Kate.

[Song: "I Want To Break Free" by Queen]

MG: It's kind of perfect, isn't it? If Meghan and Harry had a theme song these days, Queen's "I Want to Break Free" would fit the bill. The royal drama started last week with the couple's announcement that they wanted to step back from royal life. The queen apparently was taken aback and a big summit was called. Now the couple appears to have her blessing to live part time in Canada.

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VOICE 1: They're coming to Canada? I didn't even know that. How exciting. Lovely.

VOICE 2: If you like the cold, come on down, you know.

VOICE 3: You get a very warm coat.

VOICE 4: Meghan has just the association with Canada from filming Suits here. So that's cool. I get why they would want to come and be here.

VOICE 5: Canada is an awesome place.

VOICE 6: Harry and Meghan is good for the Canada economy and is good for our country because they are celebrities, they are queen and prince for us. So they are most welcome.

VOICE 7: I don't really care if they're here. People should probably just let them live their life.

VOICE 8: There is a whispering or I don't know that they're choosing Vancouver. It will be great to be here in Toronto. Bundle up Harry.

MG: Bundle up indeed. The decision by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to step back as senior royals leaves many unanswered questions and an ongoing debate about the Crown itself. Stephen Bates is a former royal correspondent for The Guardian and the author of Royalty Inc.: Britain's Best Known Brand. Carolyn Harris is a historian and royal commentator based in Toronto and the author of Raising Royalty: A Thousand Years of Royal Parenting. And Amna Saleem is a Glasgow-based screenwriter and broadcaster. Good morning to you all.

CAROLYN HARRIS: Good morning.

STEHPHEN BATES: Morning.

AMNA SALEEM: Morning.

MG: Stephen. Take us inside that room at Sandringham. What do you think happened?

STEHPHEN BATES: Well, I gather the meeting lasted a couple of hours. And Harry was with the queen for a bit longer than that. They must have sketched out the areas of contention about their future life, chiefly money. Who's going to pay what? And how are they going to be funded? But also questions of status and how much they're going to perform as far as royal duties are concerned.

MG: What happens next, do you think?

STEHPHEN BATES: Well, it's gone to advisers and private secretaries and the bureaucrats behind the scenes at the palace to work out some form of modus vivendi. Really? How it's going to work out what Harry and Meghan can be expected to do. Where they're going to live, how they're going to divvy up their time. And hopefully the queen wants it settled within days, maybe by the end of this week. I just thought it would take a bit longer than that, frankly.

MG: But there was no great reversal or anything like that. The queen was not able to convince them to remain senior members of my firm.

STEHPHEN BATES: No, I think that was something that was never going to happen once they'd gone public about all this. And of course, the queen was never going to stop them separating themselves off from the royal family to a certain extent anyway, because who wants an unwilling member of the firm? And if you're someone who's local hospital is being opened by Prince Harry, you want him to be doing it wholeheartedly, not on sufferance. And that was obviously a consideration as well.

MG: Just the last point on that, Stephen. They've had a clean sweep of the newspaper front pages for the last few days. How are Britons reacting to this news? Is it sadness that there was not some sort of agreement to get them to stick around or don't let the door hit you on the way out?

STEHPHEN BATES: Well, it depends where you stand. I think younger Brits are feeling probably good on them. Let them go and live their own lives. Older Brits, perhaps more royalist are feeling sorry that this has caused a crisis within the royal family and not actually within the monarchy as an institution.

MG: And we'll get to that in a moment. Amna Saleem, are you surprised that Harry and Meghan wanted out?

AMNA SALEEM: No. And I said this before, but I feel like the warnings were there. Their boundaries were consistently and into intruded upon. And this is the consequences of that. Had they been able to uphold those boundaries, we may be seeing a different story in the party has made it clear that he wants to protect his wife and his child and that's exactly what he's doing.

MG: And by to do that, he needs to leave and they need to leave the firm, as it's called.

AMNA SALEEM: Exactly. They have to leave. And because the British media has been relentless in their attack against Meghan Markle, a mixed race black men. She could not be more of a model minority. And that's still not enough. The contrast between Kate Middleton itself is jarring. And I feel like there's a sense of cognitive dissonance on the entire Britain right now because they're claiming not to see the racism, except it could not be more blatant. No one is saying the N-word or any particular words, but it is so insidious, it's hard to escape. So, of course, Meghan wants to leave. Why would she want to stick around for that? She had more freedom and she had more success outside of the royal family. All that's happened is that she'd been severely restricted.

MG: Carolyn Harris are you surprised? As a historian, are you surprised that they've taken this step?

CAROLYN HARRIS: I'm surprised that there has been a big public announcement that they're stepping back as senior members of the royal family before all of the details have been established. But I would not have been surprised by a gradual withdrawal from her duties as senior members of the royal family. Harry and Meghan have had a very difficult relationship with the British press, which has critiqued them on a variety of levels. There has been a lot of emphasis on Meghan not fitting in, and that can be interpreted in various ways. Her background, the fact that she's divorced her American. There has been critiques of everything from what they spend on their home renovations to Meghan serving avocado toast at tea. So there has been a lot of press intrusion into Harry and Meghan's lives. It's clearly something they want to step away from.

MG: Amna Saleem, you talked about racist coverage from the British press. There was a piece that was in The New York Times and it talked about why she wants out and the headline was "It's the racism." Give us an example of what you're referring to, because it's not just about her, it's about her entire family.

CAROLYN HARRIS: It is. When you look at the treatment that her mother has received as well in their connotations of slavery keep coming up. Meghan is 150 years removed. And then you just you have constant references, without just overtly mentioning race. It's enough for instance, we had publications trying to debate or guess how black their baby would be. I don't know, where that's acceptable in any publication or even just in polite society. It's been undeniable. And then again, the contrast between Kate and Meghan. For instance, Kate is often described as sweet and introverted, whereas Meghan Markle is often called sexual or dominating, which is quite frankly, coded racism for black women. Everything about her is more angry and assertive, which is something that definitely black women go through.

MG: Weren't there great promises when the wedding happened? I mean, you wrote a piece about this in the paper. There were from the preacher to the gospel choir, this belief that that this was going to change, not just the royal family, but you know, this would change Britain perhaps. What happened to that?

AMNA SALEEM: We definitely did have hopes. I think that most of us knew that it wasn't going to be the utopia that we've hoped. The waiting itself is beautiful and different and progressive in a way that we haven't seen before in Britain in that scope, but the media scrutiny up until the waiting and beyond has still been relentless. So as much as I had hoped that this would be a catalyst for change it has actually gone exactly how most people of colour have predicted, and that has been this unrelenting attack on Meghan Markle to the point that we have actually hounded her out of the royal family.

MG: Stephen Bates has the press hounded Meghan Markle out of the royal family?

STEHPHEN BATES: I don't believe they have. I I recognize some of the comments that Amna has made, but I think that the most spiteful and sneering comments have come from a few columnists on one or two of the tabloid papers. I think generally they've had pretty positive coverage and I think there are aspects of the way Harry and Meghan have conducted themselves, which are legitimate objects of criticism.

MG: How so?

STEHPHEN BATES: And I think that, for instance, lecturing the world on climate change while taking private jets is something that's perfectly permissible to comment on and to criticize. They are not impervious to criticism.

MG: Carolyn Harris, they apparently will split their time between Britain and perhaps Canada. Would the press here in Canada treat this couple any differently than they've been treated in the UK?

