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The Current Transcript for October 19, 2020

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: theme]

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: They're there. They think they can get away with anything, the commercial fishermen and they won't stop until they get their way. But they're in for a fight.

MATT GALLOWAY: After a dispute between indigenous and non-indigenous lobster fishermen erupted in violence last week, things escalated further this weekend when a Mi'kmaq lobster pound was burned to the ground. The leader of the NDP has called it terrorism. The RCMP has been criticized and all parties are calling on the federal government to take action. In 30 minutes, Senator Murray Sinclair explains why he has called the Trudeau government's response thus far an abject failure and what's at stake? Also this morning.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: If we stick to this curfew for six weeks, if we take collective responsibility for reducing our contact, we think we'll be able to progressively reopen at that stage.

MG: After a relatively normal summer, COVID has come roaring back across Europe. We'll put in long distance calls to Prague, Paris and Rome in an hour. We begin though, with a Canadian cold case, an answer decades later and concerns that have been raised about where your DNA could lead investigators. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current.

[Music: theme]

Genetic genealogy technique used in Christine Jessop cold case comes with privacy concerns, warns expert

Guests: Anthony Redgrave, Brenda McPhail

MG: For the family of Christine Jessop and the man who was falsely accused of her murder, it offered at least some closure. Toronto police announced last week that they had identified the man they believe is responsible for the nine year old girl's disappearance and death in 1984. And they did it using an emerging technique known as forensic or genetic genealogy. This has been around in recent years and used in recent years to identify serial killers, clear missing persons cases and reunite families. And while it is giving police new hope, it's also raising concerns about privacy. More on that in a moment. First though, I'm joined by a forensic genealogist who worked with Toronto police on the Christine Jessup case. Anthony Redgrave, good morning.

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Hi. Good morning.

MG: Tell me about the role that you and your team played in identifying the man that police now believe killed Christine Jessop.

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Yes, I was the lead forensic genealogist for the team that came to a candidate for identification for the Toronto Police. We received the kit number associated with the perpetrator DNA and from there, we did our part to work on the genetic matches of that perpetrator kit. The living cousins who would willingly submit their DNA to and opted into law enforcement matching. So everybody had already agreed to this for us to use their relationships to each other to determine where this unknown person fit in with that puzzle and where they might fall in relation to everyone.

MG: So walk me through how you do this. Police give you a DNA sample, then what happens?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Well, the police submit the DNA samples to the lab. The lab goes through their process to create a digitized file that is then uploaded to GenMatch or and or a Family Tree DNA. The lab was out of Texas and I was the lead forensic genealogist for the lab at the time. I am no longer working for them, but this was one of the cases that I contracted with them on. So when the lab receives the DNA sample, they digitize it and form it into a file that can be uploaded to these sites. Once it's uploaded I have access to that information via a log in and our ability to see the DNA matches of this kit, the people who share genetic material with the unidentified person, we can see them, but they can't see us because it's an open forensic investigation. And we go in through a law enforcement flags kit, that doesn't show up in other people's match lists. So, for example, if you were working with, if you had done a DNA test, you would see everyone in the entire database who had also tested at that company. We only get to see the ones who have clicked a little button that says I opt into law enforcement matching and we're invisible to them so that they can't see our kit, so that we keep the investigation private.

MG: How close of a relative do you need to find in these public databases in order to identify a subject? You think of, there's that cliche there's a needle in a haystack, but the haystack is gigantic here. How close of a relative do you need?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Well, it's not just one needle in a haystack. It's several needles. It depends on the case. Sometimes you get lucky and you end up with a first or second cousin who's just sitting there, and then you can figure it out sometimes relatively simply. If that relationship to that person is documented and they're not an NPE or not the parent expected, which is when you know, you don't know exactly who your parents are. And what usually happens is that we have a whole bunch of people who are third cousins or more distant and we find clusters of those people who are related to each other, figure out their common ancestor with each other. And then we can assume from that point that if we know that two or more people descend from this one couple, this third person who we don't know who they are, probably also descends from there. And we have to do that a whole bunch of times over and over again and find the places where descendants of those common ancestor couples also marry each other and make somebody who combines the DNA and is the likely place to look for the person that we're trying to identify.

MG: So this is the same technique in some ways that's that's used by those ancestry sites to try and figure out what your family tree looks like. You're just using it to match DNA that police have submitted to you to try to figure out who a suspect might be.

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Yes, it's very similar to the way that a person who is adopted might search for their birth family, except in our instance, we can't ask the person who the DNA came from, where they were born or what their name is or any other identifying information. And we're not working on identifying the parents. We're working on identifying them. So it's just kind of the same puzzle, but on hard mode. And also, we don't contact people and ask them, hey, can you tell me about your family? I'm looking for somebody. Because it's an open investigation and we do our best to stay quiet in the background and not reveal any information about what we're working on.

MG: Do you know what you're investigating? I mean, when you were working on this case, did you know the specifics of it or do you just have the DNA and you're just trying to find the match?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Yes, we did. We knew the specifics of the case. It's very important for us to know the specifics of the case and be in contact with the investigating agency in order to get more contextual information, because you never know what piece of information is going to be useful when you're working on one of these cases. And they might not give it to you right away. You might have to ask. And again, that's another case in which it's very similar to how you might work on an adoptee case. They might know a story from someone that they don't think of until it comes up, unless you ask them like I'm seeing this happening. Is this something that I should be concerned about? So, yes, we had the details of the case. We knew where and when it happened. And we knew we knew about the wrongful conviction and we knew about how there were very, very many people who were investigated and cleared through DNA or otherwise. So we knew the long and arduous history of this case from the beginning,.

MG: Your interest in this field, this is personal. Just briefly, tell me about how you got involved in this.

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Yeah, my partner and I are we both had our own mystery solved. My partner is adopted and I didn't know who my father was. So we learned how to do this on our own a couple of decades ago, and we've only gotten significantly better since by way of working our own working our own puzzle and helping other people after we took care of ourselves. We just got better and better. And then when the advent of DNA happened, we were doing a lot of this before we had our DNA tests. Once we started working on the genetic aspect of things, when we got into genetic genealogy, we started volunteering with the DNA DOE project when that first started over two years ago.

