Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2020

The AIH Transcript for October 5, 2020

Hosts: Carol Off and Chris Howden

Prologue

CAROL OFF: Hello. I'm Carol Off.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening. I'm Chris Howden. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

CH: Tonight:

CO: Turning a positive into a positive. An advisor on the Trump campaign tells us the U.S. president plans to publicly spread his hospital bed realizations about COVID-19.

CH: All the president's men. A doctor says it was preposterous to see Donald Trump in a motorcade yesterday, putting himself and secret service agents at risk. And it's even more mind boggling to let him go home today.

CO: The grass is always greener. Fresh from her election as Canada's new Green Leader, we ask Annamie Paul whether the hard liners she beat have a place in her more centrist vision of the party.

CH: They want results. Some private companies see an opportunity in Ontario's testing backlog, and while they say they're just trying to help, a Toronto doctor tells us COVID tests for a fee are more like pandemic profiteering.

CO: Research engine. A University of Alberta virologist is sharing the Nobel Prize for discovering hepatitis C. He hopes the honour reminds those in charge that basic research is vital.

CH: And costume drama. Japan has chosen its most adorable mascot for the last time because overzealous lovers of cuteness kept trying to rig the vote. As It Happens. The Monday Edition. Radio that's there when plush comes to shove.

[Music: Theme]

Part 1: Republican defends Trump's release from hospital with COVID-19: 'He's a fighter'

Trump COVID: Republican Strategist

Guest: Mica Mosbacher

CH: We know that at least 14 people who met with Donald Trump last week have tested positive for a coronavirus so far. But today, the U.S. president himself got the okay to leave the hospital. This afternoon, Mr. Trump tweeted that he would be back at the White House tonight. He wrote, "Feeling really good. Don't be afraid of COVID. Don't let it dominate your life." The president's doctor, Sean Conley, explained the decision to reporters outside Walter Reed Medical Centre.

SEAN CONLEY: We send patients home with medications all the time. In fact, yesterday afternoon, he probably met most of his discharge requirements safely from the hospital. And he's returning to a facility, the White House medical unit, that's staff 24/7, top notch physicians, nurses, PA's, logisticians. And unit here, the team here, behind me is going to continue to support us in that nature.

REPORTER: Dr. Conley on his mental status, can you talk about whether he has any neurological symptoms? Does he have any side effects from his medications, any fogginess from the virus?

SEAN CONLEY: No. I think you've seen the videos, now the tweets and you'll see him shortly. You know, he's he's back. Yeah.

REPORTER: Is there any evidence of pneumonia or any inflammation in his lungs at all?

SEAN CONLEY: So we've done routine standard imaging, I'm just not at liberty to discuss.

REPORTER: So you're actively not telling us what those lung scans show, just to be clear?

SEAN CONLEY: So there are rules and regulations that restrict me in sharing certain things for his safety and his own health and reasons.

CH: That was Donald Trump's doctor, Sean Conley, speaking to reporters outside Walter Reed Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, today. Mica Mosbacher is a member of the Trump campaign's 2020 advisory board. We reached her in Austin, Texas.

CO: Ms. Mosbacher, what message is Mr. Trump sending to Americans by leaving hospital when his doctors say he's still not out of the woods?

MICA MOSBACHER: Well, first of all, he's got one of the most outstanding medical teams in the country, and they felt that his vital signs were normal, he was not running fever, and that certainly with the fact that 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has a mini hospital unit, that they're able to care for him out of the hospital, especially giving him 24/7 attention. Dr. Conley said one thing that was interesting, he said that it's typical of any protocol to ask a patient or try to release a patient from the hospital as soon as possible because it limits your risk. I want to say this, is that his message to the American people today is one of eternal optimism. You know, he feels great. I've been on a conference call with a couple of the First-Family, and they have been talking with him regularly and have assured us that he does feel good. He is going to obviously exercise some caution, but he has continued to work and he will listen to his doctors. But I've said that he is a fighter and that he has the strength of two 30-year-olds.

CO: What message does it send when he says that he feels better than he has in 20 years? I mean he has, as you point out, the best medical care one could have. And yet this is not the same medical care that other people have who have seen their loved ones die and who have had to cancel huge parts of their lives in order to avoid contracting this virus. What message does it send to them when he says, well, I feel great and actually I feel better than I did before?

