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The Current Transcript for September 5, 2019

Host: Laura Lynch

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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We addicted a whole generation of kids on nicotine through these vaping products, and this isn't like a teen fad that you can just turn off.

LAURA LYNCH: Two deaths. More than 200 severe lung ailments. Vaping -- meant to wean people off deadly cigarettes -- is now the prime suspect in all of this, and in luring teenagers into its addictive grip. That is first up today. After that, the writ hasn't dropped but we are waiting. A preview of our election coverage; a new podcast drops today and there's a new team looking at disinformation.

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I didn't see the protesters until just a little while ago and it was a very, very small group of people put in for political reasons, so it was fake. Thank you.

LL: OK. We aren't talking about Trump but we will be taking a much closer look at how false information is planted and spreads here in Canada during this election season. Plus, the girls of Chibok and a journalist who got to know some of them intimately. I'm Laura Lynch. This is The Current.

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Health Canada caught 'flat-footed' by rise of popularity of vaping among youths, expert says

Guests: Dr. Andrew Pipe, James Van Loon

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TRYSTON ZOHFELD: I was throwing up everywhere and my heart was just completely pounding and I really couldn't breathe.

LL: At first the doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with Tryston Zohfeld. The athletic 17-year-old was in the intensive care unit of a Texas hospital. His lungs had shut down.

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TRYSTON ZOHFELD: They had me on this big machine that was pretty much breathing for me. If that didn't work out then nothing else was gonna work out.

LL: Tryston had been vaping for a few years and doctors concluded that his habit likely caused the illness. Across the United States there have been more than 200 cases of lung ailments likely connected to vaping. Two deaths are also being investigated. It's not clear yet what exactly is causing the illnesses but politicians are starting to take action. In Milwaukee, city officials issued a health warning telling people to stop vaping altogether. And in Michigan they've just announced a six-month that ban on favoured vaping products. Last night Health Canada issued a statement urging those who vape to be cautious and warning young people, pregnant women and non-smokers not to vape at all. Dr. Andrew Pipe is a Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ottawa and the former Chief of the Division of Prevention and Rehabilitation at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute. We reached him today in Shenzhen, China. Hello.

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Good morning, or good evening!

LL: How surprised were you by the news of these vaping related illnesses across the United States?

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Well in one sense I wasn't surprised. I think I was surprised by the rapidity with which the number has increased in the last week or so, but researchers have in the past pointed out that there are substances in vaping solutions that irritate the lungs and can cause inflammation in the airways. And particularly, when individuals start smoking they'll probably start vaping very aggressively, as teenagers and others will want to do once they become addicted to nicotine and they seek it in a highly flavoured form. So they, you know, inhale large quantities of these substances and it's not unreasonable to expect that there will be lung complications in some.

LL: And yet, Health Canada says there have been no reported cases of this kind of pulmonary illness here. How would you account for that?

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Well I'm not surprised by that. I think, you know, if you're a clinician and you see somebody with a significant respiratory illness your first priority is to care for that individual and- who may not necessarily even ask the question about vaping or what- what produced those symptoms. I think now clinicians everywhere are sensitive or have been sensitized to this phenomenon and it wouldn't surprise me if we didn't find cases now being reported in Canada in the weeks to come.

LL: Dr. Pipe, I wonder if you can break things down a bit for us because there may be some confusion about these different terms. What are vapes? What are E-cigarettes? Flavours? What's what?

DR. ANDREW PIPE: You know, these devices have evolved considerably since they were first introduced. That basically vaping devices as a device which allows a solution containing nicotine to be heated and produce a vapour. And the vapour- vapour produced containing nicotine contains no products of combustion. And therefore the harmful products of combustion which are produced when a cigarette burns are not produced. So there's no question that if an individual smoker switches exclusively to these devices that they're harmless is substantially reduced. Now the initial devices were simple [inaudible] returned that heated these solutions, but these solutions- pardon me, these devices have now evolved. They can- you can change the temperature, you can refill these tanks or so-called tank devices, you can purchase different solutions of different concentrations, you can make your own solutions. So it's a whole witch's brew of solutions out there. We also know that the devices themselves contain metallic elements that left traces of which can themselves cause injury to lung tissue. So it's an evolving market. It's a bit of a Wild West because there's really been no effective regulation of these products in Canada to this point. And I think the situation that's evolving calls for very thoughtful, but nonetheless, forceful regulation. Of course the other dimensions of this problem is that it takes about 48 hours to become addicted to nicotine. And so we have manufacturers of sophisticated devices -- things like Juul which is arguably, outside of the insulin pump, the most sophisticated drug delivery device in our community delivering large quantities of nicotine. Teenagers are attracted to these devices and the favoured solutions or flavours that they contain very quickly become addicted. And inevitably, in order to save that nicotine addiction they will also use combustion cigarette products. So we have these acute incidents but also you have the major public health issue and the fact that we may be spawning a new generation of nicotine addicts.

LL: Right. According to the US Centre for Disease Control, the vast majority of cases of these suspected vaping illnesses involve teenagers.

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Yes that doesn't surprise me at all. You know it's back to school time and as we've seen already in Canada in high schools across Canada. High school principals are taking doors off bathrooms or removing computer USB charging devices because students are so addicted to nicotine they take these surreptitious devices into the classroom. They're using them in the classroom. They're exhaling into the into their sweaters or down their sleeves. There's a very substantial issue associated with the use of these devices in teenagers. And I think those of us who've been involved in tobacco control issues for decades are astonished that we now seem to have lost sight of the lessons of the past. And the same kind of regulation of tobacco products has not seem to be... it is not seem to be applied to these devices which are appealing to teenagers. Of course the tobacco industry is now heavily involved in these devices and the tobacco industry has no interest whatsoever in helping people stop smoking.

LL: You touched on this already but I'm wondering if you could talk a little more about Health Canada's regulatory response to vaping up to this point. They did issue this statement last night but what about the regulatory response? How do you gauge that?

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Well I think the regulatory response, to be fair, has been somewhat flat footed. But you know, a few years ago at Queen's University there was an international summit that looked at ways in which Canada could achieve, develop an end game for tobacco. And at that time one of the recommendations of that summit was that it needed to be aware that these products were coming into the marketplace and that there were significant implications for their arrival in the marketplace, and therefore that appropriate regulation was needed. I think we're in a situation now where we're going to play catch up. There's no need for candy floss favourite -- flavoured, pardon me -- e-juice solutions. I think we need to regulate the nicotine content of these products. Other jurisdictions have either... or- have moved to regulate them. In your introduction we noted with some introductions are even prohibited now. Ironically, that the city of San Francisco which is cheek by jowl with Stanford University or Juul, one of the more sophisticated at these devices developed which [inaudible] has now prohibited their use in their importation. That's what we're seeing municipalities act in the absence of more- a more appropriate state or federal regulations in the American context. Now we may see that in Canada is that where the tobacco control in Canada.

LL: Is that what should be happening? Is that what should be happening?

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Well I think... I think regulation should be happening. And in the absence of regulation from central powers or central authorities, I think you may see public health departments in various communities act in ways that public health communities acting like... public health organizations acted in cities like Kitchener, Waterloo, Ottawa to produce smoke-free environments in advance of provincial and federal legislation in those respects.