CAROLYN HARRIS: I think that the press will treat them differently here as we don't have quite the same tradition of intruding into the private lives of public figures unless that's considered to be in the public interest. And royalty who have come to Canada and there have been royal visitors to Canada since the late 18th century, have found that Canada is a place where they're able to relax and operate in a more informal manner and to be able to just fit in to existing societies.

MG: They're not going to be able to just fit into existing society though.

CAROLYN HARRIS: Well, what I mean is being able to take up Canadian pastimes, perhaps meet people from different walks of life. Some of the 19th and early 20th century are royal visitors to Canada such as Queen Victoria's daughter, Princess Louise, whose husband was governor general from 1878 to 1883. She was praised for taking up sleigh riding and skating. Her husband tried curling.

MG: You could see them out on the curling rink, perhaps.

CAROLYN HARRIS: There was a sense of them just throwing themselves into Canadian pastimes. So it's something that members of the royal family have enjoyed being able to live more informally here.

MG: Amna Saleem there is a line or a narrative that has developed that Meghan Markle knew in some ways what she was getting into, that she married, not into any normal family, but she married into the royal family. And what did she expect? What do you make of that line of questioning?

AMNA SALEEM: That's a disturbing comment that people keep making, because what they're saying is that how dare she not just swallow the racism? How dare she not stand up for herself? How dare she not swallow the misogyny on top of that? And we have to remember that Meghan is actually quite familiar with Canada. It must be a place that has treated her bear for her to want to return. But no, it's very strange because I've actually been personally asked on TV shows, not only to get numerous examples which worry me because what world have they been living in that they haven't been seeing the same thing that millions of us have. But too, why didn't she prepare? How do you prepare for racism? That's an answer. I would love an answer to that question. Why would you ever expect anyone to prepare for that? Do we as women, as we make appear with ourselves, imagine an employer said to a woman, oh, by the way, you should prepare for sexism. And then when she complains about it to say, oh well, you should have known. That is unacceptable. I'm pretty sure we have laws against that. So why does it make it any different for race. And Meghan, it's right that they are able to be criticized? No one is saying that, but to deny that the criticism is underlined by race and racism is just, it's just willingly being ignorant about the entire situation.

MG: Is this part of this Amna also about a generational change? They represent a younger generation and perhaps their idea of duty or how you follow duty is different than an older generation.

AMNA SALEEM: I think so. I don't think they're exactly related, but I think Brexit over here showed that because the age difference was remarkable. It could not be more staggering. And that seems to be showing in the same reflection with Meghan and Harry. And it's also, if you think about it, the way that Meghan has been portrayed is if she's manipulating Harry. Harry has no agency in this. He is the prince, for heaven's sake. How it can't take one women to suddenly make him abandon his life. We have to look at his background, with his mother died in such a public and tragic way and the parallels, unfortunately, seem to be quite hoarse. So I don't see why that trauma is in, we're not taking that seriously. Of course, he doesn't want that to happen to his family.

MG: Stephen Bates, what's going to happen now? They've talked about being financially independent. How are they going to make any money if they aren't part of the firm and are doing the things that one in the firm is expected to do?

STEHPHEN BATES: That's a very good question and it's an unanswered question at the moment. There's talk of a charitable foundation being set up to promote the causes and the charities that they support and believe in. But of course, that can't subsidize their lifestyle. It seems quite likely that Harry has thought that he would continue to get quite a large subsidy from the Duchess of Cornwall Estates, which is what funds his father's private life. I dare say that some of that will continue. But I do think that once the immediate surprise of celebrity wears off in their new life, I think they may struggle because however they earn their money, it's going to be constrained. They can't be seen to endorse commercial products and maybe not even give sort of royal sign of approval to the sort of commercial deals that maybe they'll have to pursue. I think all that has to be worked out still.

MG: Carolyn, where do you think this goes? There's talk of maybe there'll be a Netflix deal. Maybe they'll sign a book deal. Maybe they'll go on speaking tours. Can members of the royal family, whether they're immediate or now, you know, stepping back, can they do any of that?

CAROLYN HARRIS: Well, they need to avoid the perception that they're cashing in on their titles. When Harry's cousin, Princess Beatrice, marketed herself as a paid speaker and used her royal titles in that marketing, there was an immediate backlash and that plan was withdrawn. There is also some criticism of Harry's cousin, Peter Phillips, Princess Anne's son who sold his wedding photos to Hello magazine. So that sort of thing is viewed as cashing in. But there are other opportunities for the royal couple to pursue an outside career. Harry's a trained helicopter pilot from his time in the military, so he could go down that career path. William certainly worked as a search and rescue pilot at the time of his marriage to Katherine. So certainly Harry, with his experience with the military, has other options in terms of pursuing a career besides paid endorsements.

MG: Just in the last couple of minutes that we have, Stephen, I'll start with you briefly. What does this mean for the royal family and the brand of the royal family? How big of a blow is it?

STEHPHEN BATES: I think it's damaged it. I think that the strategy that the royals were adopting where Prince Harry and Prince William were going to take over more of the royal duties, more of the royals public role is obviously dented by this. I think the institution itself will clearly survive. There is a succession. Harry was never going to be king and I guess the battered ship will continue to sail on.

MG: Carolyn, does the battered ship continue to sail on even with a very public spat about who is on the ship?

CAROLYN HARRIS: Yes, I think we're going to see Charles and Camilla, the prince of Wales, and the duchess of Cornwall, and William and Katherine, the duke and duchess of Cambridge, taking on even more public engagements as there are fewer working members of the royal family. So I think this does represent change to the institution and may well set precedents for future generations. There must be discussions happening about Charlotte and Louis and the younger children of William and Katherine and how their lives will unfold in the future.

MG: Amna Saleem, last to you. One of the things that people have said is that it shows that in some ways this family's just like other families, that it has its issues. These issues are just playing out in public and I wonder whether that damages the royal brand.

AMNA SALEEM: If anything, I personally find that endearing. It's nice to know that other families are just as complicated and unfortunately they do have to deal with it spilling into public life, which I can imagine is unfortunate and it's uncomfortable. So I don't quite envy that. But I just wanted to quickly mention that Prince Charles has aligned with Waitrose. So I think that we're being very hypocritical when we're seeing that Harry and Meghan can't do standard things when the royal family are very much cashing in on the royal title.

MG: It's just how you, it's just how you cash in, I suppose.

AMNA SALEEM: It is, so that's the case, and I'm excited to see the monarchy go in a different way and hopefully be outed for the redundant institution that it is.

MG: People have said that this is a preview of perhaps Season 7 of The Crown. We'll wait and see whether that plays out on the small screen. Good to talk to you all this morning. Thank you.

AMNA SALEEM: Thank you.

CAROLYN HARRIS: Thank you.

STEHPHEN BATES: Thank you.

MG: Stephen Bates, former royal correspondent for The Guardian, author of Royalty Inc.: Britain's Best Known Brand. Carolyn Harris is an historian and royal commentator and the author of Raising Royalt: A Thousand Years of Royal Parenting. Amna Saleem is a Glasgow-based screenwriter and broadcaster. Well the CBC News is next and then.

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VOICE: For achievement in directing, the director's branch of the academy nominates.

MG: Men. A whole list of men.

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VOICE: Congratulations to those men.

MG: Add that snub to the fact that most of the acting nominees are white and you've got people calling for the revival of the OscarsSoWhite hashtag. We'll talk to the woman who started it. That's coming up in about 30 minutes. My name's Matt Galloway and you're listening to The Current.