MM: I think he's showing that he is eternally optimistic. And I think that most Americans have pandemic fatigue, and they are looking to balance work and school, along with taking precautions. But they need to get back to work. Let's face it, this virus has devastated people economically. And the president has built a robust economy before. He's trying to reassure individuals that with Operation Warp Speed that a vaccine is underway that will be safe for individuals to take. And I think that his job as a leader is to send an optimistic message while still, of course, not minimizing the fact that so many individuals have lost loved ones in this country and around the world to this novel virus.

CO: As you know, nearly 210,000 Americans have died. They've been buried in your country. Millions are sick with it. So is this really the time to start talking about how great he feels?

MM: Well, absolutely. He's reassuring world leaders around the world that there is not going to be a transference of power. And I think that's what we're looking for in a president. Obviously, he's in a unique position. He's not Joe Q. Public. But he's also using a therapeutic that was developed during Operation Warp Speed that should give help and hope to other individuals who are suffering from coronavirus. I want to say one thing, I think the media coverage has been almost laughable at times because he was criticized yesterday for taking a brief ride in The Beast to greet supporters who've been camped out at Walter Reed Hospital. And U.S. Secret Service was wearing personal protection equipment. They had been around him. I just wonder how they thought that President Trump got to Walter Reed Hospital. He didn't fly Marine One by himself. And then secondly, Dr. Conley has been criticized nonstop. He was head of a trauma unit as a commander in Afghanistan, and he's not going to risk his career to lie or cover up the facts. So I think that the president's been very transparent. But I think that this is good news regardless of what party you're in that our president is feeling better.

CO: So what do you say to Americans who are asking why they have sacrificed so much to try and stop this virus and they're now seeing picture after picture of people at the White House flaunting that social distancing?

MM: Well, first of all, we don't know the origin of how this outbreak happened-- senators around many many people as well as campaign staffers. So we'll leave that up to contact tracing. I can't speculate on that. But I will say that there have been a number of protocols that have been adhered to, even at rallies. The RNC passes out masks to individuals. They choose to come. They're not forced to come. But they are encouraged to wear masks. But there's no national mandate in this country which would be unconstitutional to wear a mask. All we can do is continue -- all of us are trying to do our work, we try to adhere to wearing mask ourselves, I certainly wear a mask in meetings. I just got off a Women For Trump bus tour. There were seven of us on the bus. I've been COVID tested before and after. We wore masks, except for very brief outdoor photo op...

CO: I'm so sorry to interrupt, but we did see members of the Trump entourage, the Trump family, who are already among their circle, knowing that there were infections, show up at events, including at the debate. Many people were shocked and very concerned about how they did not wear masks. What do you say to them? Do you think that the Trump family, the people around Donald Trump should have been wearing masks?

MM: They are regularly tested for COVID. And anyone who meets with the president in the Oval Office or at the White House is tested for COVID.

CO: So you're confident that there was no infection spread at that debate, no infection spread at the events from Mr. Trump and his family have been?

MM: I have no idea and cannot speculate on where it originated. Obviously, this virus is very contagious. It's hideous. But the good news is, is that according to Health and Human Services, the hospitalizations are declining, also emergency room visits, also intensive care.

CO: I'm talking about the events around the president.

MM: Yes. I'm not going to speculate on how this happens. Obviously, it is extremely contagious and you can take every precaution, apparently still catch it. If the President of the United States can catch it, I guess anyone can. And he's been so highly protected.

CO: We'll leave it there. Ms. Mosbacher thank you.

MM: You're so welcome.

CH: Mica Mosbacher is a member of the Trump 2020 Advisory Board. We reached her in Austin, Texas.

[Music]

Trump COVID: Doctor

Guest: Eric Topol

CH: Eric Topol is a cardiologist and professor of molecular medicine at the Scripps Research Institute. We reached him in La Hoya, California.

CO: Dr. Topol, President Trump's doctor, Sean Conley, just told reporters that the president is back. Do you believe him?

ERIC TOPOL: Well, no, not really. We don't know a lot of things that are in the background. We have a very strong suspicion that he had significant pneumonia. And Dr. Conley refuses to answer the questions, although some of the answers give evidence that there was a lung CAT scan that was quite abnormal. So, no, we really don't know the true status here.

CO: We just spoke with a Republican who says, well, he has the best care in the world. He has 24/7 assistants even at the White House and he seems to be on the mend. Is that not fair?