LL: OK. Just to be fair, the state of Michigan announced a six-month ban on all favoured nicotine vaping products. Is that the kind of move that you want to see here?

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Exactly. We know that favoured products are attractive. Oh, by-and-large to teenagers most smokers who are attracted to e-devices generally don't use the favoured products. And so if we are to capitalize on the harm reduction potential of these devices I think we've got to make sure that they're carefully regulated and in particular that they... we just don't know how the Wild West show of flavours and robust marketing that has resulted in an epidemic of the use of these devices by Canadian teenagers.

LL: Dr. Pipe, thank you.

DR. ANDREW PIPE: Thank you very much.

LL: Dr. Andrew Pipe is Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ottawa and the former Chief of the Division of Prevention and Rehabilitation at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute. We reached him today in Shenzhen, China. Well, school days are back and so too are those sweet smelling clouds of vapour that are wafting from groups of young people on school and university campuses. As mentioned, research released in June shows that the rates of vaping amongst Canadian teenagers rose 74% in just one year. Souresh Rezaie is a bit older than that, he's 25, but he vapes and he's starting to watch the news out of the U.S. more closely.

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SOURESH REZAIE: It's- it's kind of frightening. I knew that vaping wasn't really healthy but I didn't know what the unhealthyness in it was. But a lot of people that I know personally, friends, think that this is- there's nothing wrong with it. So when these things have started happening in the States it was a good wake up call, I think. I don't plan on vaping forever but I'm quitting vaping too. This is just like a purgatory between smoking cigarettes and just fully quitting nicotine. So I started smoking cigarettes when I was about 15-16 years old when I first came to Canada. It was just sort of a fun habit at first. And then it turned into a bit of a problem, an addiction. And in order to quit smoking cigarettes I changed to vaping about two and a half years ago. The surface level appeal was the fact that it was... didn't smell like cigarettes too, and it wasn't as time consuming as a cigarette was. I had a sense that it was a little bit more healthy. But at the end of the day I still knew that it was unhealthy to be inhaling some unknown substance. A lot of kids, though, I see that they're vaping without really any concern because they don't think that it's like cigarettes or that they don't think that it hurts them. But they have this school prep black market thing where like they trade the stuff. So it's pretty scary stuff. I think that there should be more regulation and more research done regarding vaping and the chemicals that are used in the companies that are making these. I know there's companies that are making these homemade. I'm not sure how regulated that is or how- how much they have to like what the health standards are, what not. Right? So I definitely want to see more at least. I don't know what's being done necessarily but I want to see more being done.

LL: Souresh Rezaie is an engineering student in Vancouver. James Van Loon is the Director General of Health Canada's Tobacco Control Directorate and he's in our Ottawa studio. Hello.

JAMES VAN LOON: Thank you for having me.

LL: You just heard from Souresh Rezaie. I wonder, how familiar is his story to you?

JAMES VAN LOON: It's familiar in a number of ways and there are some parts of that story that are actually a bit gratifying. Souresh said that he was smoking cigarettes and had switched completely to vaping and was now looking to exit from vaping. And... and that's kind of what the original idea was with allowing this alternative source of nicotine into the marketplace. On the other hand he said that he... that lots of his friends seem to think or that lots of the younger kids seem to think that there's just nothing harmful about vaping and that's simply not the case. Dr. Pipe mentioned that... that a smoker who switches completely from smoking to vaping is reducing their exposure to a large number of chemicals. And that is true. Cigarettes remain the leading cause of preventable death and illness in Canada. It's not very difficult to provide something that is less harmful than that. But so yes, there's a lot of familiarity and what I heard from Souresh.

LL: Well Dr. Pope also said he's being deluged with e-mails and phone calls from parents who are wondering what to make of the news from the United States. What would you say to those- those parents?

JAMES VAN LOON: Yesterday evening Health Canada issued what we call an information update which is sort of a live update of what we're learning about an emerging situation concerning a product. In this case it's about these hundreds of illnesses that have been seen in the United States and what is going on there and what Canadians can do to protect themselves or how to react. And just to give a bit of a thumbnail sketch of what that information update says, there are serious pulmonary illness serious lung illnesses occurring in the United States. It's being tracked actively by the Centres for Disease Control, the Food and Drugs Agency and local and state public health authorities in the United States. The... Health Canada is carefully monitoring what's going on with that. Oh by the way, those are very serious illnesses. People come to hospital with trouble breathing, coughing, some vomiting, illness, stuff like that. They are, in some cases, having to have supplementary oxygen steroid treatment for their lungs, even going on a breather. It's a very serious situation and there have been two deaths linked to this in the U.S.

LL: So- yes. Yes. So you put the statement out last night and we referred to that but Dr. Pipe also says that Health Canada has been caught "flat footed" when it comes to regulating this. What do you say to that?

JAMES VAN LOON: I would just like to. I will address that, but I would first like to say that with respect to this emerging situation which is something that's emerging very quickly over the last couple of months we're looking for it actively in Canada. We haven't seen any cases yet but we are looking at all of our information sources for possible cases. That includes federally accessible databases like consumer complaints about vaping products or drug adverse reaction reports, but more- but it also includes the Public Health Agency of Canada reaching out to all of the chief medical officers of health across the country and saying please be on the lookout for this. Providing descriptions of the sorts of things that doctors should be reporting, and encouraging practitioners to ensure that they ask people about their vaping history if they're coming in with any kind of a respiratory illness. Given all that we still haven't seen anything that said, like, if Canadians are concerned about the possibility of this illness occurring to them. Obviously the easiest thing to do if you're concerned about avoiding a vaping-related illness is do not vape. If you are using vaping products or are... or have used him in the past, just monitor yourself carefully. And if you end up with difficulty breathing or or severe illness and going, make sure that you talk to your doctor about what that is.

LL: Can you please respond to Dr. Pipes' claim that you've been caught "flat footed" on this?

JAMES VAN LOON: Absolutely. So Dr. Pipe had a number of thoughts and one thing that resonated for me was that he said that he thought that thoughtful and forceful regulation was required here. Health Canada has been looking at this- this rapid increase in the number of young people using vaping products since we first became aware that the numbers were coming out that way in Canada as well. That was back in December. By February of last year, The department put forward regulatory proposals that would put much stronger restrictions in place with respect to the promotion of vaping products. You should understand that vaping products were legalized in Canada last year back in May of 2018 and that the tobacco and vaping products Act, which put in place the regulatory framework for that, already prohibits a whole lot of the kinds of promotion that we'd seen in the United States. So lifestyle promotion is illegal-.

LL: But... Is that too little given what we're seeing now?

JAMES VAN LOON: There are a whole lot of restrictions in place. We have seen this increase in the number of young people vaping so we are looking at doing more. The legislation provided a bunch of regulatory authorities that would allow more to happen. So as I said, in February of last year we proposed additional restrictions on promotion that would basically take all of the sort of ads out of places where young people tend to be, put in place additional restrictions on broadcast advertising, restrictions on... potential social media advertising, and then beyond that. In April we published another discussion document saying OK well what is the role of flavours in uptake by young people? What is the role of nicotine and what is the role of the design of the product and to what extent should we be doing additional regulatory measures to address those issues as well? We heard back from Canadians -- from industry, from vapers themselves -- throughout the summer and we're currently considering that and working as quickly as possible to develop-

LL: But is it time to ban these products entirely? Or at least suspend their sale while you look into this?