MG: What's that project?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: The DNA Doe Project is a non-profit organization that works to identify John and Jane Doe's using this same method. And it's a way for agencies to bring cases to their project to be worked on by volunteer genealogists with no limit to the number of hours they can work. But they can only do this for adults unidentified and say they don't do this for perpetrators or children. So that's an advantage that we have being our own company. We're now incorporated as our own business, Redgrave Research Forensic Services.

MG: How reliable is this science?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Well, it's incredibly reliable because in the grand scheme of things, everyone has parents and everyone has the DNA of their parents. And therefore, you are very likely to have some genetic cousins somewhere who's already submitted a DNA test. It's not as thoroughly vetted yet as STR testing, which is a standard for forensic DNA. But what we end up doing is we come down to the nearest possible identification we can get sometimes. It's usually the exact person, if not a group of siblings. And then we'll pass that candidate for identification to law enforcement to follow through with confirming the STR testing or fingerprints or dental records or interviewing family members. So they consider it a very highly scientific tip that's being passed off. And therefore, for extra assurance that we have the right I.D. and the amines that are standardly used in in court as forensic evidence.

MG: I ask in part because there have been cases where the wrong suspect has been identified. Have a listen to Michael Usry, who's a filmmaker from New Orleans, was questioned by police after forensic geneology identified him as a suspect in a horrific rape and murder case. He spoke with PBS News Hour last year.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I kept asking questions like, you know, did somebody I know do something horrible? And finally, after maybe about an hour or two, they had to just basically go, no, we think that, you know, you were involved with this crime. And I'm like me? When it came crashing down was when they walked out of the room and the biggest state policeman that I've ever seen in my life came in with latex gloves and a cotton swab and said, I'm going to take your DNA now.

MG: That DNA test ended up clearing Michael Usry, but that took weeks for it to happen. Do you worry that there's a lot of excitement around this case in particular because of the answers that have been found decades later. Do you worry that the work could end up winding the police down the wrong path and leading them to the wrong person?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Well, I believe that if I personally have the ability to communicate directly with the law enforcement agency and tell them exactly the information, that I haven't explained it in terms that are very clearly understand. I understood that particular situation would be completely avoidable. In the case of Michael Usry, he was wrongfully accused due to honestly, I believe it was a communication error between the people working on his case and the law enforcement agency because that was done with Y-DNA and a possible surname was presented. But it may not have been fully understood to the person that was communicated to exactly what that meant. It wasn't a confirmed idea. It was a possible surname. And as we know, it's entirely possible for a patrilineal surname to get broken along the way and not be the right name. In the work that we do, we use A-DNA and we very rarely use Y-DNA in our process.

MG: And that's more specific?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Except for the purposes of confirming.

MG: Just before I let you go, are there safeguards that you think need to be in place to ensure that this technology which is growing, is used appropriately?

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: Absolutely, I personally feel that there is a middle ground in which people who are working on cold case investigations for families who deserve answers have been waiting a long time, can do that and also respect the the privacy and personal concerns of people who are living DNA matches or relatives who might be looked at via DNA. There are very clear terms of services on the sites that we use and they should be adhered to, but there's not a whole lot that goes into really making it clear what that means. I think there needs to be a more public education aspect to what it means to opt in to law enforcement matching. And I think there also needs to be more education for departments on how to use it appropriately and fairly. And that's actually something that my doctoral studies are on right now is actually developing educational materials and policymaking and training programs so the future of this field can be protected in a way that serves everyone fairly.

MG: We're going to talk more about that right now. In the meantime, Anthony, appreciate speaking with you this morning. Thank you.

ANTHONY REDGRAVE: No problem.

MG: Anthony Redgrave is a forensic genealogist, worked with Toronto Police to help identify the man that they now believe was behind the 1984 murder of Christine Jessop. Brenda McPhail is with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and has been listening in. Brenda, good morning to you.

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Good morning.

MG: Anthony Redgrave uses commercial DNA databases. When you hear about the work that he's doing and those databases, what concerns you most from a privacy perspective?

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Well, I mean, there are really nuanced issues at play in cases like this because, of course, it's a good thing for the Jessop family to finally have closure. The public wants justice in these kinds of cases, and it matters to all of us that they get solved. But, you know, there are important things to think about when it comes to using a commercial or a public genetic database for policing, because, you know, DNA is the building block of our bodies. So it's the ultimate in intimate and sensitive information. There's a bunch of these kinds of services out there. They range. They're very different in terms of what they allow in terms of police interaction with their databases. Some don't voluntarily cooperate with police or let them upload data and others do. So it's in some ways it's buyer beware, but it's buyer beware in an incredibly complicated environment where the consequences for us clicking the opt in, as your previous guest said, are huge and for many people, really unknowable.

MG: The investigators working on the Jessep case used this ancestress site called GED Match. And the disclaimer there says that users have explicitly given permission for their information to be accessed by law enforcement. Is that enough?

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Well, the question is whether or not somebody who just wants to go online and find a long lost cousin ever read or understood that policy or what it might mean for them. You know, so again, there's a fine line between informed consent and meaningless consent. And meaningless consent is contrary to privacy laws here in Canada and many other places around the world. And then we have to ask, what does it mean to give consent to using a genetic database? Because you're not consenting just for yourself and if this is ancestor matching, you're consenting for all those who came before you, your children, their unborn children, and you go forward into the future. So how reasonable is it to ask one individual to consent to the exposure of that many others who are connected to them?

MG: Is there any precedent for something like that? Where where you click yes to something, but it has nothing, it has something to do with you, but it could you possibly implicate many, many other people?

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Well, I mean, the most recent example is probably the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which is a very different kind of situation, but where, you know, a few hundred thousand people agreed to do a survey for research purposes and ended up implicating all of their friends and the friends of their friends and the friends of those friends extending to millions and millions of people to profiling. It ultimately with the purpose of influencing elections, potentially. So that's a sort of a contemporary example of the way that these sort of effects can ripple out and expand. And in that case, I mean, there've been investigations here in Canada that basically said that was absolutely not a legitimate way to go about collecting information.