[Music]

Fighting the scourge of plastics in our oceans – The Fix

Guests: Shawn Bath, Chelsea Rochman

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

[Music: Theme]

MG: Still to come, the opioid overdose crisis has cities like Thunder Bay scrambling to find solutions. Meanwhile, another drug is taking hold, crystal meth. And there is no alternative for people who want to quit. That's coming up in about 40 minutes. But first, our new series: It's The Fix.

[Music]

MG: Now I will admit the news cycle these days feels kind of overwhelming. From conflict in the Middle East to stories about climate change, you take it all together, frankly, it can be depressing. It is not the whole story, though. There are people, many people who right now are working on solutions to the big problems that are facing Canada and the world. So this morning we're launching a series called The Fix, focussing on people who are quietly working on ways to improve life for everyone. We will focus on the solutions big and small. And this morning, we start big with the oceans. It is estimated that at least eight million tons of plastic are dumped into the ocean every year. If you're trying to figure out what that means, that's the equivalent of a million male African elephants or a billion pugs. Does that put it into context? Shawn Bath from St. John's, Newfoundland, is one of the many people trying to find a fix.

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SHAWN BATH: There's four or five cars there. Hopefully school bus. It's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking.

MG: Shawn Bath from within a scuba diving mask in Bay Roberts, Newfoundland, for the last year and a half, the former sea urchin harvester has been hauling in a different kind of catch, garbage. Thus far he figures he's lugged away more than 9000 kilograms. That's about 20,000 pounds of garbage from under the sea. Shawn Bath, good morning.

SHAWN BATH: Good morning.

MG: If I were to dive into the water with you around the wharfs in your province, what would I see?

SHAWN BATH: You'd see lots of old tires and car batteries, bottles, all kinds of stuff.

MG: Describe some of the things. I mean, those are three things. What else is under the under the sea?

SHAWN BATH: Well, pretty much everything that we had back in the day that we didn't want anymore. We tossed it over the wharves. That's where it went to. Back in the day, there was no local dumps. So pretty much everything people had they didn't want, went over board. And unfortunately, today, some people are still doing that. Not many, but there are a few.

MG: What's the strangest thing you've hauled out?

SHAWN BATH: I found a statue of Buddha one day. I dove in close to the wharf, and when I was digging through to kelp for tires, I uncovered a little probably a 16-inch high statue of Buddha.

MG: Somebody had a change of heart.

SHAWN BATH: A change of religion, yeah.

MG: I said you hauled out about 20,000 pounds of trash.

SHAWN BATH: At least. I'd say it was closer to 30, but we keep our numbers down just in case our estimates are off a little because we don't weigh all the trash we take out obviously. We weigh most of it. We weigh pretty much all the different sized tires and we just multiply that by the the weight of tire.

MG: What does 20,000 of trash look like?

SHAWN BATH: A big mess. It's a giant mountain of old rubber tires, stuffed full of kelp, car batteries, netting, fish boxes, whatever. Whatever people didn't want anymore. So it went in the water.

MG: Is there a dive that you've been on where you do this, even you couldn't believe the amount of trash that you found?

SHAWN BATH: Yeah, I won't say what harbour it was, but I did. I spent a winter on harbour in particular on one wharf. And I say we took the equivalent of five to six hundred standard sized car tires off the bottom surrounding that wharf.

MG: That's a lot.

SHAWN BATH: That's crazy.

MG: And is it just all there like visible when you're underwater or do you have to dig for it? What does it look like?

SHAWN BATH: Well sometimes you're just swimming through a forest of kelp and you've got to keep digging your way through the kelp And some of these tires are barely sticking out of dirt underneath six feet of kelp. So sometimes they're really hard to find. But once you find a half a dozen or whatever you known, if there's a half dozen chance, there's a chance there's a lot more. So then you start digging through the kelp more and more and you try to get them all cleaned up.

MG: Why is there so much garbage in and around these fishing wharfs? I mean, you've even hinted at this, but tell me a bit more about this.

SHAWN BATH: Well, like you said, there was no dumps around years ago. So a lot of the trash went off the wharves. Most of the tires, these tires were dumped or put on the wharves for bumpers. And some have rotten ropes or the pressure to bolts crossing over against the tires, whatever, sometimes break the ropes, right?

MG: And they just fall into the water.

SHAWN BATH: And they just fall in. And where they're free, you can go to the garage and get a tire, right? So rather than hard divers going to get them, it's easier to go to the garage and get some new ones. Just tie new ones, right?

MG: But that's different than car batteries and everything else.

SHAWN BATH: Yeah no,tThe car batteries did not go in there accidentally. Those were intentionally dumped then, right. A lot of times the boats come in and if their batteries are not working or whatever, just dump them down between the wharf and the boat and nobody sees it, right?, Which is a heartbreaking thing.

MG: What would lead somebody to think that that would be a good idea to just throw it off the side of the boat into the water?

SHAWN BATH: Nobody thinks that's a good idea. When they do that, they know that it's just an easy way to get rid of some trash, right? Now, mind you, most people are not doing that. That's a very small percentage who do that, right, but it only takes a few bad apples to ruin the bunch, right?

MG: But enough people have been doing it though. You've got twenty or thirty thousand pounds of garbage that you've hauled.

SHAWN BATH: Yes. If we had the funding we need to do this on a bigger scale with our cruise properly we could have easily hauled in a million pounds of trash insanely at a time.

MG: Oh my goodness. You say that it's heartbreaking. Why do you use that word?

SHAWN BATH: Well, it is. I mean, I grew up here in Newfoundland. I spent a lifetime in and on the water. And everybody I know made a living off the ocean, right? my father and my grandfather, my great grandfather, and to see people just blatantly disrespecting something that fed them and gave them entertainment and just gave them a way of life for all these years. That's definitely heartbreaking to me.

MG: You see a disconnect between the fact that, as you say, people would make a living off of this and then they'd be willing to just throw their trash in there as well.

SHAWN BATH: Yeah, for sure.

MG: What happens if I want to talk about hauling this stuff out, but if this stuff were to sit on the floor of the ocean, what would happen?

SHAWN BATH: Well, eventually it will break down and be distributed through the ocean in form of microplastic. Car batteries, the plastic part will break down in probably 40, 50 years. And that'll spread out through the ocean in microplastic. And then you get lead left behind, loads of it and you got acid getting into the water. As regards to tires, it takes 60 to 80 years for standard size car tire to break down and disappear. That's just sitting on the surface, right. Once that's getting into the, once that's broken down and it's getting into the environment, I mean we can't retrieve it then. I mean, now we need to get this stuff back whilst in one big piece, right?

MG: Because it's not just going to vanish. All those pieces of rubber and what have you are just going to be absorbed by other parts in the ocean.

SHAWN BATH: It breaks down into ever smaller pieces. Fish are eating this plastic and we're eating fish and we're wondering why we're getting sick, right?

MG: How do you drag these things or a tire out of the water?

SHAWN BATH: Well, first when we started, I used to walk in on the wharf and I'd take a probably 200 foot of rope in my hand and I jump off the wharf. Literally I just dive off the wharf with a rope in my hand and I swim out and every time I find a tire, I just got an arm with a rope right. Once I got 15 or 20 tires tied on that piece of rope, I tie that rope to the tire and then I'd swim back in, I'd get on board my truck. Well, first of all, I tie a rope on my truck and go around with the anvils and then I get in my truck, I put her in for four-wheel drive and I'd reverse her. And I pulled the tires over the side of the wharf with my truck. That's pretty much how we did it, first of all.

MG: That sounds like hard work.

SHAWN BATH: It is. It's brutally hard work.

MG: Yeah, see these are heavy things.