JAMES VAN LOON: Well as you heard from Dr. Pipe and as was the purpose of implementing- or of setting up the Tobacco and Vaping Products Act, vaping products are a less harmful alternative to nicotine if you switch completely from smoking, which is the leading cause of preventable death and illness in Canada to vaping. But more can be done to prevent youth uptake. And we're working to put those together as quickly as possible. There's one other item I just wanted to touch on briefly because I think it's important that people hear about it.

LL: OK we've got about 30 seconds left.

JAMES VAN LOON: A lot of the cases that have been reported in the United States, people have said that they were vaping THC vapes that they obtained in the illegal market. We do not know what has caused the events in the United States yet but I do want to put on a clear message out there -- vaping products that are obtained illegally are not subject to quality assurance, to oversight, to all of the things that you might like to see and are not safe. People should avoid black market products.

LL: A lot to be concerned about. Thank you for your time.

JAMES VAN LOON: Thank you.

LL: James Van Loon is Director General of Health Canada's Tobacco Control Directorate. He was in our Ottawa studio. Well the CBC News is coming up next. And then.

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WOMAN: The warning was the gunfire from neighbouring Chibok town. There was gunfire, there was a smell of smoke and they could hear screams.

LL: Nigerian schoolgirls could tell something was happening but it was the middle of the night of the night they were told to stay in place. So they waited for someone, anyone, to come and tell them what to do. No one came. Instead they were stolen away in trucks by members of Boko Haram. Priscilla, Dorcas -- the girls have names and families and 100 of them are still missing. We'll hear their stories from a journalist who knows some of them so well they call her Auntie. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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Sneak Peek: “The Testaments” and "Beneath the Tamarind Tree: A Story of Courage, Family, and the Lost Schoolgirls of Boko Haram."

Guests: Margaret Atwood, Isha Sesay

Hello I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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LL: Disinformation. Misinformation. It's all going to be piling up when the federal election gets underway. In half an hour we'll talk to CBC journalists about how to sift through what's real and what is meant to mislead. But first, a long awaited sequel by a Canadian great.

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LL: It's a novel that's been shrouded in secrecy. "The Testaments" by Margaret Atwood might just be the most anticipated book of the year. It is scheduled to be released next week. But despite strict agreements, somehow a few copies were shipped out early. My interview with Margaret Atwood about "The Testaments" will air on Monday and I had to sign a nondisclosure agreement to read the book and give it back after I'd finished. It is the sequel to "The Handmaid's Tale", that 1985 dystopian novel that tells the story of Gilead, a totalitarian state where fertile young women are used as handmaid's to provide children to its leaders. The main character in that was Offred, one of the Handmaids.

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MARGARET ATWOOD: So I've been thinking about it off and on in a negative way ever since I published the first book because readers kept saying what happens next? And tell us whether our friend gets out? And then I said, well, I can't tell you. I don't know. So that went on for a while, and by "sequel" of course they meant the continuation of the story of her which I didn't really feel that I could do because you can't recreate a voice like that. So, at least I couldn't. So- so I was I was saying, "No no no no no no," for a while. But then number one: history changed and instead of going away from Gilead we turned around and started coming back towards Gilead. And number two: I thought, well why does it have to be her? I would like to know what happened to those children. And I would also like to know how Gilead fell apart because we already knew that it did. So what caused it to fall apart? What caused it to cease to be?

LL: That is Margaret Atwood talking about her much anticipated book "The Testaments". My interview with her will air Monday on The Current. And now, the lost school girls of Boko Haram.

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ISHA SESAY: New horrors from a brazen and increasingly dangerous terrorist organization. A man claiming to be the leader of the Islamic militant group Boko Haram is promising a grim fate for 223 Nigerian girls kidnapped in the dead of night during a fiery attack on their school three weeks ago.

LL: That's former CNN correspondent Isha Sesay reporting on the kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls on the night of April the 14th, 2014. It happened in the Nigerian town of Chibok orchestrated by members of the terrorist group Boko Haram. In the hours, days and months that followed, 57 of the girls would escape. But for more than two and a half years, the remaining 219 remained in captivity. Isha says they broke the story and long after the media lens had turned away she continued to follow it. When 21 of the girls were released in October of 2016 she was there to meet them to hear the story of what they'd endured. Isha Sesay's book about the ordeal is called "Beneath the Tamarind Tree: A Story of Courage, Family, and the Lost Schoolgirls of Boko Haram." She joins me from Los Angeles. Hello.

ISHA SESAY: Hello there.

LL: I think it's hard to understand what happened that night without understanding Chibok, the town from which the girls were taken. Can you take us there and tell us why this was an ideal target for Boko Haram?

ISHA SESAY: So Chibok town is this small, dusty, dilapidated Christian community in northeastern Nigeria and it really stands out as a Christian enclave in the predominantly Muslim north, and it's so tucked away in Borno state which is long-known as "Ground Zero" for Boko Haram that it just wasn't on anyone's radar, it wasn't on anyone's mind. So even though Borno, the actual state that it's located in, was under a state of emergency in 2014 when this abduction happened, Chibok was just wasn't the place anyone, you know, had reasons to think about. Having said that, even though all the schools had been closed the school in Chibok was allowed to stay open. It was allowed to stay open to serve as an examination centre. So this tiny town had this school that was going to operate as a place for kids to take exams. And it just became a target. It was just lying in wait for Boko Haram to turn its attention to it.

LL: And you tell the story through that some of the people who lived through it. And one of the girls is Priscilla. She's an 18-year-old from Chibok working towards eventually going to medical school. How representative was she of young women in northern Nigeria at that time?

ISHA SESAY: Not representative at all. Northern Nigeria has one of the largest school populations in the world. So for Chibok where you were eeing girls of Priscilla's age mostly in school to the point where they were finishing high school, that was remarkable.

LL: And that's why they were there that night. Your description of the night of the kidnapping is just amazing. Tell me how it all began for the girls and when did they realize something was wrong?

ISHA SESAY: For a lot of the girls -- because they were there in that school to take these exams which, for all of them, I think, it's safe to say heralded the beginning of a new chapter in life. They would go home and have holidays with their families as this was a boarding school so they had been separated from their families. So the atmosphere in the school was one of just great joyfulness. When the evening came, a lot of them grabbed dinner. They moved to their dorms. Some studied because they had exams the next day, and others stayed out in the schoolyard. And it was just, you know, I guess you'd call it idealic in some ways because there wasn't a care in the world and they were just happy for them. The girls I spoke to in most cases, they were asleep and it was friends, schoolmates, who awoke them. And the warning, if you will, was the gun fire. There was a smell of smoke and they could hear screams. Now they were in the school with the expectation that there were teachers on the school property and that they would come and tell them what exactly was going on. But they just waited and nobody showed up. And that's one of the greatest tragedies I think of this story, that they were waiting for someone to tell them what to do while they try to make sense of these sounds and this- this- this chaos.

LL: And Boko Haram, they come through the gates and they prepare to take these- these girls away. They're rounded up and driven or walked out of the village in a convoy and they're taken deep into the Sambisa Forest. Tell me about the forest and how it lived in the imaginations of people who lived near it?