ET: Well, I think he has made substantial improvement. We can probably tell that best from the videos that have been sent by Friday versus the ones that we saw over the weekend, and he has as much as yesterday. So but, you know, he's had a lot of medications and some of that may be accounting for why he's feeling quite good. Also, that they're actually having a good effect on the virus of achieving control. So it's just hard to know at this point.

CO: He spoke of going home with medication. The doctor was saying that, which is, of course, more than just a bottle of aspirin. What exactly is the cocktail, the complex of treatments that the president might be going home with?

ET: Well, the one he didn't have to go home with is that he got as a one shot, which was the monoclonal antibody cocktail, which we think he received on Friday. And that probably is the one that has had the most pronounced effect, if indeed he does so well and turned around like this. The other medicines are not a one shot infusion, they require multiple days. So he got the remdesivir, dexamethasone on Friday apparently. And he's still getting this specific medicine, dexamethasone is the one that was tested in a large trial and was associated with improved survival. The problem with that medicine is there wasn't any real criteria to support it. And it may actually have done some harm by suppressing his immune response that fights the virus. So we just don't know why he got that medicine.

CO: So what does it tell you about maybe the state of his illness? Would he have been receiving these kinds of drugs if the case was kind of routine or not life threatening, that it was a milder case of COVID-19? Or is it sounding more like it's moving into pneumonia?

ET: Well, I think it's obvious that he had pneumonia from all you can piece together. The oxygen, blood saturation going down, and his difficulty breathing at one point, and also the CAT scan. What we don't know is, is his treatment based on VIP syndrome that is over-treating somebody just because they are VIP or that he was sicker than has been transmitted? It sounds like on Friday he wasn't doing well and that's why they expediently wanted to get him to the hospital. So, you know, it's just impossible to know. It's cloudy. There's been lots of obfuscations. And maybe he did have more severe COVID than we know.

CO: Beyond his own illness and trying to find out more about that, what questions do you have about what do people know and when did they know about the timeline of the infection, not just with Mr. Trump, but with those around him? What stands out for you has been something you really need to know.

ET: Oh, there's so many things. But one of the issues that we don't know about is when did he become infected? And there's refusals to respond to those questions repeatedly, I should add. So why is that important? Well, his illness really took a turn on Friday. You don't get sick like that so quickly. This harbors, the virus does, for a matter of days before you can get so ill. And also, that's important to connect the dots as to the super spreader event which is continuing to have more and more people affected with the Rose Garden and surrounding ceremony. So there's just a lack of forthright, truthful sense of what's going on. Nor is there the diligence to help prevent the spread by getting the people isolated who proved positive by contact forward and backwards contact tracing.

CO: It seems important to President Trump to show that he is not ill. He claims that he feels better than he did 20 years ago. And he went for this tour, in this Chevrolet Suburban yesterday, waving to onlookers. What did you make of that? When you saw that motorcade scene, what went through your own mind?

ET: Well, frankly, when I saw it, I figured he must be discharged. So then I learned, you know, minutes later that no no he was just making a little tour to wave to his fans. I was shocked. It is preposterous to do this, to put people unnecessarily at risk who he was in the car with and the whole rigmarole associated with it, you know, just for this kind of video or photo op. It's very sad to see something like that.

CO: But the arguments are that what he's trying to do is to reassure the American public that he's okay.

ET: Well, he's doing more than that, actually, Carol. He actually tweeted today that we shouldn't be afraid of COVID, which is just beyond belief. It shows no sensitivity to now over 210,000 Americans who've died and countless number who are still suffering. And he also says how, you know, these great medicines that the Trump administration developed. Well, they didn't develop these medicines. They were developed by scientists and companies.

CO: In that tweet, he also said, don't be afraid of COVID, don't let it dominate your life. What message do you think that sends to his followers?

ET: The point here is he's been in a denial state, play it downstate, from the get go. And that is what his followers do. That's why they don't want to wear masks. That's why they keep saying it's like the flu, don't be afraid, and you know, nothing to worry about here.

CO: Dr. Topol we will leave it there. And I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

ET: Sure. Thank you.

CH: Eric Topol is a cardiologist and professor of molecular medicine at the Scripps Research Institute. We reached him in La Hoya, California.

[Music]

Nobel Prize: Hep C

Guest: Michael Houghton

CH: Their work has helped save millions of lives. And now that noble work is also Nobel work. This morning, Harvey Alter, Charles Rice and Michael Houghton were awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for discovering the hepatitis C virus, a major cause of liver disease. The award comes obviously as scientists around the world race to find a vaccine for the COVID-19 virus, a parallel highlighted by the Nobel Committee. Michael Houghton is a virologist at the University of Alberta. We reached him in San Francisco, California.