MG: Benjamin Berkman is a deputy director of bioethics at the National Human Genome Research Institute in Maryland. Take a listen to his thoughts on this whole new field of genetic genealogy.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Once people see the power of this technology and the ability to bring these cold cases to justice years after people, investigators have given up on these cases, I think most people will feel pretty comfortable or even enthusiastic about it. But, you know, some people have a distrust of law enforcement. Some people feel very, very sensitive about how their genetic information is shared and used. Even though I think those people are all going to be in the minority, it's still important to respect their views.

MG: Brenda MacPhail, he talks about the enthusiasm that people have around this technology again on Friday when this information Thursday on Friday when this information came out around the Jessop case, you could imagine that there were a lot of people who would look to law enforcement to say, OK, what else can you do with this? Are you concerned about that enthusiasm?

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Very concerned. I think that we've got all kinds of new technologies that are allowing us to do amazing things. It's natural and reasonable and right, in fact, that law enforcement want to use them. But there's a trend towards moving towards bulk surveillance technologies. So this genetic kind of matching essentially searches tens of thousands or more looking for one. We've got other examples of these kinds of relatively indiscriminate technologies being used by police. So catchers, cell site simulators that capture the information from people's phones as everyone in the vicinity, again, looking for the identifier of one. Facial recognition has the potential to scan everybody in a space, rendering everybody identifiable. Again, looking for one. Essentially what it is is a fundamental change to the social contract in a democracy where we expect to be free of scrutiny by the state unless there's a reason to believe that we're a danger to society. And with these kind of bulk methods of surveillance, everyone is under a low-grade suspicion all the time. It can be you know, you ask what the harm is that? If we can catch a really bad guy, isn't it OK that you know that rights are a little bit infringed for the greater good?

MG: Because people will say, if you've done nothing wrong, then what do you have to worry about?

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Right. If you have nothing to hide, why do you care if you're looked at and then dismissed in a police investigation? And there's two kinds of risks there. One, you've already highlighted, it's the risk of misidentification and the anguish that can come from getting it wrong. And let's be clear that different people have different risks of that misidentification going very badly because they don't have the resources to get themselves out of it. There's an example of a guy who rode his bike around his Florida neighbourhood using a fitness app on his Android phone. He got a message from Google's legal investigations team telling him his data had been requested in a police investigation. And when he was smart, he was a young guy. He was smart enough when he told his parents. They said, we're going to dip into our savings. We're gonna get you a lawyer. And that was very wise because he was able to get himself out of the suspicion of a particularly violent burglar in his neighbourhood that he was suspect of because police got a geo-fence warrant to see the location data of everyone in the vicinity of that crime. And because he'd been out doing laps on his bike, you know, he was a suspect. All he had to hide was the 10 pounds he was trying to shed, but he got caught up in the investigation.

MG: A cautionary tale. Brenda, we'll leave it there. I appreciate you speaking with us this morning. Thank you.

BRENDA MCPHAIL: Thank you.

MG: Brenda McPhail, director of the Privacy Technology and Surveillance Project, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. This is The Current. My name is Matt Galloway. We're back in six minutes, where we head to Nova Scotia. Stay with us.

[Music]

Escalation in violence in Nova Scotia has amplified calls for the federal government to get directly inovlved

Guests: Murray Sinclair

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

[Music: theme]

MG: Still to come.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sounds from protests in Prague]

MG: The sound of violent protests yesterday in Prague over New COVID-19 lockdown measures. Prague is just one of three stops we're making today, as Europe reacts to a rise in COVID-19 cases. But first, a lobster tale.

[Music: theme]

MG: The conflict between non-Indigenous and Indigenous fishermen in Nova Scotia, which had been on a slow boil in recent weeks, exploded into crisis for the Trudeau government last week.

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VOICE: They've destroyed my van. Nothing the cops can do about it, the cops told me there's only six of us and 120 of them. We can't help.

MG: That's Mi'kmaq fisherman, Jason Marr last Tuesday. He barricaded himself in a lobster compound that he was using to store his catch. Outside, his van was set on fire and more than 100 commercial fishermen were surrounding the building. That same day, a raid by non-Indigenous fishermen on two lobster compounds used by the Mi'kmaq to store their lobsters. Hundreds of lobsters were strewn on the ground.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: They're all walking around, believing that they can do whatever they want and get away with it and take the law into their own hands. And I'm starting to believe that's true.

MG: That's Chief Mike Sack of Sipekne'katik First Nation criticizing the RCMP for their inaction. He says the community feels unsafe and doesn't know who to turn to. Then, finally on Saturday night.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sounds from a building fire]

MG: A fire tore through a building where Mi'kmaq were storing their lobsters. Last night, the Association of Mi'kmaq Chiefs asked for an emergency meeting with the federal government, and many are now calling for the federal government to solve this dispute. Murray Sinclair is a Canadian senator and the former chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Senator, good morning.

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Good morning.

MG: What went through your mind when you saw the violence escalating over the past week and then erupt this weekend?

MG: Well, it probably is best reflected in the letter I wrote to the prime minister on Friday, in which I pointed out that in my view, the government of Canada was essentially following an unfair path when it came to the dispute involving recognise indigenous rights, when it too could be compared to what the government did and what the RCMP were directed to do with regard to the wet suit and claim where they were protesting against the building a pipeline across our territory. In that case, the RCMP were out in military style type force and in this case the RCMP were literally standing back and even to a certain extent were getting out of the way, too, and moving. Miguel, fishermen out of the way in order to allow the non-indigenous commercial fishers to be able to access and destroy their produce and their equipment.

MG: As you pointed out in a letter, in February, the prime minister said, we are a country of laws. Why do you think there's a discrepancy between the prime minister's comments this winter when it came to those rail blockades in the port of the Wet'suwet'en First Nation and what we're seeing right now in Nova Scotia?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: It seemed very clear to me that the constitutionally protected right that the Mi'kmaq fishers have to their fishery, which the Supreme Court of Canada has twice reaffirmed, is not recognized as a law by the prime minister because if we are truly a nation of laws, then one of the most important laws that we should be protecting are the constitutional rights of Indigenous people.

MG: Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the NDP, has said that what's been unfolding, particularly this weekend in Nova Scotia, is terrorism. Do you think that that word applies here?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, absolutely. I think it's terrorism in the sense that it's designed to both intimidate and to assault indigenous people, both individually and collectively, and to destroy their rights and destroy their property. So that being the case, I think it should be dealt with as an act of domestic terrorism.