ISHA SESAY: Yeah. I mean, and this thing about it and I think it is worth just underscoring that the men came not with a plan to abduct girls, which I think makes it even more tragic. That was because there was nobody there to stop them effectively from taking them that they carted them off into Sambisa Forest which had become... their hiding place because it is this wide expansive area which has savanna grass and bushes, and while the overgrown trees some of it grows so thickly that if you were to be behind an expanse of it you couldn't see through it. And in that space there were all these strange sounds of animals and snakes and just this deep fear of what was lurking close by, that you could see and not see. So for locals, this just wasn't the place that you went into. So to have these girls now forced into this space was truly terrifying.

LL: But what we should say is that within hours of them being taken we see the first acts of defiance by these girls. Fifty-seven escaped but when the rest of them finally stop the girls are led to shelter under a tamarind tree, the tamarind tree of the title. Tell me about that tree.

ISHA SESAY: You know it was so interesting when I was finally given that detail I thought to myself I don't quite understand because they had arrived at the Boko Haram camp, they had been told to get out of the trucks and to go under this large tree. And as we spoke it transpired that they had been forced to take residence under this overgrown tamarind tree with bowed branches and overlaid with with leaves and fruit, the tamarind fruit, which was so overgrown and gargantuan that basically the branches reached the ground or nearly touched the ground so it formed, as I say in the book, kind of a "hoop skirt." And so they parted the branches and they were asked to basically enter and where they would basically be hidden from sight from any Nigerian aerial surveillance. And it was this hot, humid, dank space and they literally been taken prisoner by nature. And in this space there were these bugs and there was just this fear of what was crawling around them and just the sense that they had entered into, I guess, a different dimension if you will.

LL: And in the meantime, back in Chibok, what are the families of these girls going through?

ISHA SESAY: A sense of... shock. Kind of a disbelief that the children could have just disappeared into thin air. A deepening distress with each passing day that came from... from the silence on the part of the Nigerian government which endured for almost three weeks and just this this knowledge that because they are poor, because they are from a place like Chibok, this realization has started to sink in that their children could be lost to them and nobody would care.

LL: You describe the particular agony of Esther, whose daughter, Dorcas was taken. Tell me about Esther the night the girls were missing and the guilt she carried with her?

ISHA SESAY: For Esther it was particularly painful because when Dorcas left for school to take those exams, Esther took her cell phone from her because she wanted her to concentrate and not have any distractions. But that also meant when she got the phone call from her brother-in-law in the middle of the night saying that these "Boko boys" to quote him were making their way to Chibok and heading towards the school that also meant she couldn't reach her daughter Dorcas because she didn't have a phone. And the confusion that night of knowing that Boko Haram was approaching and hearing gunfire in their home and wondering at first whether the gunfire was coming from, you know, the handful of Nigerian soldiers stationed in Chibok to protect the community. And then hearing the cries of Allahu Akbar realizing, no, in actual fact it's not saviours that are firing but potentially their tormentors. So you think about all these split second decisions she had to make. Should she stay? Should she run? What about her other children? You think about the guilt she felt if, you know, cutting the line of communication with Dorcas. And that agony is still very present in Esther who, over the years, has just developed a number of physical ailments from the stress.

LL: And we'll come back soon [to] Dorcas a bit later on. Of course, the girls knew none of what was playing out politically. Within six months they'd been moved twicemore, Boko Haram had been trying to get some of the gir- well, had been trying to get all of them to convert to Islam with some success. Then there was talk of marriage between the girls and some of their captors. But there were those who refused to convert and who refused to marry, and one of them was Priscilla. Tell me what hers and the other ones who refused, what did their lives look like?

ISHA SESAY: They became... I mean, outcasts really sums it up in a way because for those who agreed to take their captors as a husband, those who refuse became their servants. But for Priscilla and for the others, you know, Priscilla in particular when it comes to the issue of conversion felt very strongly that she, in her words, she was born a Christian she would die a Christian and nothing else mattered. And when it came to marriage the idea that was being peddled was that if you marry you'll get better treatment, if you marry your husband can make the individual decision to reunite you with your families. But Priscilla just never bought that line and just always just thought this is just a ruse. And she just wasn't prepared to do that.

LL: Her defiance and her strength are extraordinary. In October 2016, 21 of the girls were released and she ends up playing a really key role in this release. Tell me about what happened.

ISHA SESAY: You know, when she reflects on her time in captivity and her ability to stand up to her captors in small ways. I think she's still quite surprised by it. So even though they were told that they weren't allowed to have any writing material she managed to keep a notebook that they had been given for Qur'anic studies. And when the time came for a list to be drawn up of who would be freed, the captors asked who had a pen and paper. And she still went ahead and put up a hand and said I do have a pen and paper and she handed it over and her name was put down on the list. But from that, it kind of morphed into Priscilla being the girl who was chosen to actually be a form of a human shield and walk with some of the terrorists to this meeting point in a clearing where she would meet with members from the Swiss Embassy and from Nigerian security forces and she would be the person who would vouch for the safety of the other girls who had been released. So she plays this remarkable role and the whole time as she's walking to Ban Ki having left the others behind, she's wondering what will happen to her. She's also wondering why she's been chosen. But there is something remarkable about her and the moment you meet -- I've met almost all of the girls who've been released and there was something about her that you feel immediately.

LL: You... when you heard that the 21 had been released, you knew you had to get there. You got yourself there. You've met these 21 girls. You've actually met them on two separate occasions and I just want to talk for a moment about- about the second time, and that's when they were travelling to Chibok for Christmas. The book opens with this beautiful moment in the hotel when you were waiting to travel to Chibok. Can you describe for me what you experienced there?

ISHA SESAY: Yes. So I was in this hotel and suddenly I could hear a melody. I could hear something. And eventually I find out they were singing because it was evening worship, because this is a devoutly Christian community and there's morning worship and there's evening worship. And so they had gathered in this one room, this group of 21, and I sat there watching them and just being, you know, wrapped up in the sound and just being really struck by just how peaceful they seemed and how- how- how light they seemed, light of spirit, that they didn't seem, in any way at least, to look at them pained or feel like they were battling with dark thoughts or emotions. I was just very struck by just the beauty and the harmony in the room.

LL: Testament to their faith.

ISHA SESAY: Yeah.

LL: You go up to Chibok then you come back to see to- to get this story out. You're expecting a deluge of requests from the media. What happened?

ISHA SESAY: Yes. So on... two occasions, on the occasion where they were released, that October of 2016 and then later on in December when I made the trip to Chibok with them, on both occasions just raring to tell the world about what I'd seen and experienced and learned about them. And on both occasions, and in particular when they were first released, there was just- there was just little to no interest on the part of the network. And I was just deeply, deeply upset by that because I felt that the world deserved to know that they were back and deserved to know that there was a happy ending for some families and to see them and to rejoice with them. And that just never happened.

LL: And then- and this was reflected in a lack of international media's appetite. What responsibility do you say the media bears in this story?

ISHA SESAY: I think that when it comes to Africa and I think when it comes to the tragedies that that take place on the continent, too often the international media gives the stories short shrift. Too often they come in full -- if you want the blood and the guts, if you will, to use the crude term turn of phrase -- but don't don't stay long enough or with sufficient enough appetite to really tell the stories of the people and to move them beyond as I say ciphers or representations of just how awful the continent can be and really begin to understand who they are, their hopes their dreams, and where they come from. And with that, we fail too readily to humanize the people of the African continent. And I think that is a failing. That's a habit international media has.