CO: Professor Houghton, first of all, big congratulations.

MICHAEL HOUGHTON: Thank you so much.

CO: What was it like to get that call at 3:00 a.m.?

MH: [Chuckles] Well, I actually got it from a colleague at the University of Alberta, Dr. Tyrrell -- he had seen it on the wire services and Internet. And he called me and told me that Nobel had been trying to get hold of me without success, apparently. But obviously, I did connect with the Nobel Committee later on.

CO: And what was the moment like to hear that news?

MH: Pretty amazing. A Nobel for hep-C has been sort of discussed fairly widely for many years now. So when a Nobel phone comes around, there's always the possibility of getting it. And finally, we got it. So many thanks to the Nobel committee.

CO: We know that the discovery of hepatitis C virus was long in coming, over decades. And different people who are receiving this award contributed to that, though, as you know many more people in the background who also did that. But tell us a bit about your breakthrough in 1989.

MH: Yes. So I started working on it at a biotech company in California in 1982. You know, we were using molecular biological approaches and they were very powerful. But unfortunately, hepatitis C is present still at very low levels relative to normal liver proteins and blood proteins. So really, the methods we were applying were not sensitive enough. And so we were forever trying to improve sensitivity and trying different approaches. We must have tried 30 or 40 different approaches over 7 years. We also screened hundreds of millions of what we call recombinant clones. Eventually, after s7 years, we found one very tiny little clone. It was not really a eureka moment. We had to continually put the clone through a series of tests. And after about eight rounds of that, we convinced ourselves, my word we've actually got it. We can't believe it. [Chuckles] And then interestingly, it took about another year for the field in general to believe us that we really did have it.

CO: You say, it wasn't a eureka moment, but it was a breakthrough. And what was the significance of that?

MH: Well, several million people around the world are infected with hep C, around 400,000 people are dying every year. And so the first thing that we were able to do is to develop blood tests to protect them -- excuse me, not just to diagnose patients, but to protect the blood supply around the world. So that stopped millions of infections through getting transfusions and so forth. And then after 20 odd years, in a collaboration between the academic field and the pharmacological industry and entities like NIH, eventually so many good drugs were developed maybe five years ago. And these are highly curative. They can cure most patients very quickly within one to two months with very little side-effects from the drugs. So it's great that we have therapeutics to treat this disease. But like any epidemics, ultimately you need a vaccine to stop it and prevent it and to eradicate it. And so that's the big for us now, trying to get a vaccine against hep-C.

CO: Lots of people are talking today about the significance of this Nobel Prize going to you and the other scientists at a time when we're trying to find a vaccine, a treatment for COVID-19, which you're also involved in. What does this say? What does the research that you have been doing for all these years tell us about the significance of the work you're now working on?

MH: Well, I think, you know, we do have the real possibility of eradicating hep-C from the planet and we obviously need a vaccine to get approved, which will probably take 55 to 10 years from now. But once it's approved, it needs to be used all around the world. And then we have a real chance of eradicating it. And, of course, that's what we need with COVID, very quickly. We need a vaccine to prevent the infection cycle and to basically inhibit the virus around the world. So I think the world today, along with the COVID efforts to develop a vaccine, just amplifies, I think to all governments around the world that we need more investment in virology and infectious disease and immunology at the basic research level. But also, we need to invest in translating it fast. You know, I think many people in Canada, including myself, believe we have to beef up manufacturing capacity because research in Canada is very good, but you need to be able to translate it into making vaccines, blood tests, therapeutics for Canadians. And I think there's a recognition now that we do need to beef up manufacturing capacity. The message is also we need to spend more money on basic research. You know, I think we became a bit blase over the last several decades that we know how to stop viral infections, we've stopped polio essentially, or nearly stopped it around the world, you know, we curbed TB with vaccines. And I think we became a bit over-casual, that we could deal with this easily. And I think obviously we've learned we cannot.

CO: Professor Houghton, it's good to talk to you. And again, congratulations.

MH: Thank you very much.

CH: Michael Houghton is one of the winners of this year's Nobel Prize for Medicine. He's a virologist at the University of Alberta. He was in San Francisco. And you can find that interview on our website: cbc.ca/aih.