MG: There has been fierce criticism directed towards the RCMP, to your point, for not intervening in a tweet. You pointed out an RCMP officer saying that he sees both sides. And you said this is the problem. What is the RCMP need to do in your eyes?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: The RCMP needs to see this as an act of criminality. The RCMP are in this particular instance, in the only instance that I've seen where there's been violent protests and it's been violent on the side of the non-indigenous commercial fishers. And in that case, they're beginning to say, yes, well, we see their point of view. It's very much like Donald Trump saying there's some nice people over there, so let's not worry about it. And that is not the case at all. These are not nice people. These are people who are working and working forcefully to try to destroy the megamall fishery. And they're doing it not just out of self-interest, because the reality is that this is going to have minimal to no impact whatsoever upon the commercial fishery. What it is it's really just an excuse on the part of racist commercial fishers to take out their sense of privilege against Mi'kmaq fishers.

MG: Now, people have said that they aren't racist, that this is about conservation. That this is overfishing and that if this continues out of season, the entire lobster stocks could be a threat.

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, let's look at the statistics, really. You know, there's almost 400,000 non-Indigenous commercial fishers out there who are fishing the lobster fishery. And there's only about 200 Mi'kmaq fishers who are exercising their rights both in season and during this particular time of year and involving this particular incident. The Mi'kmaq fishers are going to have virtually no impact upon the lives of lobster stocks and its the commercial fishers who themselves are depleting the resource as they depleted the cod stocks. And so what needs to be done is if people are worried about conservation, they should be reducing the amount of commercial fishing licences.

MG: You aren't the only one who's asking for the federal government to act. Take a listen to Ruth Innis, who's the spokesperson for the Maritime Fishers Union.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Over the last number of years with the federal government, with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, with Bill Blair's office, and asking and warning them that if they don't do something, if they don't act, that something like this is going to happen. This happens from the ground. It's escalated very, very, very quickly. Our concern, our largest concern right now is peace in our communities.

MG: What's your response, Senator Sinclair, to her saying that they had been warning the federal government for years that things could turn ugly?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, they should be warning the commercial fishers who are out there destroying the property as well. They should be in the front line preventing them from doing what they're doing. If they don't want to show leadership, they have to persuade the people that they are leading to stop doing what they're doing. I appreciate the voice. I appreciate the fact that they recognised what inevitably was going to happen. But to turn around and blame it on the government when in reality the blame rests squarely on the shoulders of those who are committing criminal acts, is misplaced attention.

MG: I guess the reason that people have been saying that is because the Mi'kmaq have said that this has been 20 years in the making. They are exercising their rights, but that it's the federal government that hasn't gone ahead and defined what they have been given through that Supreme Court ruling, which is a moderate livelihood. And so is their responsibility on the federal government to to figure out what that actually means?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, clearly, there is if they intend to regulate it. If they don't intend to regulate it and they don't have that obligation. What the Supreme Court of Canada said is that under the treaty that was signed in the 1750ss the right of Mi'kmaq fishers to continue their commercial fishing operations or their fishing operations as they had to that point in time was protected by the Constitution. And then they said on the review of that particular decision, however, the federal government does have the authority to regulate it so long as they don't diminish it. And the federal government has instead chosen a path of negotiation and that path of negotiation has not turned out. And in the meantime, the big law fishery and Mi'kmaq fishermen were quite patient in holding back on exercising their rights until they could see if they could work out a plan with the federal government. The federal government over 20 years now has failed to come up with a reasonable plan that was acceptable to the big board fishery. And now this is a result.

MG: What specifically do you want, aside from, as you say in the letter, the RCMP, to uphold the rule of law? What specifically do you want in this moment from the federal government?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, my primary focus at this point in time is to uphold the law and to prevent violence from being perpetrated against the Mi'kmaq fishers out there. That's the major concern to deflect our attention away from that and to say we're alone. Now, let's bring everybody back to the negotiating table is to ignore the fact that criminal activity has been allowed to go on and criminal activity will continue to go on unless something is done and people are held to account for what they have done to this point in time, during this particular period, will it take some sort of negotiation after that rule of law is re-established? I don't know that it will take negotiation. I think what it might take is because they've been trying to negotiate. And so with the issue of negotiation and complies, is that the big mouth fissures, then we'll have to stop and try to negotiate before they start exercising their right. I would encourage the big fishers to continue to exercise their right, and I would encourage the federal government to come up with a plan of regulation and offer it forward as a public offering to the Mi'kmaq fishers and say this is what we are intending to enforce and if you don't follow these regulations, then you will be prosecuted. And if the Mi'kmaq fishers don't agree with that and they can continue to exercise their right and it may end up being reviewed by a court at some point in the future. But at least it'll be reviewed by somebody independent from this particular process. And at this point in time, it's clear to me that those engaged in the process are not able to talk to each other.

MG: Just finally, you were, of course, the chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. And in your letter to the prime minister, you said, In my heart, I believe you are committed to reconciliation. Why do you believe that?

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, he said so and and each time that he said it, it appears to me that he means it. And, you know, he and I have engaged in a number of conversations about the process of reconciliation that this country needs stuff to embark upon. And my concern has always been that the federal government does not have a plan, a plan to carry out their responsibilities and their actions with regard to reconciliation and because they don't have a plan. They're all over the place when it comes to what they're doing and how they're doing it.

MG: Senator Sinclair, good to speak with you this morning. I appreciate your time. Thank you.

MURRAY SINCLAIR: Well, thank you, Matt. It was nice to talk to you.

MG: Murray Sinclair is a member of the Canadian Senate, former chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. We were scheduled to speak with Marc Miller this morning, the Minister of Indigenous Services, and we were going to ask him what the government's plan is in response to the escalating violence, but Marc Miller cancelled our interview late last night.

[Music]

Fed up with afros 'based on cauliflower,' Black players of The Sims eager for better representation

Guests: Jade Ade-Yusuf

MG: You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One. My name's Matt Galloway.

SOUNDCLIP

[Clip of Jade Ade-Yusuf playing The Sims]

MG: That's Jade Ade-Yusuf in her southeast Calgary apartment. She's getting ready to go shopping. Jade loves fashion, loves it all. Hair, makeup, even trying on clothes. So this pandemic is not a good fit for her obsession.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: A nice pair of earrings. Oh those look better than I thought they would.