LL: Part of the reason you left your job and wrote this book. Now, we should remind people that less than a year after the first girls were set free, another 82 were released. But to this day 112 remain missing. Boko Haram is a fractured organization and the current president of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, campaigned on a pledge to bring those girls back. But he's really- he's done very little. What does that mean for the now young women who are still missing?

ISHA SESAY: It means that unless the international community, unless ordinary people around the world continue to talk about this and tweet about this and make noise about this, the Nigerian government will simply cast this to the side. They have, quite honestly, I mean because they've given no indication to prove otherwise, they have moved on. They have moved on and they are not engaging with the families. They're not speaking to the community. And there is no evidence that they have provided to anyone that they are doing everything possible to account for the remaining 112 and bring them home.

LL: Now we spoke earlier of Esther and her tremendous guilt over her daughter, Dorcas. Dorcas is one of those who is still missing. But a video did emerge. What did that tell us about what happened to her?

ISHA SESAY: The video showed what we know can happen when people are taken hostage. That bonds can be formed with captors and allegiances can be formed and new sides chosen. And so for Dorcas, who is the youngest of the girls taken, she was 15 going on 16 when she was taken that night in April. She has essentially become radicalized and has decided that her place is with her captors. Her place is with, you know, Muslim believers and not with her family. And she has no interest in returning. And that is a... it's a, you know, it's incredibly painful and distressing for Esther and for all the other families who now wonder whether this is the same fate that their children have embraced.

LL: Let's end this by by going back to Priscilla who you perhaps got to know better than anyone else. This extraordinary young woman, you last saw about a year ago. But you talked to her on the phone a fair bit. She calls you in the middle of the night sometimes! [laughs] Tell me about her and how she's doing these years removed from captivity.

ISHA SESAY: It's so interesting to see how she's blossoming from the very shy young lady I met. She was so reluctant to just, you know, to project her voice and to kind of hold her body upright and it's so interesting to see all of that changing and her finding a sense of confidence, and even just in what she wears. Even though there is still conservatism because she's from the north to what she wears it's still long skirts and what you would describe as demure blouses by Western standards, if you will. But the neck lines are widening [laughs]. Not necessarily lowering, but widening. You know? And she, you know, she's now not afraid to speak her mind with greater consistency. And she's in school. And she's excited about school. And she's excited about the future. And in a remarkable way has, you know, and I asked her about this whether she'd forgiven her captors and she said "absolutely." You know? And Priscilla and her best friend Bernice both speak of readily forgiving them. And I won't say that they are over what happened, but they found a way to make some kind of peace, some kind of -- not complete, of course -- but some kind of peace with it and be excited about going to school and fulfilling dreams of becoming professional young women.

LL: I can hear in your voice how much all of this has touched you. I thank you for your work and for your book and for taking the time to talk to us today.

ISHA SESAY: Thank you.

LL: Isha Sesay a former CNN correspondent and the author of "Beneath the Tamarind Tree: A Story of Courage, Family, and the Lost Schoolgirls of Boko Haram." We reached her in Los Angeles. Well coming up in our next half hour rumour has it a federal election is coming up. Hill watchers are still waiting for the official call. But at least a couple of our journalists have already been very busy.

SOUNDCLIP

ROSEMARY BARTON: Hey I'm Rosemary Barton and I love politics.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: You don't possibly mean that. I'm Elamin Abdelmahmoud and I tweet about politics but I don't want to.

ROSEMARY BARTON: I really do!

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Stop it.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Welcome to Party Lines. This is a podcast where we will talk about the issues that we think matter this week in the upcoming federal election.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Yeah. This election is going to be messy...

LL: The hosts of Party Lines join me in a couple of minutes. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

Back To Top »

Party Lines & The real 'fake news': how to spot misinformation and disinformation online

Guest: Rosemary Barton, Elamin Abdelmahmoud, Kaleigh Roberts, Andrea Bellemare

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

JAGMEET SINGH: Je ne suis pas comme les autres. Comme vous, mon identite c'est ma fierte. Pas de cadeaux, pas d'heritage, j'ai assez connu les injustices pour savoir me battre...

LL: The federal NDP's election ad aimed at battleground Quebec. With leader Jagmeet Singh telling voters, "I'm not like others. Like you, my identity is my pride." But will that message be enough to help the cash-strapped party -- which has also been struggling to find candidates -- hold on to its seats in the province? And what is at stake for the Liberals, the Conservatives, the Bloc Quebequois, the Greens and other parties as voters prepare to go to the polls on October the 21st. Those are just some of the questions you can expect to hear answered in Party Lines, a new offering from CBC News and CBC Podcasts that is launching today. The weekly podcast is host co-hosted by The National's Rosemary Barton and Elamin Abdelmahmoud, Editor of News Curation for BuzzFeed News -- that's a mouthful. And they join me from our Ottawa studio. Hello!

ROSEMARY BARTON & ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Good morning!

LL: Rosemary, let me let me ask you first off - what did you make of that ad?

ROSEMARY BARTON: I actually thought it was- it was quite good. I thought it was surprising. I thought it tried to deal head-on with an issue that that Jagmeet Singh and the NDP are struggling with in Quebec which is, I guess, some discomfort with the fact that he openly wears a religious symbol, a turban, and knowing that there is a different perception of that kind of thing in Quebec that- that does seem to be hurting them in the polls, and just trying to take it head on. I thought it- I thought it was fascinating and I also think it's fascinating to see him without his turban because, you know, Sikhs don't don't generally do that in public. So it really exposed him in a way. Is it enough? Will it actually make a difference in Quebec, that I'm less certain of. But I thought it was smart advertising for sure.

LL: And that's only one of the NDP's challenges is had to get back on the campaign travel budget. And earlier this week a number of former provincial NDP candidates in New Brunswick went and threw their support behind the Greens. What does that tell you, Rosemary?

ROSEMARY BARTON: You know, I think the problem is is much larger than just Jagmeet Singh. I think there's some organizational problems. There's some definite fundraising problems. They simply don't have enough money to to campaign the same way the other two big parties do. And I think we're at a point now where the question will not be can they, you know, can they turn it around? It's a save-the-furniture sort of play that they have to have in this election. And I think that speaks to some of the the the turmoil that the party was in when they decided to have a leadership review of Tom Mulcair and boot him out as leader and then try something completely different. And I think if you are the NDP today you are... you are quite worried heading into this election.

LL: Let's just touch briefly then, Rosemary, on one last story this week. It's about announced Liberal candidate in Quebec named Hassan Guillet who was dumped by the party over online comments he posted in the past. What do you think the takeaway is from that?

ROSEMARY BARTON: Well I mean the takeaway is be careful of social media because it will bite you in the butt. And that party's probably need to do a better job of vetting their candidates. You know, he did speak yesterday suggesting that the Liberal Party had asked him to clean up his social media account. That that's his version of events. I'm not sure where the truth lies. But the only option really for the Liberal Party was to remove him quickly because many of the comments were, as you say, anti-Semitic and you can't, you know, that's simply not acceptable. And particularly not acceptable for a candidate. So there are always, you know, episodes like this during an election, Laura. And you find things even when you think you've vetted your candidate as best you can and you've gone through all their social media threads. Things pop up, war rooms are very good at finding them, and we should probably expect more of that.