[Music]

Mascots

CH: It is the moment all of Japan was looking forward to: the drum roll and the presenter announcing "and the winner is" while the split screen shows all their faces. Shinjuku Awawa, the sentient soap-bubble promoting handwashing. Quaran, the yellow quarantine ferry. Amabie, the mythical blue haired mermaid bird who wards off plagues. And Koronon, the huge-headed mask-wearing kitten. All newcomers who gave brilliant debut performances during the pandemic. All adorbs. All winners, really. But sadly, none will be winners because there will be no 2021 awards for Japan's most popular mascot. As you may know, Japan is big on mascots. They're called Yuru-chara. And there are hundreds representing companies, government agencies and communities. In this year's Yuru-chara awards, there were 697 contenders. And the 2020 champ, the final champ after 10 years of the contest was a bear-like fairy mascot Iwate Prefecture, who distributes happiness and dreams from a bag over its shoulder. But as has been predicted repeatedly regarding a much less important election, there were shenanigans -- as in rigged voting. So the organizing committee sternly announced that everyone had lost sight of the contest's original purpose. And now it's cancelled forever. They're very soft, but I imagine the mascots are taking it hard. And it's also sad for human voters in Japan. I imagine they're feeling a-cute sense of loss.

[Music]

Part 2: Private COVID Clinics

Private COVID Clinics

Guest: Danyaal Raza

CH: Ontario labs are trying to catch up on a massive backlog of COVID-19 tests. Tens of thousands of them. For the time being, walk-in testing sites are closed as the province moves into an all appointment system. And now private companies are capitalizing on the confusion and long waits. According to a report in The Globe and Mail, a growing number of for-profit clinics are beginning to offer their own COVID-19 tests, some charging up to 250 dollars. Dr. Danyaal Raza is the chair of Canadian Doctors for Medicare. He's a family physician at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto.

CO: Dr. Raza, why have you described this private COVID testing as pandemic profiteering?

DANYAAL RAZA: Well, Carol, it's been really, I think, unfortunate and regrettable to see the rise of these sorts of services. And I fear that unless governments act, we may see them expand even further. And, you know, I used that term very very purposely because these sorts of privately financed testing services have been started in parallel to the larger population health response that public health professionals are working on. And that's not what they're interested in. These are companies that are interested in using this as an opportunity to make a profit, to make a buck. So this is you know, you can call it pandemic profiteering, crisis capitalism, but that's really what it is at the end of the day.

CO: Well, they're arguing that people, yes, they're paying for it and they're making money from it, but they're helping to take pressure off the public system, they say. What do you say to that?

DR: Yeah, no, I mean, I've heard this before, and it's totally the wrong metaphor. It's not about a pressure release valve. It's actually a seize that's draining resources away from the public system.

CO: Just tell us how this works, because we know from speaking with many people who are trying to get tested that they can go from place to place, spend days trying to get an appointment or to wait in line and then be told they can wait anywhere between a few days to seven days, maybe even longer, before they get the result. In these ones, we're hearing that if you pay for it, then you can get it right away and that you get your results in 24 and 48 hours. How is that possible?

DR: Well, it's because you're prioritizing access to these swabs, not based on medical need, but on ability to pay. And it's a real shame as well. You know, we know that health and wealth go hand in hand, but especially, you know, in this pandemic, folks who have been disproportionately impacted are low income and racialized people. You know, those aren't the sorts of people that these companies are going to be testing. They're going to be testing people who are going to be asymptomatic, who are wealthy, who aren't living in the communities that are hardest hit. And it's not to say that, you know, people who are wealthy don't deserve to be tested -- absolutely not. But we need to allocate our resources in a way that enhances our response to everyone.

CO: But if they're able to do this testing, do they have their own source of the kits and the swabs? Do they have their own testing facilities? Does it separate from the public system?

DR: Well, see, this is a challenge and we don't really know because there's not any transparency around how these services are operating. I have heard that some of these services are saying that they have their own kind of local or within province private labs that they're actually sending it to private labs they're working with. But the problem here is, is this is an all hands on deck situation. So provinces are not just utilizing hospital lab capacity, they're not just using lab capacity within their public health labs, but they're also working with companies that, you know, normally do community based testing for things like diabetes or cholesterol. And they're recruiting those labs as well. So these sorts of companies, unless, you know, they are giving a very explicit plan about, you know, where they're using this or how they're somehow not affecting the public system -- frankly, they are. And it's not just a question of testing resources. It's also a question of human resources, right. In the Globe story that spoke to this today, we heard that one company as a first step is employing 100 nurses to administer these tests. That's 100 nurses that will not be available to administer tests in a publicly funded system.