MG: We should probably explain the Jade is not actually going to the mall. She's playing the Sims video game. She is one of 30 million players of that game. They call themselves Simmers. If you're not familiar with The Sims. It's kind of like a life simulator. Players create characters who do all sorts of things. They build houses, become a vet, you can open a clinic or like Jade.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Oh those are nice.

MG: You can try on new clothes. If you are a player who is not white though, your options for creating a character that looks like you have been pretty bad.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: The worst part of this game, I will say, is the afro hair. The tumultuous afro hair that was based on cauliflower. And it just looks very strange. It looks like a large, equally sided puff on somebody's head. It just never looks like that.

MG: Not a good look. This has been a big problem for players of The Sims for a long time. So lots of gamers have created their own material to work with more options for hair, skin tone, clothes. And the company that makes this game has responded. Electronic Arts promises to release an update to the game before the end of the year. What exactly will that look like? Jade Ade-Yusuf is the devoted Simmer we heard playing her game and she joins me now. Good morning.

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Good morning.

MG: An afro that looks like a cauliflower?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Yeah, that was something that I noticed that kind of came up in the game, and also within the Sims community. It was just some, I guess, pregame sketches, and apparently the afro was based on a cauliflower.

MG: How bizarre. Tell me what it's like to try to create a character that looks like you.

JADE ADE-YUSUF: The biggest thing when trying to create a character that looks like you. Of course it's a video game, know that. But of course, also being a life simulator, you want to try to be as accurate as possible. So whether you have defining facial features such as freckles, your hair and your skin tone, you kind of want to try and make it similar-ish.

MG: And so if you were trying to make a character that looks like you, what would you have to do and aside from the cauliflower afro, what are some of the limitations that you would run up against?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: So the biggest limitation that I can think of currently, the range of skin tones that The Sims currently has. I believe there is about 20 or so skin tones that are available and they're meant to showcase a wide range, but sometimes they fall short of the mark. So especially in the deepest, darkest categories, some of them look kind of grey, kind of purple. And then in the mid-tones, just not quite right. So that's definitely something that comes up.

MG: How frustrating is that?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: It's an annoyance. It's frustrating at times because as a life simulator, you want it to look like yourself, and kind of that's your mini-you in the game.

MG: Could you tell me more about that? I mean, for people who've never played this game before, you can imagine they might say, well, it's a game and it's a simulator. And in real life, I mean, we know how we look and that's important. But in a game, why is it important that you are able to create a character that looks as close to you as possible?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: I think in the way that The Sims is, a lot of it is, I guess, stress relief, an outlet. And in the way that you play the game as being able to live out your best life through this video game, you'd also want your SIM-you to live out your best life, in a way that feels accurate and authentic to you. So whether that's, you know, your skin tone, achieving things in the game, it's really almost a reflection of yourself in a way to say.

MG: What are players doing to try to fill in the gaps? Players who aren't white, who want the game and the SIM to to look like them, what are they trying to do?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: So out of this has really come a large group of Sims custom content creators. So The Sims is the game that does have a large custom content platform, and a lot of Black creators have kind of come up amongst this, and created new skin tones, new clothing styles, just different things that really just add to the game and create a little bit more accuracy as well.

MG: And when you say they're custom, how does that work? They're add-ons that you have to pay additional for, or how does that work?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Yeah. So The Sims has different, there's different avenues to be able to download custom content, sometimes Sims custom content creators will create their own website, or put them on a platform called The Sims Resource. And when I say they're making custom content, they're literally starting from scratch kind of online missions like one would use through computer programmes such as Blender and creating content on The Sims, whether that's skin, so different skin tones or whether that's outfits as well.

MG: What are some of the coolest things that you've seen?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: I think one of the coolest things I've seen is there's some of the 3D eyelashes, that are out there that are quite dramatic. That was one thing that I'm like, wow, these are really dramatic as well as some skins actually look like people. So some people have created custom skins that look like celebrities and you can put them on your Sim. It sounds kind of crazy, but it's just something that someone put a lot of time into that, and that's cool to me.

MG: This is a hugely popular game. I mentioned, like what, 30 million people play this thing, and it's been around, I mean, I remember playing The Sims way back when, in the old days. Why in 2020 do you think there haven't been better options for black and brown folk, players of colour who want to, as you said, embody their characters with all of the characteristics that they have in the real world?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: I think to a certain point that it just hasn't been a priority. And I think certain political events have also brought it up. People are speaking out about it more, and especially the Black Sims community has been very vocal for some time, and they're finally being heard. And I think that's great.

MG: Is there a belief within the gaming culture — and that could be the people who create these games, or promote them — that black and brown folk aren't playing the games?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: That might be so. I think the Sims community is so diverse that, you know, it's sometimes hard to be heard. And I think Black members are just finally making themselves heard and really banding together.

MG: This summer, I mean, we have seen a whole conversation around anti-Black racism, but also the discussions around Black Lives Matter. How has that influenced not what players are doing, but what the company that makes this game is doing, do you think?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: I think with the Black Lives Matter movement and just Black people speaking up in general, a lot of brands have started listening to their consumer base a lot more. And with EA, that's the Sims. That's an area where people are very vocal and that's an opportunity for them to do something now.

MG: This update is coming at some point in time. What would you like to see in it?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: I guess I'd just like to see skin tones that are more accurate, as well as hairstyles that more accurately reflect what Black hair can look like. There's so many different types of black hair, different types of textures. So I'd like to see a better array and just more accurate looks better.

MG: Things that aren't based on cauliflower.

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Yes. Things that are hopefully not based on cauliflower, but on actual hair, on somebody's head. And that's what I'd like to see.

MG: What do you love about The Sims?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: I guess what I loved the most about The Sims, I've grown up playing this game essentially, but I really loved the ability to kind of make whatever you want live. I guess the make believe life that you want. Whether that's as yourselves that said, somebody else but make believe and also be able to create different things within the game.

MG: What do you see is the opportunity here? Just finally, I mean, to your point, there have been conversations after the summer where corporations and everyone in between have had to try to figure out how better to reflect and represent the people who are using their products. And we've seen that in, you know, movies. We've seen that in books. What's the opportunity here if you're able to better reflect the people who are playing a game like this?