LL: Okay. Well I mean this is the kind of stuff that we in the media often talk about when we talk about politics. But you are hoping to do something a bit different with Party Lines so tell us about that.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Right. I mean I think that the strength that Rosie brings to our podcast is that she is deeply enmeshed in the political universe. But also, there's a broader conversation I think about the larger narratives at play for the audiences who are not plugged into the day-to-day minutia of politics. And so the hope is that together the pairing of us will- will- will balance those perspectives of the inside. And I'm sort of broader view.

LL: Do you have a target audience who you're hoping to reach?

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Anyone who is very engaged and knows all the major players but they just don't have the time to keep up with the daily turns of- of the political universe. So once we will sit down we'll say here are the major things that you need to know and their consequences and how they matter.

LL: Okay. Rosemary, Elamin just called you "enmeshed." [laughs]

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: I did.

LL: [laughs]

ROSEMARY BARTON: He likes to mock me, actually.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: I do not!

ROSEMARY BARTON: He thinks I've been- yeah he I've been brainwashed to love politics! [laughs]

LL: Well, you know I can understand because you know I was on Parliament Hill myself for a long time and I know that when you get into it you can be surrounded by everything and it's insular. And I wonder why you think it's important to try to reach that wider audience that might be more interested in the big picture than the minutia.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Well because those are -- that's possibly the majority of people, really. I mean I'm aware that I am an anomaly and that's- that's OK. And that I talk to other people that are the same as me and that's that's not great, you know, for me. I need to push my boundaries a little bit too. So it's- it's, I think it's important that we talk to everybody because this is really an election for everyone and part of what we have to do is inform people so they can make good decisions when we get to voting day. The thing about Elamin that's great is that he comes at it from a really different view. Like, really different life experience... everything's di- we're very different, but we get along. And so he pushes me to think differently too. Like on the podcast today that's dropped, one of the questions that he wanted to dig into was "Why do politicians not say certain things?" Like why do they stay away from certain topics?

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Yeah. Like the strategy behind, you know, avoiding certain big topics so that you don't single the people that, you know, something that you don't want to talk about.

ROSEMARY BARTON: And it's like I just think that was a super smart way to talk about some of these wedge issues or issues that parties are, you know, fearful of scaring voters off and that kind of thing. So yeah, I think he does a good job at like bringing in most Canadians, frankly, that don't follow things the way I do. And that's really important, especially during an election.

LL: Was it- what else is in today's first episode?

ROSEMARY BARTON: Well we also just sort of set the stakes, like lay the table a little bit, because we're obviously trying to get everybody up to speed. I'm pretending the election has already started.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Yes.

ROSEMARY BARTON: [laughs]

LL: I don't think it's that much of pretending, quite frankly.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah you're right. So we're trying to get people engaged on just like where we are as the starting gun nears closer and just certainly the table for the stakes for everybody, for all the leaders, as we head into it.

LL: So I like this idea of the way you're approaching it, but how are you, Elamin, going to decide which topics to discuss each week?

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: I mean I think there's something about the natural conversation that ends up developing on social media of talking to people who don't spend all their days, you know, talking to political staffers, that you end up to developing perspective that these are the issues that we should talk about and these are the ways we should talk about them. And this, again, about like larger, broader narratives as opposed to, you know, very specific sort of policy ideas.

LL: OK. But you're also planning to have fun, right?

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Absolutely.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah. We both have very loud, potentially obnoxious, laughs, so-.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: For sure. For sure obnoxious.

ROSEMARY BARTON: That's- so when you're on the, you know, if you're on the GO train or on a bus or do you're biking to work... that possibly will alarm you.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: I apologize in advance.

LL: But can politics in this country be fun? Even for a non-political junkies?

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: It has to be. I mean, I think there's something to be said about the grave tone that we take when we talk about politics in this country. And it just doesn't need to be this way. It doesn't need to be as sort of serious and buttoned up as it is right now and we get to be that kind of, you know, we got to take that kind of tone.

ROSEMARY BARTON: We get to be ourselves, basically. You know? And talk about things and have a laugh and... just be ourselves. I mean, I agree. I have always thought that politics needs more laughter. It's serious business. But if you can't crack a joke and have a guffaw from time to time then I think you're missing the plot.

LL: Rosemary you're hitting the road next, you're going to my backyard. They're heading to B.C. to take a closer look at the riding there. Tell us about that.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah it's Burnaby North-Seymour so, as you know and listeners on the west coast will know, that is the riding where the pipeline, the Trans Mountain pipeline, already runs through and where it will be expanded, doubled really, in terms of how much capacity can run through it to the coast. And interestingly, the Liberal MP who's there who's running again Terry Beech has been openly criticizing his own government for supporting the pipeline, for buying the pipeline, voted against the government in parliament. And he's really the personification of this this- this tight wire that that they are trying to walk. The Liberals are trying to walk between the environment and energy and the economy. So we spent some time out there seeing what his chances are in the next election and we're going to go out there and talk to some more people about about some of those issues that are so critical on the coast. Everyone's thinking about them in Canada but so critical on the West Coast.

LL: Probably why suburban Vancouver is going to be a place to watch in the election.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Totally. Absolutely.

LL: You're going to be on the road a lot as part of The National's campaign coverage and I'm wondering how that time in the field is going to shape what you and Elamin end up talking about in the studio?

ROSEMARY BARTON: I think it helps inform me. I think it's always good to get out of this little Ottawa bubble and to hear from real people. And I've done some of that last week in this week in the 905 around Toronto. And hopefully we'll do more of it. I think I come back with a different perspective. And then Elamin gets me thinking differently too and it just makes it all a little more real which I think we need to do for voters. Like bring it back down a little bit.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Ground it a little bit.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah exactly. Doesn't mean we won't talk about policy issues, the carbon tax and immigration or whatever else pops up, but to put it in a place where people can digest it and take it in.

LL: Yeah. Elamin, I'm wondering what else you're personally looking forward to over the next six weeks as as you and Rosie deliver Party Lines.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Just spending more time with me.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: [laughs]

LL: Well Rosie it sounds like you're gonna be on the road so much you may not be together that much!

ROSEMARY BARTON: No, no we won't. Yeah. [laughs]

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Listen, one of the things I'm really interested in is... to me it feels like, and this is something that we said in the episode today, is that it feels like the 2015 election Justin Trudeau was lent a lot of votes by people who wasn't so much that people were interested in the Liberal Party as much as they were less interested in Stephen Harper at the time. I'm interested in seeing how the Liberals go about solidifying that support, if they're able to do it, because we're dealing with a Justin Trudeau who's not the same Trudeau that he was in 2015. His popularity has changing a lot. He's been, you know, quite weighed down by those scandals. And so I'm- I'm curious to see how he's able to escape that.

LL: Okay. Now there's already been some dirt thrown between the parties. I'm wondering what kind of tone both of you think we can expect through the election.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah, I don't think it'll be good that's for sure. I mean I always head into an election being hopeful and optimistic that everyone will sort of hit a higher standard for themselves. That's- that's generally not the way things are.