SHAWN BATH: It is, yeah. Most of these tires, you're not getting over the side of the wharf by hand, right?

MG: You're diving all year?

SHAWN BATH: Yes, absolutely.

MG: So how cold is the water?

SHAWN BATH: It's definitely cold. It's not comfortable. When you're diving anywhere in Newfoundland this time of year, you're not gonna be comfortable, right. That's out of the question.

MG: How do you stay warm?

SHAWN BATH: I work hard. I wear lots of clothes and I work really hard. When you're underwater, there's times like I'm swimming around. If I don't have a rope on me or whatever, I'll pick up three or four tires and put on one arm, maybe three or four tires on the other arm. And I'll be in 30, 40 feet of water or 20 feet of water, whatever the case might be. And I could be 200 yards away from the wharf. Now I've got six or seven tires on my arms and I got to try to get back to that wharf, right? so as you can imagine, that builds up the heat in your body quite good.

MG: You look like Popeye.

SHAWN BATH: That's crazy, man.

MG: Giant arms.

SHAWN BATH: Yeah. If you could see it, you'd love it.

MG: Aside from from that, I mean, are there times when you're in the water and you're building up heat, but it's still really cold? Do you think I need to get out of here? This is just too much.

SHAWN BATH: We spent 21 years diving for sea urchins and the temperatures and the conditions we dove in back in was a thousand times hotter than what it is now, right?

MG: Do you have some sort of hi-tech dive suit to keep you warm?

SHAWN BATH: I've got a right now I'm using a bare dry suit. My suit is like 20 years old.

MG: 20 years old?

SHAWN BATH: Yes. I've had the zippers replaced a couple times. I mean, the boots replacement. Right now, my relief servers are leaking again. So I had to glue that shut and I've got, I'm having trouble with the valve. So the suit has pretty much had its day now, right?

MG: You don't really want a leaky suit in those cold waters.

SHAWN BATH: No, no. Not really, no.

MG: Why are you doing this?

SHAWN BATH: Well, I started for my love of oceans. Right? Like I said I made a living and my family made living at sea and the sea, all the stuff on bottom all these years and nobody doing nothing about it. I'm getting older and if I don't do something now, I'm not going to be able to do something in 10 or 20 years. And nobody else didn't seem to be interested in cleaning it up. So I figured maybe I'd start bringing awareness to this problem, right?

MG: What do people make of what you're doing? I mean, when they see you arms laden with tires crawling your way out of the ocean, what do they think?

SHAWN BATH: A lot of people love it. We're getting a lot of positive feedback from them. There are a few people who think that we're bringing bad publicity to our island and bringing bad publicity to the fishing industry.

MG: Bad publicity? What do you mean?

SHAWN BATH: Well, we're talking about the dirt on the bottom. We're talking about all the ghost nets in the ocean, right? and now our intention is not to make nobody look bad obviously, but I mean it is what it is. We all took turns dumping stuff into the ocean. We made a mess. Now it's time to clean it up.

MG: Do people,aAre you finding that people are willing to help you out with this? That they see what you're doing, they understand the scale of the problem and they want to step in and make sure that you're not the only one who's out there doing this?

SHAWN BATH: There's quite a few people helping us out on the world stage with small donations, right? 20 bucks here, 30 bucks there. But I mean, for us to do what we're doing, we need some corporation or we need our federal government or somebody to come onboard, to help us out, get the gear we need to use on a much safer scale, on a much larger scale, right.

MG: I was going to say this sounds like the kind of thing that the government could get involved in to help out with.

SHAWN BATH: Yeah. They definitely should. I don't know what's taking then so long. So if you know anybody in government, you put in a good word for us.

MG: What would you hope to accomplish with this? I mean, you're doing it. You're doing a lot of work, but it's on an individual scale. At the end of the day, what would you want to accomplish with this?

SHAWN BATH: Well, my goal is to bring awareness to this problem, to the point where somebody's got to get on board with us so that they can no longer turn a blind eye to it, right. When I'm finished, I want to see 10 crews at this all over Newfoundlound. And there's lots of trash for everybody. There's lots people who would love to be doing, but the funding's the issue, right? Everybody needs to get funding to get stuff on the go. And hopefully when I'm finished, we can have like I said, ten crews diving all around Newfoundland, picking up tires and whatever and have boats out underwater dragging for ghost nets. I mean there's literally millions.There's 640,000 tons of ghost nets going into the world oceans every year.

MG: And for people who don't know, what's a ghost net?

SHAWN BATH: A ghost net is a net that was used as a fishing net and was lost or abandoned or whatever the case might be, right? It's no longer retrievable. So they're just drifting around or snagged on the bottom and it's continuously fishing. It's killing fish forever. We need to get boats out dragging this out, right?

MG: How much of a difference do you think you've made so far?

SHAWN BATH: I've brought awareness to a lot of it, but we've got a long ways to go yet.

MG: You're doing a great job and I can imagine those waters are cold and it's hard, hard work, but it's appreciated.

SHAWN BATH: Yeah.

MG: It's good to talk to you, Shawn. Thank you.

SHAWN BATH: Thank you.

MG: Cheers. Bye bye.

SHAWN BATH: Yeah, bye bye.

MG: Shawn Bath the founder of Clean Harbours Initiative in Newfoundland and Labrador. It's a mostly one man diving operation to clean up the harbours of his province. Shawn Bath is just one person, but there are many projects around the world trying to clean up our oceans, including one that's being used by the Port Authority in Toronto. The Seabin was created in Australia. It's like a trash can in the water, skims the surface and sucks in garbage and micro plastics.

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VOICE: It's shocking when you start looking at the amounts as well as the kinds of things we're finding. Large pieces of plastic, but we're also finding microplastics, which are down to two millimetres in size. the size of a grain of sand and the Seabin can capture that. Some of these are pellets that are used in the plastic baking process. So that's very curious is how they're ending up in the lake. The seabins collect on average about four kilograms a day. I think we were reaching about 400 to 460 kilograms a week per seabin. So it's a lot of material. Yeah, I'm upset about it, but rather than just be upset about it, we've got to do something. We've got to act upon it. I think it's something that we all need to combat collectively as a city, as a province, as human beings to make sure that we're doing the right things here.

MG: Chelsea Rocjman is an assistant professor in ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Toronto. Her research focuses on plastic waste and ways to tackle the problem. Chelsea, good morning.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Good morning.

MG: What do you make what you were listening to to Shawn, talking about what he sees on the floor of the ocean. What do you make of a situation where people are just tossing things over the side of the boats or just throwing in? There wasn't a dump there, and that was the easiest place to put it.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: I mean, I guess what do I make of it? I think it's not a good thing. But at this point, it's really commonplace. I mean, there are now laws that are put in place that suggest that we're not allowed to dump our plastic in the ocean. But it wasn't very long ago that the law of the sea was that it was OK to throw your plastic overboard. And so there's been decades of dumping of plastic over the years that have built up. And then unfortunately, there's still mismanaged waste all over the world that enters the ocean each year.

MG: How would you describe the state of our oceans today?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: In terms of plastic pollution?

MG: Or even just more broadly? I mean, if you take a look at the health of them and the plastic pollution is something that would jeopardize health.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Yeah, I mean, I'll I guess I'll focus on pollution in general. We have considered the oceans to sort of be the solution to pollution, thinking that it is so grand and so large and so dilute that no amount of pollution can ever affect it. But our population is so large in the amount of waste, including plastic pollution that we produce is so big that that kind of coming back to haunt us now and haunt the oceans. So in terms of plastic, I mean, we find it at the surface of every ocean and the sea floor in the deep sea trenches in Arctic ice, and we find it in the bellies of more than 200 species of wildlife.