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Yeah, I think it's a really a win win on both sides. On one side, you have happy consumers, happy customers who really have banded together over the game and will vouch for you as a company, but as well on the company side, really just into people who were really willing to play the game and, you know, play that game and ride hard for it.

MG: Jade, it's great to talk to you about this. Good luck. I mean, I hope they update, so that you don't have to create your own skins, but that the update actually reflects the nature of the people who are actually playing this game.

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Yeah, absolutely. I'm really looking forward to seeing it. So I guess it's just a matter of time.

MG: Excellent. Jade, thank you.

JADE ADE-YUSUF: Thank you so much, Matt.

MG: That's gamer, Jade Ade-Yusuf. She was in Calgary.

SOUNDCLIP

[Music: Macy Gray's "Hands in Simlish]

MG: That's a song that maybe sounds familiar, but not entirely. It's Macy Gray's "Hands," but it's sung in "Simlish," which is the language of The Sims. Coming up after your regional update, we head to Paris, Prague and Rome to see how Europe is handling recent surges of COVID-19. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current. We're back in 90 seconds. Stay with us. Here's more Simlish for you.

[Music: Macy Gray's "Hands" in Simlish]

New COVID restrictions spark protests across Europe

Guests: Etheliya Hananova, Gloria Taliani, Jan Paces

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

[Speech by French President Emmanuel Macron]

MG: That's French President Emmanuel Macron announcing a new curfew to help curb the spread of COVID-19. Across Europe, many countries are seeing COVID surges and this morning we'll hear from a few of those places. First, to Paris, where residents in that city and several other cities in France are now restricted from being out past 9:00 p.m.. That means restaurants and bars have to be shuttered by 9:00 p.m. as well, which is not sitting particularly well with those in the hospitality industry. Etheliya Hananova is a Canadian who, with her husband, owns the Michelin-starred restaurant Comice. It's in Paris. Etheliya, good morning.

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Hi.

MG: What is it going to mean for you having to be close and having your employees out the door as well as your customers by 9:00 p.m.?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: It's a juggling act because the French generally start eating at about 8 or 8:30. Dinner is later than in North America here. And so we were really confused about how to proceed. We don't do lunch. And so our instinct was to open earlier and sort of say everybody's in the same boat, we're all going to have to adapt for the next six weeks. And what I see right now is that a number of restaurants are sort of doing the same thing, opening at 6:00 or 6:30, so that we can do early dinner to accommodate guests earlier and get them out in a reasonable amount of time.

MG: I can hear, I think, some exasperation in your voice.

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: It's more bewilderment. It's not exasperation exactly. It's just it's all very kind of confusing, arbitrary. I think one of the frustrating things about the situation is that we get very little notice and almost no advance guidelines when these decisions are made. So, for example, the curfew was to take effect on Friday at midnight. We got the you know, we got the news like everybody else did at eight o'clock when the president did his speech on Wednesday. So we had about a day and a half to prepare. And the I guess you call it a test run, the papers that you have designed to give you leeway to leave later because you're an employee. We didn't we didn't have those till quarter to midnight on Friday. We had no idea how to proceed. So, yes, it's a bit frustrating when, you know, you do things the right way. We're extremely rigorous about respecting the protocols and town. We like bleach our menus every day and we have sanitiser on all the tables. We have the proper distances between tables were super careful, were all masked. And yet we're we're kind of in the dark when it comes to changes. That's what's a bit hard.

MG: How did you make it through the first lockdown?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Well, at first we were a little bit panicked, just like everybody, because, you know, the new world and you don't know what to do. And then a few weeks in, we kind of looked at each other and said, we've got to take this into our own hands. We can't just wait for for somebody to swoop in and save us. So we started doing a take out concept called Comice Comfort Food, which was not at all our fine dining food. We did a really high quality ingredient comfort food that we would send in delivery with bike couriers or people would come pick it up once the lockdown eased.

MG: What does that mean financially, just in terms of people run restaurants and it's on a knife edge at the best of times. What is all of this meant for you in terms of keeping the lights on?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Quite, quite concretely, ours sales compared to last year, well, during the summer, I don't know. we were probably at about 10 percent or 15 percent of our sales. And since September, when we were allowed to be open somewhat normally it's been about 35. So not very good.

MG: Wow. How are you able to keep paying the bills?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Well, there is a certain amount of government support. For example, unemployment benefits are paid out to our employees who who we can't keep the entire team on. So our employees are unemployment and there is a small amount of money that's sent to businesses. It's very small in a fund, the solidarity. It doesn't even cover a third of the rent, but it's a little bit. And other than that, it's been pure survival. I mean, we have not we as business owners are not for unemployment. And so we don't even get the same benefits that our employees do, so we just had to hustle. It's been really interesting.

MG: Interesting is an interesting word to use.

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Yeah.

MG: I was going to say do you allow yourself to look down the road?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: You know, we just we try to maintain a positive attitude and we try to say to ourselves, you know, this is what it is. We're just going to have to get through and we don't try to predict or project anymore. We hope that in the distant future we get to go back to what we opened to do, which is, you know, be a fine dining restaurant that welcomes a mixed clientele of locals and foreigners. And. up until that point, we'll do whatever it takes to make it work. We're willing to you know, we have and will continue to adapt at every single turn.

MG: Emmanuel Macron has said that the aim of this curfew is to stop people from having parties at home. But it also has obviously a real impact on you. Do you think that it's fair that your industry to try to convince people not to have parties at home, that your industry takes the hit?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Not totally, no, because I think that the problem is much more widespread than what you see in restaurants or bars. I do think that there's not a huge amount of discipline amongst a certain part of the population, especially younger people are sort of fed up with being told what to do. I was in Marseilles this summer. We took a half time off in August and went to Marseilles and we saw buses packed with people who were not wearing masks and people were partying. And there was absolutely no sense of of consideration for fur covered restrictions there. So I. I just don't feel like closing restaurants or respecting rules and being really careful is the crux of the problem. And I understand that some restaurants are less respectful than others, but maybe there could be a way to sort of inspect businesses and and kind of, you know, look at it differently than just sort of across the board, shutting everybody down to to penalise everybody for certain people's actions. And you clothing us isn't going to stop young people from having a party. My neighbours. Saturday was the first day of the lockdown. We closed everything. We were at home by 9:30 and our neighbours were having a bumping party. So I was a bit frustrated.