LL: And they often talk about that at the start.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah... they all say we're gonna be positive, we're not going to criticize each other. There's ways to, you know, be a leader and not criticize someone and have a proxy go out and do it for you. And that's what you'll ultimately see. And you know, don't don't think that they haven't been digging away for months and months now to try and find damaging information about candidates and leaders and that those things won't be leaked or put in places to expose. I mean, I think that that video that we saw that Ralph Goodale dropped in his Twitter feed of Andrew Scheer in 2005, this comes up in the podcast today too, where he is you know condemning the notion of same sex marriage like totally out in the public. We knew about it at the time. But to go and pull it again and edit it and put it out on social media to make it into a thing -- that's that's a good sign, I think, a good indicator of the kind of campaign we're going to have.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Right.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Yeah.

LL: I mean how do you think that kind of thing is going to play with voters?

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Listen, as far as we can tell no leader has stepped up to say this is going to be a particularly positive campaign. So I think what we can expect is that voters are going to get, I think we're gonna get a little bit turned off by all the negativity that's gonna be thrown around.

LL: I thank both of you for coming on.

ROSEMARY BARTON: Thanks for having us!

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Pleasure, thank you.

LL: And congratulations on dropping the first episode! Looking forward to listening to the rest of it.

ELAMIN ABDELMAHMOUD: Thank you so much!

ROSEMARY BARTON: Thanks Laura.

LL: All right. Rosemary Barton and Elamin Abdelmahmoud are co-hosts of Party Lines. It is a new offering from CBC News, CBC podcasts. It will be available each Thursday just in time for your morning commute. You can find it wherever you get your podcasts or you can go to cbc.ca/radio/podcasts. And while Rosemary and Elamin offer up a look at this week's political news in the lead up to the federal election. Some of their colleagues will be reporting on another aspect of the campaign: the plethora of misinformation and disinformation online. Reporters Kaleigh Rogers and Andrea Bellemare are part of the CBC News unit that has been given the task of separating fact from fiction and they are with me now in the Toronto studio to talk about what they're finding. Hi.

KALEIGH ROGERS: Good morning.

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Hello.

LL: Kaleigh, let me start with you. The term "fake news" gets tossed around a lot but you're trying not to use it. How come?

KALEIGH ROGERS: Well originally it had a very specific meaning which had to do with the legitimately fake news stories that were bubbling up ahead of the 2016 election. Since then it's been co-opted by a lot of people including President Trump to sort of mean anything from something that's an opinion piece to something that you just don't like and don't want to read. It gets really muddied as to what fake news really is. So we've tried to avoid using it so that it's not confusing.

LL: Okay. And Andrea, in July you wrote a guide on how to spot misinformation and disinformation. Can you tell me what the differences between those two terms?

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Misinformation is when you have something that's circulating that people may think is true or they don't know isn't true. So they're circulating this, they think that it could be true. Disinformation is when something is deliberately created to deceive. So there's a purpose. There's an intent to deceive there. So we tend to focus a little bit more on disinformation in our unit because obviously... there's intent to deceive going on.

LL: Right. OK. But when you're looking for the signs, tell us what some of the top telltale signs are.

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Well probably one of the first signs is that it's something that maybe gives you a really emotional reaction. So it'll make you go, 'Oh I can't believe this!' And then of course you want to start checking and say well where's this coming from? Is it making a claim that's too good to be true? Some of the things that... make disinformation really successful is that it might have a nugget of truth in it. So it's hard to tell sometimes. Is it being widely reported or is it just from one outlet? Is it a reputable outlet? Are you just seeing it on social media? Did a friend of a friend say it, or are you hearing it from a reputable outlet? It's widely sourced, it's easy to prove. So those are some of the signs you might look for.

LL: Have you got an example of something when it has that nugget that you can sort of hang your hat on?

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Well really, this is an example of misinformation. Our colleague Jeff Yates found that last year the most popular story on CBC News' Facebook page was a story about a change to a law in P.E.I. so people would be fined if they passed a school buses. So that's a nugget of truth. This story ended up being circulated, posted all across the United States, because people believed it was true in their region. So the nugget of truth was this law was true. It wasn't true for people in Texas necessarily, or Florida, where this circulated.

LL: All right. Kaleigh, in some ways your job sounds like it's you're a bit of a sleuth online. What tools are you using to track what is trending on social media and how that can lead you to stories about misinformation and disinformation?

KALEIGH ROGERS: All right. So we have a couple of different tools. We use something called CrowdTangle which is really good for digging into social media and we're able to see, for example, where a story has been shared and posted online and on Facebook and Reddit and Twitter. Also just sort of digging through the social networks ourselves can be really helpful and trying to find different links there. I did a story earlier this year that I got help from inside CBC, actually, so we have our own tools for tracking, you know, when our stories are shared and where, and they would send me a report every time a story that was two years old or older was shared again. And I was able to see that a lot of our old stories are recirculated as if they're new which is also a form of disinformation because if a law was passed in 2005 but someone sharing it now, it looks like it's from a different Prime Minister than than when it was actually.

LL: All right. OK. Andrea, you recently looked into a photo that was circulating on social media and it was stoking fears about voter fraud ahead of the fall election. Can you tell me about that?

ANDREA BELLEMARE: This story was interesting because we we founded originally on Twitter and it was a picture a woman had taken and it was for voter registration letters. And she said she'd posted it and she was surprised because she hosts international high school students and she said why did these students get this letter? So she was just confused when she posted it. But we had found people were circulating it as purporting to be evidence that non-citizens could vote in Canada's election. Where it gets even more interesting is that these were letters sent out by Elections Nova Scotia -- so provincial agency, not a federal agency -- and we contacted Elections Nova Scotia and they said these letters are sent to every student who will turn 18 in this year that we mail this and it's to encourage them to register to vote. You can't use this letter to vote. This is not proof of this but it's very easy for things like that to circulate. And then there's that emotional reaction, 'Oh this is proof of something that I thought could be true.' That's what people think.

LL: Right. And it's interesting because it was not only misinformation, there appears to be an anti-immigrant agenda built into that.

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Possibly. I mean it's sometimes hard to say what the the motives are of people behind that, but certainly, you know, fear of immigration is a trend that we're seeing in some of the names and posts that were coming across on social media.

LL: Kaleigh, this week you wrote about how a story which originated in a British tabloid claiming that a convicted child killer could be sent to Canada was picked up on by the Conservative Party leader Andrew Scheer. Can you tell us what happened?

KALEIGH ROGERS: Right. So that was an interesting one because we didn't have any reporting here on this being true. And so I spent pretty much the whole day trying to find out if it was true or not. Obviously, you know, Mr. Scheer tweeted it and I wasn't saying if it was true or not he was just saying I came across this and had an opinion about it, but it led to a lot of confusion online as to what was true what was not. I tried my best to debunk it and take a look at how the different parties are using strategies of sharing things that may or may not be true, might be out of context and sort of towing this line of they're not lying, they're not, you know, saying something is true when it's not, but they're they're still disseminating these things. And that story got a lot of reaction online, actually. People were quite upset about-

LL: Emotional reaction, again.

KALEIGH ROGERS: Exactly! And then my story, as well, people, you know, on both sides are constantly flagging some of the language that politicians are using and claiming it's just information when a lot of the time it's more of this sort of fuzzy political rhetoric that isn't necessarily, you know, false.