MG: There are tens of millions of tons of plastic in the ocean. I think it's hard for people to wrap their heads around that. Help me get some sense as to what that figure would mean.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Sure. So you mentioned earlier that 8 million metric tons of plastic enters the ocean each year. To put that into perspective, that would be every year if everyone lines up shoulder to shoulder on all of the coastlines around the world holding two plastic bags full of plastic and they throw that in annually.

MG: You just fling it in.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Just fling it into the ocean and let it go.

MG: That's as much as is going into the ocean every year?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Every year.

MG: And what kind of plastic are we talking about?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: We're talking, well you heard Shawn talk about tires, which is a big issue. Single use items like plastic bags and bottles and caps, fishing debris, as he also mentioned, construction debris. I mean, it's kind of everything, you name it. We find it.

MG: Where's it coming from? I mean, we're not standing on the shores of the ocean flinging plastic bags, ideally into the sea. But where's it coming from?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: You know, there's a lot of different sources. So we think that about 80 percent of it comes from land. So that includes waste. That's just not managed. It doesn't go to a landfill. Instead, it ends up in the environment and trash flying out of trash bins that don't have a cover on them. Fishing vessels accidentally or purposefully letting gear go, mostly accidentally. And we have plastic industry letting some of their spillage of the plastic go out and then the tyres. So Sean talked about these big tyres in the water. But also every time we drive a little bits of tyres come off of our of our of our tyres. So we get tire and roadwear particles, micro beats from face wash. The sources are really endless.

MG: Are there specific countries that are the biggest contributors to the garbage problem, the ones to blame?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: I wouldn't say that they are necessarily the ones to blame. I would say that, yes, there are specific countries and there have been lists generated and who those countries are countries where the world is developing so rapidly that they're using more and more plastic, but they don't have the waste management to keep up with the mess. And so a lot of that trash is just simply going out into the ocean. So there's a statistic that f you put solid waste management all over the world, 60 percent of the trash that goes in the ocean today would would stop. And so a lot of these countries are in Southeast Asia. But again, I wouldn't really point fingers because the reality is we ship our waste sometimes overseas and call that recycling. And so all of us need to do our part.

MG: And the effect of this. I mean Shawn hinted at this, but the effect of all that plastic on the creatures that live in the sea is what?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Yes. So that is what we study in our lab at University of Toronto. It varies. So for that large plastic debris, the big fishing nets and the tires and fishing ropes, we have no doubt that that harms large animals. We see hundreds of animals washing up on the shorelines every year with bellies full of plastic or entangled in plastic. We know that can be and sometimes is the cause of mortality. When it comes to that micro plastics, we see different effects. So we know it's eaten by, as I said, hundreds of species at every level of the food chain. One interesting thing when it comes to the tyres, so I loved his story about tyres. We've looked at how tyred us impacts fish. And one of the things that we've seen is increased mortality and deformities, but also the loss of pigmentation in the eyes. And so something like that might cause the ability for a fish to lack its use of its eyesight or for to and maybe escape a predator or to find its prey. And so there's these obvious effects like mortality, and then there's these subtle effects that just may make it more difficult to live.

MG: Now, there are people and organizations that are trying to deal with this. One of them is Shawn out there in the water hauling these tires out on his arm like Popeye as I said. There's also the seabins. We heard the Toronto Port Authority talking about these seabins. Here's one of the creators of the seabin, Pete Ceglinski.

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VOICE: We operate now in 52 countries, cities, ports, yacht clubs and everybody just has this incredible concern for the environment and how can we fix it. So it's about 1.4 tons of plastics and marine litter that we're collecting every year per unit. I'm pretty optimistic, so I just sort of focus on solutions and, you know, what are the learnings from these problems that we can get out of that and then how do we fix it? So we just focus on solutions, positivity and taking action.

MG: What sort of a role can the seabins play in cleaning up the ocean?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: I think the seabins can play a huge role in cleaning up the ocean. So, I mean, there are I'd say, three main themes of solutions that we need in the world. One is waste reduction, which includes plastic reduction. Another one is waste management. But a third is cleanup. And the reality is, no matter how well we manage the waste, we're always going to have some going out into the ocean. So right now.

MG: Which is why people have said in some ways that seabins might be a bit of a gimmick, that it doesn't actually deal with the real, as they say, the root cause of what's happening.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Yes, some people call these cleanup solutions a Band-Aid. And I would argue that they're a necessary Band-Aid, that no matter what, you're going to have some form of litter. And so we need this as a last line of defence to protect the ocean, watching what the seabirds collect in Toronto. I'm quite impressed.

MG: What are they collecting?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: All kinds of things. So we collect single use items like bottles and straws, but we also collect and Chris from Ports Toronto mentioned it, plastic pellets and micro plastic. So we catch lots of little things and we find things like syringes and strange items, but they capture quite a large amount per day.

MG: There's the seabins. There's also this company called One Earth, One Ocean, and they're using catamarans to help clean up the oceans.

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VOICE: It cruises through the water. We drive through this litter on the surface and collect it with the nets. The next ship, which we are currently building, it's including a conveyor belt. So it's a permanent lift up of the plastic or other litter in the water. They are in Europe and in Asia and we are currently constructing the next vessel for northern Africa and for South America. We need to involve the people who are living close to the coasts where the plastic is. For example in Cambodia, we have got 10 people who are full time employed people. They must be aware of what the plastic does to their lives.

MG: So you have the sea beds, you have the catamarans, you have the huge ocean booms designed to grab garbage. They all sound very impressive. But are they actually doing anything?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: I think they are doing anything and it's twofold. So they are doing something. One is they're cleaning up, literally taking the plastic or the waste out of the ocean to get it out of potential harm for animals, but to their creating awareness. I think that on top of those three solutions that we need, we absolutely need the education and awareness in order to enable some of the solutions that we need.

MG: So this is the kick-off for this series called The Fix, which is about how people are trying to tackle the big wicked problems as I was saying earlier, that face us. What's the fix?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: I think the fix, as I said, I think it's multifold.

MG: It's the three things.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: It's those three things. It's combination of waste management, a combination of waste reduction, which includes plastic reduction, but also building into a truly circular economy where we're going moving towards a zero waste lifestyle. And it's cleanup. And underneath that under a foundation is policies that enable these solutions. And also that education and awareness that allow for the people to be able to work under those new solutions because change is hard.

MG: People will, you know, be familiar with the whole idea of of banning plastic straws and wonder whether that actually does anything on an individual level, does it? If I'm not using a plastic straw to drink my smoothie in the morning?

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: It does do something. So, I mean, I think every little bit helps. We as part of our lab, we have an organization that we've started called the University of Toronto Trash Team. And our goal is to increase waste literacy. So to teach people how things like getting rid of straws work, but also the bigger picture about how just buying things at the grocery store that can go in the recycle bin or the green bin vs. the Blackman and other types of of ways to have a zero waste lifestyle. Straws being the first step.

MG: In the remaining seconds that we have, where do you find optimism in this work? Because it could be overwhelming.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: It's very overwhelming, but that's a great question. I find optimism a lot of the time in my students. And then we go out in the community and do school programs. And in youth. They have all kinds of ideas of how we can make a difference. And so I have, I guess, faith in them that they can help.

MG: And they need to be able to influence those, us oldsters, who have our hands on the levers of power perhaps, and can actually make that change.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: That's right. Yeah. And keep us from feeling jaded.

MG: Chelsea, thank you.