MG: Just finally, I mean, you talked about, you know, the discipline that people are fed up with us. What's the mood like in Paris right now, given everything that people have gone through and then a little bit of a breather in the summer where people were able to kind of almost live a bit of a normal life? How are people feeling now?

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: I think I think that generally most well, the people I encounter, our guests and our employees, most people are generally pretty obedient and respectful of rules. There's not a ton of rebelliousness. There were demonstrations against the curfew recently, a couple days ago, but I think there's grumbling. I think people are a little bit fed up. I know business owners, I know restaurants, what I see on Instagram, what I see amongst our peers, people are exasperatedly following the rules, but kind of frustrated at being forced into this situation. I think they're really concerned that the government is not going to follow through with aid to get them through this forced early closure. So during the lockdown, a lot of us felt really left to the wayside that there wasn't enough help. You know, at the beginning, Macron was like, French will be covered, nobody will go bankrupt. But we had to pay rent the whole time and so did everybody else. So I think there's a lot of concern grumbling, but people are willing to sort of bear down and do what needs to be done because, you know, most people are pretty responsible citizens.

MG: I wish you the best of luck and stay healthy and take care.

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Thanks very much. Sounds great.

MG: Thanks. Bye bye.

ETHELIYA HANANOVA: Bye bye.

MG: Etheliya Hananova owns the Michelin-starred restaurant Comice. It's in Paris and she owns that with her husband. Well, from France to Italy, Italy, of course, one of the hardest hit places in the early days of the pandemic. Now, after a time enjoying lower case numbers and Piazza's full of people, the numbers are starting to creep up again. The country set three daily case records in a row last week. But according to my next guest, those numbers may not be as alarming as they seem. Gloria Taliani is the director of the Clinic of Infectious and Tropical Diseases at Sapienza University of Rome and she is on Italy's COVID-19 task force. Good morning to you.

GLORIA TALIANI: Good morning.

MG: What differences are you seeing in your patients between the first wave of COVID-19 and the second spike that you're in the midst of right now?

GLORIA TALIANI: Oh, well, there is a lot of difference because at the beginning of the pandemic and here in Italy, we experienced the epidemic first in the European countries, among the European countries. You know, at that time we were detecting infection in the severely or not severely, but in any case, diseased people. Therefore, we were counting the people who had a disease. And at the moment, on the contrary, we are looking for infected people, which makes a lot of difference because now we are detecting the virus in persons who are perfectly healthy, what we call asymptomatic subjects. And we are doing that because we want to reduce the transmission of the infection from one asymptomatic person to many others. And this is the reason why we make a lot of swabs and this is the reason why we force the prime minister forced Italy to be more respectful of the rules and reduce the circulation of subjects in an uncontrolled condition, such restaurants and barns and open parties and so on. But just to remember us, that we must be conscious of the virus spreading amongst us and it makes a very big difference comparing to the time of the first pandemic. I don't think and many of my colleagues share my conviction, I don't believe that we will have a second, the need for a second lockdown.

MG: Really?

GLORIA TALIANI: Yes, because I think that these measures will cope very well in reducing the situation of the virus and reducing the number of infections we will find in the next couple of weeks, let's say.

MG: How are the hospitals coping right now? Because we'd seen and we've spoken with a number of doctors and nurses and people on the ground in that first wave who were, as you know, just overwhelmed by what was going on. So how are hospitals coping now?

GLORIA TALIANI: Well, the hospitals are coping quite well because the number of beds are continuously increasing to accept more patients as possible. And but the most important thing is that the intensive care units are not overwhelmed by the patients who are severely ill, severely sick. And therefore, for as much as we can cope with severely ill patients requesting the admission to intensive care units. The condition can be considered under control. And that's exactly what is going on at the moment in Italy. The measures has been decided to make possible to maintain this level of alarm in terms of clinical demand, and therefore we are convinced that they would be effective. And among all these things, we have to remember that the Italians have been the first population to be attacked by the virus. And when we started with the pandemic, the virus was spreading in Italy since December. Now we know it. Therefore, it had circulated uncontrolled and without us being aware of the situation for three months. It's easily understandable that it makes a lot of difference comparing to the situation at the moment.

MG: How are Italians, what's the mood like of Italians? Given to your point, what people went through in that first wave and now you had a summer where, you know, there was a bit more of a normal life and then suddenly this comes back in. How are Italians feeling right now?

GLORIA TALIANI: Well, we are scared. Of course we are worried, but we are very, very clever. I have to say that walking around the streets, all people are wearing masks, all pay attention to be in the correct distance from each other. No one is touching the other anymore, which was something very common in Italy, you know. And the discipline that Italy has shown is an example for the rest of the world. And moreover, we were the first to be killed by the virus in Europe and we maintain in our common memories, social memory, the consequences of being so severely hit by the pandemic.

MG: Is that why you think perhaps Italy is doing better than places like France and Spain?

GLORIA TALIANI: Yes, exactly. Exactly. And and we have been conscious for all this time that the virus was between us, among us. And now we it's not so difficult for us to keep a very disciplined and very conscious behaviour and prudent also. So I have to admit in the period the worry of scare of whatever you can imagine, the most important thing for us is to prevent another lockdown will be terrifying in terms of the economics and the measures of the prime minister. Our consciousness very largely widespread. We'll make a good job in the future.

MG: Just before I let you go, as we in Canada see our case counts rise here, is there anything that you think we could learn from the Italian experience?

GLORIA TALIANI: To prevent. Prevent means giving the right tools to teach people how to behave properly in terms of prevention of the spreading of the virus, and that this is something we should do every day without any stopping it, without being stopped by anything. Because this is the very most effective measure we can take for the present and for the future, of course, and teach our children that they're being healthy, even with the virus means the possibility of transmissions to defiance to the families and their consciousness should be our strength.

MG: So that vigilance that you talked about, the wearing of the masks, for example, and making sure that you're not close to each other, that that's the kind of thing you just have to stay on top of.