LL: Well then just- did you find out whether it was indeed true?

KALEIGH ROGERS: I was able to confirm with a source in the government that it's- they have no record of this individual applying to come to Canada and they've had no contact with the UK government. So I'm not sure what the Daily Mail sources were but my sources said that there's no fact to it.

LL: And the office of Mr. Scheer just said, "That we're not saying that's happened. We're just putting this out there." Wasn't that the response?

KALEIGH ROGERS: Precisely. So when I reached out to them and said, you know, another outlet had previously sort of debunked this and what did they think, they said, 'Look we're not saying whether it's true or not, we're just saying if it were true this is how we would react and we want to know how Justin Trudeau would react if it were true.' So as I said, sort of toeing this weird line where they're not necessarily sharing incorrect information but it does get confusing for people.

LL: Let's talk about something else that that I'm sure is a concern of many. Andrea, after the U.S. presidential election and the Brexit referendum there were a lot of focus on guarding against foreign meddling in domestic voting but would you say that this kind of day-to-day sharing is actually more common than meddling in the election?

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Day-to-day domestic sharing, yeah definitely. What we're seeing is, I mean, first of all it can be really hard to tell if there's foreign interference or not. It's not something that, you know, Kaleigh and I can log into a CrowdTangle, go, 'Oh I think- I think that's Russia.' You just can't. It's very difficult.

KALEIGH ROGERS: We're certainly looking out for it, and obviously the major agency ceases are watching out for it. We haven't heard tell yet of any kind of foreign interference. But it's something that we've been deeply concerned about and watching.

LL: But how do you look out for it? It'll be quite complicated. You have to track it back to source don't you?

ANDREA BELLEMARE: I mean you would probably need some a bit of sophisticated technology some things that maybe we don't have access to. And generally what you're having to look at is look- look for patterns. So it might take time, you know, it may take time to say, 'Yeah we think all of these accounts are, you know, doing X or Y,' and that's not something that you can just see in a sort of one-day sort of window.

LL: How much disinformation are you seeing right now in the lead up to the election?

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Well it's certainly ramping up. Just even in the last week we're seeing, you know, more videos circulating. There is a video that Kaleigh and I were looking into this week. I was a clip from Trudeau speaking at the parliamentary press gallery. He was making a joke about, you know, media funding the media and then this got taken out of context and people were cutting out parts of his speech and adding different headlines to it. So, I mean, that's just one thing of, you know, several that we're seeing this week.

LL: OK. Kaleigh, you're also looking at third parties and the role they can play in the campaign. Had there been any signs that they are spreading misinformation? Disinformation?

KALEIGH ROGERS: I wouldn't characterize it like that. I would say that the reason we're interested in these third parties is there is kind of a new role that they're playing and that there's these groups that didn't really exist before whose whole function is simply to campaign ahead of the election. And they're very savvy- savvy online. They're good with social media, with memes, and people are getting information from them but maybe don't necessarily understand that they are a registered third party that has a specific mandate and a specific goal in mind. And so it's not the same as reading a story from a news agency. And so that's where I'm looking is is how clear and transparent are these groups being with what's going on.

LL: A lot of both of you were talking about, I mean, you are obviously trying to help Canadians understand what is real and what isn't. But it speaks to a responsibility of people are voters to actually educate themselves.

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Absolutely. And I mean it's kind of a bit of a joke between Kaleigh and I but like if you aren't sure, don't post something. And so we're always joking, "Don't post that! Don't post that!" Because- but really it's true! I mean people will reflexively share something and then it spreads and spreads and spreads and then afterwards even if you can prove that it's not true, even if you've debunked it... that's never shared as widely as the original story.

KALEIGH ROGERS: Right. And like Andrew was saying, if something is giving you that intense sort of first emotional reaction that can kind of override the more logical part of your brain that wants to think critically about what you're seeing, if you're really upset about something, you want to tell people. You want to share it. You want to react to it. So if you are getting that intense feeling, take a beat because most often somebody wants you to feel that way and want you to react without thinking too deeply. It never hurts to take a second and read a little bit more. You can always post it later.

LL: The rid hasn't even been dropped yet. I wonder what you will be watching for once the campaign officially gets underway.

ANDREA BELLEMARE: I think we'll probably be watching for things that seem like they're true and they're not. I think they'll probably be videos that will be manipulated. I haven't seen really any examples of deep fakes yet or the ones that we have seen- have been very obvious.

LL: Define "deep fakes" for us quickly.

ANDREA BELLEMARE: A deep fake is a video that has been altered to make it seem as if someone had said something that they haven't. And it's really neat because technology can make it seem like you're saying something when you haven't. So. Yeah.

LL: Yeah, neat but...

KALEIGH ROGERS: Neat and scary! Let's be clear! [laughs]

LL: Kaleigh, what are you going to be looking for?

KALEIGH ROGERS: Yeah I mean I'm going to be looking more closely I think at some of these more contentious races that could potentially flip a riding. I think that there is sort of a target in areas like that for disinformation to spread whether it's domestic or potentially foreign. I think that anywhere where it's going to be a contentious race there's just going to be more attention paid to it. And therefore there could be more disinformation spreading around it.

LL: I think you probably should also look forward to not very much sleep.

KALEIGH ROGERS: That's already started! [laughs]

LL: Because part of your responsibility is going to be coming back and talking to us as the campaign goes forward. I hope you'll do that!

ANDREA BELLEMARE: Yes absolutely!

LL: All right. Thanks you guys. Kaleigh Rogers and Andrea Bellemare are CBC News reporters covering disinformation and misinformation online. They were in our Toronto studio. And I'm wondering, does this information concern you online in this election? Tweet us @TheCurrentCBC or me @lauralynchcbc -- or you can find us on Facebook. Well that is our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for Q. Canadian guitarist and songwriter Robbie Robertson is the driving force behind the new documentary Once Were Brothers. It's an in-depth and personal look at his former group The Band. He'll join Tom Power to discuss why this is the time for a definitive documentary on the legendary group. Our discussion about vaping and the rising concern about its safety got us thinking about another debate that started more than five decades ago. But back in 1963 the product in question was, of course, tobacco. Some of the hand-wringing was the same. Mysterious illnesses possibly related to cigarettes. At the time the CBC sat down four tobacco executives, two of them were actually smoking during the interview, to talk about the rumours that were starting to swirl. And we're gonna leave you today with that archival tape. I'm Laura Lynch. Thank you for listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

EXECUTIVE 1: When you have these fear campaigns going on you're bound to scare the hell out of some people so I guess I'll be able to stop smoking!

EXECUTIVE 2: Presumably life itself is a hazard. There's hazard in over eating, there's hazard in over-exercise, hazard in driving a car. I say with these things you either accept the hazard, or the appreciation of the hazard, and that's that. That's again an individual decision.

EXECUTIVE 3: There's lots of people who've been, through fear, scared to eat bread! Scared to eat butter! Refrain from eating sugar. I think they're pretty good commodities, myself.

EXECUTIVE 4: Smoking has been an adult practice for a long time, for several hundred years. It has provided the human race with a lot of pleasure and a lot of satisfaction. I doubt very much if we will give it up.

SOUNDCLIP

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Sept. 5, 2019 episode transcript

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