CHELSEA ROCHMAN: Yeah. Thank you.

Chelsea Rochman is an assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Toronto. Kicking off our series called The Fix. If you have things that we should perhaps focus on in The Fix, you could let us know on Twitter @ThCcurrentCBC or cbc.ca/thecurrent.Coming up in our next half hour.

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VOICE: We've got methadone. There is Suboxone, which is really the preferred opiate substitution therapy, but we haven't really got anything for meth. So right now it feels, what can we do? Where is this going to end?

MG: There is no end in sight to the growing problem of crystal meth use, particularly in northern Ontario. We'll bring you that story, coming up in about 15 minutes. My name's Matt Galloway, and you're listening to The Current.

[Music]

Why #OscarsSoWhite creator April Reign isn't surprised by the lack of diverse nominees

Guests: April Reign

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

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VOICE: For achievement in directing, the directors branch of the Academy nominates.

MG: The actors Issa Rae and John Cho announcing the Oscar nominees for best director. That list includes heavyweights like Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, foreign auteurs like Sam Mendez and Bong Joon-ho and upstarts like Todd Phillips. But did yon notice what they didn't include? Issa Rae sure did.

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VOICE 1: I did it. I did it.

VOICE 2: You did it.

VOICE 1: Thank you so much.

VOICE 2: You did it.

VOICE 1: Congratulations to those men.

MG: "Congratulations to those men." Snap The list did not include any women and in the acting categories, all but one nominee is white. A fact that certainly wasn't lost, not just on Issa Rae, but on April Reign. April Reign created the OscarsSoWhite hashtag in 2015 after feeling frustrated about that year's slate of nominees. April Reign is in Washington, D.C. good morning.

APRIL REIGN: Good morning, Matt.

MG: Were you as puzzled by the Oscar nominations as so many people were when they came out yesterday morning?

APRIL REIGN: No, unfortunately, I wasn't surprised. What we know is the Academy voting membership, despite the Academy's commitment to doubling the number of people of colour, is doubling the number of women within its membership ranks by this year, 2020, the Academy is still 84 per cent white and 68 per cent male. So, you know, people gravitate toward like they watch the films that they think reflect the facet of their experience. That's not racism or bigotry or anything else, but you know, that's just what people are interested in. And if the Academy voting membership is overwhelmingly white and male, then I think the nominations are going to reflect that.

MG: There was an argument made in past that there weren't enough great films made by women or starring people of colour. And that's why those nominations weren't there. The product wasn't there, wasn't good enough, and I'm sorry, we're only celebrating the best and the brightest. Is that still the case — or was it ever the case?

APRIL REIGN: That was never the case. And it's incredibly specious this year because there was an overwhelming amount of talent both in front of and behind the camera by marginalized communities. So, yes, that was a throw off line that was used, you know, "well, we just don't have enough talented performances to nominate." That clearly was not the case here. And so now we need to look at a larger argument as to why this is still happening in 2020.

MG: Who got snubbed this year?

APRIL REIGN: Oh I think the entire genres got snubbed this year. There aren't particular performances that I'll point out, but you know, if you look at sci-fi and horror, so a movie like Us, for example, which, you know, made over $250 million at the box office, had amazing performances and still we saw no nominations. Not just with respect at best actor or actress, but also with respect to directing and editing and music and so on. And there are a lot of examples like that. So, you know, I congratulate all of the nominees, all well-deserved nominations, but still, the Academy needs to do more and Hollywood in general need to do more to ensure that traditionally underrepresented communities are acknowledged and recognized.

MG: There are people who are saying that Jennifer Lopez deserved a nomination for her role in the film Hustlers. You mentioned Us, Lupita Nyong'o was sensational in that film. That Awkwafina in the film, The Farewell, deserved a nomination. Are those names that you maybe you didn't expect them, but that you had hoped would be on the list of nominees?

APRIL REIGN: Well, I would, but I have a lot of hopes and dreams and that was shattered yesterday morning. So, absolutely those women all turned in fantastic performances, but it's not just about actors and actresses. You know, as you mentioned in in the over 90 year history of the Academy, only five women have been nominated for best director and only one has won. And what we know is we had Lulu Wang for The Farewell, Kasi Lemons for Harriet, Lorene Scafaria for Hustlers and other women who turned in amazing work and unfortunately were not recognized. So it's not just about the faces that we see on the screen. It's about whose stories are being told and who is telling those stories.

MG: What about a film like Parasite? This is a South Korean film nominated for six Oscars, including Best Picture. People love this movie. Isn't that worth acknowledging?

APRIL REIGN: It absolutely is worth acknowledging and I'll be rooting for Parasite in February because it was a fantastic film, but I think you point out the issue here. If we can name on one hand or on one finger, the films and performances that represent different facets of the community, of marginalized communities, then that's where the issue lies.

MG: I was going to say people have made the same argument for Greta Gerwig's adaptation of Little Women. Again, much celebrated film, it's nominated for best picture. And people have said, well, maybe that's a step forward for women in terms of films that might be about women or as the industry might see it, films for women.

APRIL REIGN: It absolutely is a step forward. But the issue is we should not still be talking about first in 2020. We should have surmounted all of that by now and so the fact that we're still talking about the first in any particular category or that we could name people or performances on one hand when we're talking about inclusion in the film industry is unfortunate, specifically because we need to think about what the audience looks like. Those people who have paid their hard earned dollars to sit in a darkened theatre or stream on a streaming service, they should be reflected on the big screen.

MG: Why does this matter? I mean, people might write the Oscars office as a frivolous awards show. And in the grand scheme of all the problems that the world is facing, people would maybe shrug to something like this. Why does it matter?

APRIL REIGN: Well, it matters because whether you're a fry cook in a fast food restaurant or the CEO of a Fortune 500 corporation, you want to be acknowledged and recognized by your peers. So we can have the argument about whether the Academy is worthy, but it is still considered the pinnacle in the film industry. So it matters to those people who have created amazing work all year long and they deserve to be recognized and acknowledged. What we also know is that in some cases, definitely not all, the Oscars lead the way for people to have more opportunities. On the other side, being able to tack on Oscar nominee or ask a winner after your name may open doors for you in the future. And we can talk about whether the Oscars and all awards shows should matter, but especially with respect to the Oscars, because I'm not sure the listeners know the Oscar membership is not required to view their performances before they vote.

MG: So they can just vote without having seen these films.

APRIL REIGN: Right. And so I have always said with respect to OscarsSoWhite that it should be a meritocracy, right? Spread your net as far and wide as you can and you choose the best possible performance and that person or that film should win. But if you're not watching the film, then doesn't it become a popularity contest?

MG: Is it realistic to expect that the Oscar voters would watch what, I don't know how many films there are? 200, 300 different films in the course of a year?

APRIL REIGN: It's not realistic to ask that they watch all 300 films or whatever the case is. However, once we get down to the top five so that where we are right now, why wouldn't they be interested in ensuring that their vote truly matters? And so it is incumbent upon the studios, for example, to send the screeners so that people can watch the films from the comfort of their own home, but it is also incumbent upon Academy voters to seek out these films, not just during this awards period of voting period, but all year long to ensure that they are maybe expanding their network of film and understanding of what film can be.

MG: Just, we have a couple of seconds left. You put this tweet out in 2015, OscarsSoWhite and the hashtag, which turned into a much larger thing than just that tweet. Do you feel as though it made any difference?