GLORIA TALIANI: Exactly. Yes. Washing of hands, the wearing of mask, the being apart from each other. It's a sacrifice we can afford in terms of security for all of us.

MG: You're very busy. I do appreciate some of your time this morning. Thank you very much.

GLORIA TALIANI: It was a pleasure. Thank you.

MG: Gloria Taliani is the director of the Clinic of Infectious and Tropical Diseases at Sapienza University of Rome.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sounds from celebrations in Prague]

MG: That's a good time there. Sounds like pre pandemic life, doesn't it? It's actually from this summer in the Czech Republic in late June, thousands of citizens in Prague sat down at a table half a kilometre long sharing food and drink. It was a farewell to COVID-19 party. That's because the country did quite well in the first few months of the pandemic. Fewer than 400 deaths and infections remained low. The celebration though, may have been premature. The country is now experiencing an outbreak. There are thousands of new infections every day and this month it surpassed Spain with the highest cases per capita in Europe. Yang Purchase is a virologist at the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague. Good morning to you.

JAN PACES: Good morning. Thank you for inviting me.

MG: Thank you for being here. Were you at that farewell to COVID party?

JAN PACES: No. Actually, I was looking at it because I'm living nearby, but no, I didn't.

MG: Then what did you make of it? I mean, this giant table, nobody social distancing people kind of bidding farewell to this thing that had ruined people's lives. What did you make of the fact that this party was thrown in the first place?

JAN PACES: At that time, you know, at the time you we were as a whole country really proud of how we fight the COVID. And that actually the way it ended, there were ionly few new cases per day. So you really think it's over.

MG: A bit premature perhaps?

JAN PACES: Definitely. Definitely. We are still the best in the Europe, but on the other side of the scale.

MG: How did the Czech Republic do so well in that first wave? What was it that was happening in the country that kept cases as low as they were?

JAN PACES: We were at the beginning quite afraid. And after that, because it came a little bit later than in Italy and Spain.And not only we as a people, but also our government. So after a few mistakes, they really stepped down and let the experts and scientists decide what should be done. And they just followed and it turns out to be the best way.

MG: They just followed? So residents were onside with the initial lockdowns and the restrictions?

JAN PACES: Yes, actually, it was really from the time of like society, it was a really nice time because you are helping each other. Like where your local shop was closed, you were buying from them just to keep them running and it turns out that the COVID is dangerous for people. There were volunteers to go shopping for them. So they didn't went to the city and so on and so on. And it was really like compact time for the whole population. We were working together to fight the COVID.

MG: So what happened after that? I mean, there was this farewell party, but then what was the situation like in the Czech Republic this summer?

JAN PACES: I'm afraid that everyone did some some wrong things during that time, but the most problematic was our government. Because just after the pandemic, they were become very proud how we managed and then they start to make a really mess in what restrictions should be done and what should not be done. And then basically make a lot of recommendations, which were changed just the next day. Our prime minister recommended everyone to stay in Czech Republic during the summer to help our tourism and then he went to the Greece for his vacation and things like that. That was the start. And after a while, basically, the people started not believing government, do not trust the government actually increased the pandemic. And then it means that some of the people do not follow the rules. And I think that that's the reason why we are now in such a bad shape.

MG: The Czech Republic was one of the few countries in Europe without restrictions during the summer. You mentioned the prime minister going off to Greece on holiday. What were people doing in the absence of that leadership that would lead to the virus picking up steam again?

JAN PACES: So I think because we are a free country, a lot of especially young people, and during the summer toured the city, because our bars were open. So that was the first rane of infection of during the middle of the summer. Almost all new cases were foreigners. And then our people, of course, went abroad, mainly to the ocean, and then they catch the virus and then they bring it back to the country. So at the end of the summer, the numbers of new infections were growing.

MG: As a virologist, did you see this coming? Did you have the sense that that these cases would spike again?

JAN PACES: I think that the experts knew that our government is not doing really well. But I have to say, I was surprised how bad it is. That amount or the speed is really striking now.

MG: Why wasn't the government listening to experts like yourself?

JAN PACES: Well, good question.

MG: Do you have any sense as to why? I mean, what would it be behind the decision for the government to loosen those restrictions?

JAN PACES: I think they hope that our government is very business oriented. So our prime minister is very business oriented. So they try to lose all restrictions and hope that the economy will start to grow again. And that's how.

MG: You talked about how people were not trusting of the government yesterday there were anti-lockdown protests in Prague that turned violent. Are you worried that people are just fed up and they're not going to follow any further lockdown measures because, as you say, they don't trust in the government?

JAN PACES: Yes, this is quite unusual to have such a violent demonstration in Czech. I mean yeah we do a lot of demonstrations and strikes, but not such a violent one. So that was and now when the numbers are so high, I think that people start to understand that they again have to follow the governmental rules.

MG: Given what happened this summer., do you think that the government is prepared to deal with this surge of cases?

JAN PACES: Definitely not. Nobody knows what to do. They are issuing orders and the next day the orders are switched down because they were stupid or they didn't work at all and so on and so on. So that's the problem we have right now.

MG: I wish you the best of luck and I appreciate you speaking with us this morning. Thank you.

JAN PACES: Thank you.

MG: Jan Paces is a virologist at the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague. That is it for The Current for today. Q is up next on CBC Radio One. I wanted to give you a heads up about an interview coming up later on this week on The Current. I'll be speaking with Rhiannon Giddens. Grammy award-winning singer-songwriter, banjo star. She thinks that the banjo in some ways is the instrument that best represents America. And she makes a really passionate argument for that. She's somebody who connects the dots in her music and in the information that she brings in to help shape the music. She reaches across aisles and this is something that she is bringing to her new role as the artistic director of the Silk Road Project at Harvard, an initiative founded 20 years ago by the cellist Yo-Yo Ma to promote cross cultural exchanges, something that is needed now in these increasingly polarized times. You'll hear my conversation with Rhiannon Giddens about music and politics and much, much more coming up later on this week on The Current. Thought we'd leave you this morning with a bit of her music. This is a song called, "I'm On My Way." I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current and we'll talk to you tomorrow.

[Song: "I'm On My Way" by Rhiannon Giddens]

Oct. 19, 2020 episode transcript

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