APRIL REIGN: Oh, it absolutely did. The Academy committed, as I said, to doubling the number of people of colour and doubling the number of women within its ranks. Since then, what we also know is that there are people now that are members of the Academy who were not before people like Julie Dash and Melvin Van Peebles, who created seminal works, but had not been invited to the Academy, They are now members. And most importantly, I believe that the audience members are becoming more savvy and no longer rewarding mediocrity when they go to the theatre.

MG: April Reign, it's great to talk to you. Thank you.

APRIL REIGN: Thank you.

MG: April Reign created the OscarsSoWhite hashtag in 2015. She was in Washington, D.C.

[Music]

As Canada fights opioid epidemic, a rise in meth use threatens to deepen drug crisis

Guests: Nicole Ireland

MG: You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One and Sirius XM. My name is Matt Galloway.

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VOICE: What killed him was car fentanyl. Ten times the lethal amount. That's poison. That's murder and police and the coroner basically closed his investigation prior to getting the toxicology that I would think if I was a police officer and just myself as a parent, I would, we need to get that off the street.

MG: That's Keith Rojik talking about the drug that killed his son, Tyler. Last week, we reported on the opioid crisis in Thunder Bay. Thunder Bay has the highest overdose death rate in the province of Ontario. We heard from parents whose children had died from drugs laced with fentanyl or car fentanyl and yet there's another drug that has authorities worried. That drug is crystal meth.

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VOICE: It took me down quicker than any other drug that I used. It was very fast and within months, I was unable to keep a place to live in. It took me down harder and faster than any other drug I've used, yeah.

MG: CBC reporter Nicole Ireland has spent weeks investigating the rise of meth in Canada. She travelled to northwestern Ontario to look at the impact of that drug on Thunder Bay and surrounding communities. Nicole, good morning.

NICOLE IRELAND: Good morning.

MG: We've been talking a lot about the opioid crisis and we've seen how it has hit so many communities in Canada and it's hit them hard. The man we just heard from in that intro though, he was talking not about opioids, he's talking about crystal meth.

NICOLE IRELAND: Yeah, that's right. That's Will Lacey. And he's a man who lives in Kenora, Ontario. That's about 500 kilometres west of Thunder Bay. He's been battling addiction for more than 25 years to both opioids and crystal meth. He's 47. He has this kind of war weary air about him. He seems he seems quite tyred when you talk to him. His days of using meth ended about a decade ago. As we know, meth is not a new drug. But over the last few years, he's watched as crystal meth has made this resurgence in his community. And he really worries about it because he knows how devastating it can be.

MG: How so?

NICOLE IRELAND: Well, crystal meth has a different effect on the body than opioids. So opioids, so we're talking about oxy perc assets. And now so much of the time, fentanyl has sort of a sedative effect. It depresses the nervous system. And all too often, of course, as we know, it stops people from breathing, which is why we're seeing so many overdoses. So meth is short for methamphetamine, which is a stimulant like cocaine, works by stimulating the nervous system. So both drugs cause a high by releasing the bragn chemical dopamine. And that creates a sense of high energy and euphoria. But meth releases far larger quantities of dopamine than cocaine. So the effects of meth last a long time. It also keeps users awake. Sometimes some users say for days, both experts in it and people who are addicted say that when they become dependent on meth, it's extremely difficult to get off of it. Here's how Will Lacey describes it.

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VOICE: When you stop using crystal meth, the fatigue or the tiredness is really big. You can't get out of bed. You have no motivation and you don't feel like doing anything. Nothing makes you feel good anymore. And then, I mean, it's so easy just to do a little bit of crystal meth and feel normal again, especiall crystal meth is a really cheap drug. So it's pretty easy to obtain and you know where to get it. And with the increase in our community, crystal meth is everywhere. It's really big. And it's people from all walks of life who are using it, believe it or not. It's replaced cocaine in our community. So people, middle class people, or blue collared people are now using crystal meth. It's affecting all walks of life in our community.

MG: That's really interesting because that idea of crystal meth replacing cocaine, but also hitting all walks of life. That's what we heard in Thunder Bay about opiates. It wasn't just one strata of society, it's right across the board in terms of the number of people who are using those drugs.

NICOLE IRELAND: Absolutely.

MG: So crystal meth has arrived into his hometown of Kenora. It's moved in there.

NICOLE IRELAND: It's not only moved in, it's ravaged the community. Both health workers and law enforcement professionals tell me that. So police say it's now the most common drug there in Canada. So while while Canada has been preoccupied with trying to stop the carnage inflicted by the opioid crisis, crystal meth has been making this rise, particularly in the West. So NBC and the prairie provinces and one place it's really been on the rise is Winnipeg. It's been so hard hit that health care workers and police say that crystal meth has actually eclipsed opioid use there. And Canada is only a couple of hours east of Winnipeg. So we can actually see this movement of meth coming into Ontario and it's moving into communities like Canada that are already vulnerable. So as you saw in Thunder Bay, many people already struggling with opioid addiction. So one user told me that he actually started using meth because opioids had become harder to find there. And that's something that he attributes to the crackdown on opioids. So he needs something to kerb the horrendous physical withdrawal symptoms that come when people try to stop using these kinds of drugs.

MG: Tell me more about those symptoms. What happens?

NICOLE IRELAND: Well, the cravings from a meth dependence are extremely strong and you've got people trapped in this desperate cycle of trying to avoid being dope sick, which is the term that that they use for the feeling they have when they're going through withdrawal. So I met a woman named Randa Elder. She's 34, sort of short hair, exudes a lot of energy. She actually used to work in social work until her use of multiple drugs got the better of her. And she describes what her life has become now.

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VOICE: You wake up and that's the first thing you think about is how you're going to get your next fix? How are you going to make it through the day? And it's just a continuous struggle. And you have to continuously like lower your standards and lower your ethics and always like tailoring what you will and will not do for your fix because it continuously is just going to get worse and worse because all these things that you just told yourself you never do. Eventually are more than likely going to end up doing because, you know, it gets harder and harder and to see all your friends, you know, dying and suffering and even more so than the death, sometimes it looks like a bittersweet end. Like atleast they're at peace, because that's how bad the struggle is every day. You know, all the pain and suffering that it's caused me and all my loved ones, I would do anything to take that away. I wish I could.

MG: That's really hard to hear, particularly that idea, what she talked about, lowering your ethics and lowering your standards for a fix.

NICOLE IRELAND: Yeah. Yeah.

MG: How are the health care providers in Kenora trying to address this situation?

NICOLE IRELAND: Well, like so many places in Canada and especially in remote and rural areas, there is a lack of affection, addiction services in northern Ontario. And so there are often waiting lists for for those who want to to get help. And also often, frankly, addictions, hard people just off aren't ready to go. Going through rehab is is a tough thing to do. So I was really struck by the work that a small team of public health nurses and a family doctor are doing. Their job is really to while people are going through that process and trying to keep them safe and alive to the point where maybe ultimately they will be able to go get help. So this team, they drive around Kenora in a mobile outreach van. And what they do is they bring health care to people suffering from addictions. They also bring harm reduction supplies such as clean needles. So I had the privilege of riding with them for an afternoon and I saw this relationship of trust that they had managed to build with these really vulnerable clients. And despite the stigma that these clients face everywhere else in the community with this team, they're really honest about what they're using. And in many cases, that's crystal meth. So I asked the family physician on the outreach team, his name is Dr. Johnny Grech. What makes meth particularly worrisome?

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VOICE: I think the biggest concern for me is oftentimes that come down from the meth in which we see suddenly from a mental health point of view, a lot of the depression, psychosis, the violence of the belligerence that's often associated with tearing apart communities or that's how it would be portrayed in the wider scale. And I think that's something that we probably haven't seen to such an extent with other addictions. It's also easy to obtain. There's lots of it about quick and dramatic high, which can lead to all sorts of inhibitory effects on the bReign. The final thing about it for me is that there's no real antidote. What we're struggling with is how can we? So, for example, with the opiate crisis, we've got methadone and Suboxone, which is really the preferred opiate substitution therapy, but we haven't really got anything for meth. So right now it feels what can we do? Where's is this going to end?

MG: One of the things we heard in Thunder Bay and that's fascinating to hear how prevalent this is and also how potent it is. One of the things we heard in Thunder Bay, if you're talking about opioids like fentanyl and car fentanyl, they're being found in other drugs, they're being cut into things like cocaine. Is that the concern with crystal meth as well?

APRIL REIGN: Absolutely. So they found that car fentanyl, fentanyl is being cut into meth. And that's part of what experts say makes meth so dangerous now compared to decades ago. The Centres for Disease Control, the U.S., has actually been tracking the rise in overdose death associated with meth use. The Ontario chief coroner has also been looking at this and he's seen a dramatic rise in the number of overdose deaths where both crystal meth and an opioid, often fentanyl haven't found in the person's system after death. So it's important to note, too, that there's there's also an increase in overdose deaths where crystal meth alone has been found without an opioid.

MG: So what do we know then about the health issues, aside from the overdose concern? What do we know about the health issues that are associated with taking crystal meth?

NICOLE IRELAND: Well, because it's a stimulant, meth can cause extreme agitation, raised blood pressure. It also suppresses appetite. So longer term meth can lead to malnourishment and dehydration. Some people feel like they have meth bugs. So it's a sensation of bugs under their skin. And that leads to them sort of picking at their skin, which can lead to sores, which then can lead to infection. Meth can also lead to involuntary. Body movements that's sometimes called flailing into hallucinations, paranoia and something that's known as meth psychosis. So I met Dr. Carolyn Snyder. She works in the area, worked in the emergency department at the Winnipeg Health Sciences Centre before she moved to Toronto about a year ago. And in Winnipeg is where she saw firsthand some of the devastating effects that meth can have.

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VOICE: There would be times where the people came in with such vivid psychoses and everybody basically that was coming in was just having these out of control, awful psychoses. And it was just like the primary piece to why they were there. And we knew that there was, "a bad batch." Like we could tell you and you'd turn to the cops that were often in there and you say there's a bad batch out there. And they'd say absolutely. That's what we've been saying.

NICOLE IRELAND: So Matt, Snyder says that that means that meth can be a very difficult drug for frontline healthcare workers to manage.

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VOICE: Unfortunately, with the paranoia, with the hallucinations, with being extremely escalated, there's sometimes a safety risk. And it's not just to us and staff, but it's to other patients and often to the patient from self injury. They may have put their hand through a window or a head through a window or something like that. And that can be very distressing for the patient themselves as well.

MG: Wow. So what are the doctors and the nurses and the paramedics actually able to do?

NICOLE IRELAND: Well, Snyder says they try to de-escalate, so they start by trying to talk calmly to the patient, reassuring them that they're there to help them because they're often feeling paranoid. There's also emerging this type of antipsychotic drug called Alanzapene, and there's evidence emerging that it's often proven effective in giving some release from the distress that they're experiencing. But there are times, Snyder says, that patients have to actually be temporarily restReigned. And then after that, after they sort of bring them down from that state of hyper agitation, there's really little that can be done.

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VOICE: In methamphetamines it's very difficult that agitated state can last, you know, on average, some would say four hours. I've seen it last much longer. What's most concerning to me as a physician is that the paranoid state and the hallucinations can last sometimes for days. And in fact, there's some research that shows that it can last eight to 27 days, not to mention the cravings that come afterwards. And all of that sets somebody up to use again very quickly.

MG: It's clear from what you're saying that this is a huge issue across the country. I'm just struck by the fact that when we were in Thunder Bay, we didn't hear a lot about the meth issue.

NICOLE IRELAND: Yeah, but police tell me they're quite sure they're going to see more crystal meth. Thunder Bay has a lot of the risk factors that drive addiction in the first place. So when the supply arrives, crystal meth is going to take hold. Also, I have to say to the data that we see as often really far behind what's actually happening in the streets. So what I did was I just went out I went out at around dawn and Thunder Bay to talk to people on the streets who were using. Three different people I talked to told me that crystal meth is already there. They had either used it themselves or seen it. One 32 year old woman I talked to, she told me she's tried meth, but she just simply didn't like being awake for so long.

MG: And that notion, that idea of being awake is something that we keep hearing about when it comes to crystal meth. Is that something that users actually seek out?

NICOLE IRELAND: Some of them do, and in particular, people who are homeless. So for them, taking crystal meth has actually become part of a survival strategy. I talked to Dr. Keith Ahmad. He's an addiction specialist at St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver about that.

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VOICE: The housing situation in Vancouver is so dire. There's many people that are either living in housing situations that are completely unsafe or they're homeless and to protect themselves and their belongings. They need to stay awake and in order to stay awake they use crystal methamphetamine daily so that they can protect themselves and their possessions.

MG: That's really hard to hear.

NICOLE IRELAND: It's shocking.

MG: Is there any sign of hope that you saw in the work that you were doing that would suggest that as a country we can tackle this impending crisis when it comes to crystal meth?

NICOLE IRELAND: You know, Matt, actually in all of this, there actually is some hope. So there are organizations that just aren't waiting. They're taking action right now. So one of them is a St. Stephen's Community House in Toronto. This is Janice Stevenson. She's a manager of St. Stephen's Urban Health Program.

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VOICE: Crystal meth has has always been around. It's not a brand new substance, however, you can't just keep trying to do what we were doing. We had to really step back and consult with individuals who are using, how can we support you? What can we do differently?

MG: So what did they end up doing?

NICOLE IRELAND: So what they did was create a dropping group specifically for people using meth. So they meet in a space that sort of conducive to what they're going through. So minimal stimulation because these are people who are often overstimulated using soft lighting. And there's lots of room, which is actually quite critical because something people may not know is that people using method often extremely fidgety. They like to do things like dumped all of their belongings, then reorganize them and then along with that to create an outlet for that kind of fidgety behaviour. They started this program where meth users actually learn to fix bikes, so they take them apart. They put them back together. And that sort of helps them focus and can be soothing and helps them develop a skill as well.

MG: That's really interesting like actually taking what's going on and trying to harness what's happening in a positive direction.

NICOLE IRELAND: In a productive way, yeah.

MG: Nicole, thank you.

NICOLE IRELAND: Thank you.

MG: CBC's Nicole Ireland. You can learn more about how Canada's opioid crisis is morphing into a meth problem at cbc.ca/drugcrisis.Well, we started the program with what they're calling Megxit. We'll close it on the same note. The actor Ashley Botting, an alumna of Toronto's Second City, was struck by wthat Meghan Markle showed in sending Harry to yesterday's big summit with the Queen on his own. But then, who hasn't dealt with difficult in-laws? Ashley Botting gets the last word. I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current and talk to you tomorrow.

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[Skit with Ashley Botting]

The Current Transcript for January 14, 2020

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

Brits in denial over 'insidious' racism directed at Harry and Meghan, says U.K.-based writer

Fighting the scourge of plastics in our oceans – The Fix

Why #OscarsSoWhite creator April Reign isn't surprised by the lack of diverse nominees

As Canada fights opioid epidemic, a rise in meth use threatens to deepen drug crisis

Jan. 14, 2020 episode transcript

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