CO: Well, in The Globe and Mail article, the chief executive officer of something called Switch Health Holdings Inc, who says that they're taking pressure off the public system, but they said that we cannot hire fast enough, there is so much demand. So when they're hiring fast enough, they're actually hiring the same people that the public system needs, is that right?

DR: That's exactly right. I mean, just like we don't have an unlimited lab testing capacity and, you know, all of this spare capacity to give the wealthy preferential access. We don't have a ton of extra doctors or nurses lying around. We're going to see an increase number of sick calls. So it means we need everybody available to treat people based on, again, you know, the underlying principle of our health care system to treat people based on medical need and not ability to pay.

CO: Is what they're doing legal?

DR: This is a really good question. And it may be or it may not be. And again, it speaks to a lack of transparency that we're seeing around these services. So, for example, in Ontario where I work, if you want to get a blood test for your diabetes, but you want to get it at home, that's not covered. So you can pay for someone to come to your house and administer a medically necessary test. And that's legal because at-home-testing is not publicly covered. But if you go to the clinic or to the lab in the community, you shouldn't be paying for that. So it's not clear to me what these clinics are doing. And it's not clear to me if they are directly violating the law here or even if they're just barely following the letter of the law, but I think violating the spirit here.

CO: There is a crisis and we have backlogs of people who need testing. We have people who can't find out if they're sick, they can't go back to work. Children who can't go to school. I mean, it's clearly an enormous problem, crisis. I mean, other countries have laws where they say, well, we're taking over these facilities because we're in the middle of an emergency. Do we have that capacity? Is that within the law of Canada that they could sort of commandeer these services?

DR: You know, in British Columbia, when they were trying to deal with a backlog on diagnostic imaging, they actually bought MRI clinics. And in Ontario, where we're not seeing that kind of direct purchasing of labs, we are seeing the government contract out and get, you know, not just private labs, but also university labs and other sorts of labs that maybe normally wouldn't do this but in a crisis that are doing it. I just want to speak to the current testing state because we are not doing a good enough job. In Ontario all summer, experts were imploring the province to adequately fund testing capacity in anticipation of the second wave. We're in the middle of a second wave. The provincial government did not do it. And now we're seeing a backlog. So we need the government to step up immediately to expand capacity, to listen to experts, and do so in a way that benefits everybody, not just folks who can buy their way to the front of the line.

CO: Dr. Raza thank you.

DR: My pleasure Carol. Thanks for having me on.

CH: Dr. Danyaal Raza is the chair of Canadian Doctors for Medicare and a family physician at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto.

[Music]

COPS

CH: About four months ago, the TV show Cops was cancelled. But apparently the market can't resist its siren song. Cops aired for more than 30 years on Fox, Spike, and most recently on the Paramount Network. But in June, after protests across the U.S. against police brutality and anti- Black racism, the reality show was cancelled. But apparently it was just on probation. The show has now confirmed that film crews have been riding with police officers in Spokane, Washington, since September. Apparently, the new episodes are for international TV contracts and will not air in the U.S.. Back in June, we spoke with Arisha Michelle Hatch, about Cops. Ms. Hatch is the vice president of Colour of Change, which helped convince Fox to cancel the show back in 2013, only to see it get back on the air. Here she is talking with Carol back in June.

ARISHA MICHELLE HATCH: What we see in these videos are Black people, Brown people and other poor people being overpoliced. And yet, it is somehow glamorized. And so the representations that it's produced over the last several decades have been incredibly problematic. And “Cops”, and other so-called reality shows like this, enable more police violence, and they bury evidence of police violence.

CO: What's really fascinating and hard to explain is how many of the people who they're arresting we see their faces. We can see who they are. And apparently, they have to sign waivers, and the producers claim that they do so willingly. What do you make of that?

AMH: I think what's happening, what we're seeing playing out on the cameras of “Cops”, is catching people at one of their lowest moments. And whether or not someone is in the frame of mind to actually sign a waiver, I think, is a larger legal question. But there's an exploitation. There are definitely tons of civil liberties concerns. Sometimes these images move forward before someone’s had a trial. The people who are being taken advantage of are poor people. And it's deeply problematic for these sorts of shows to continue to exist.

CO: And there's also, I guess, in the same investigation about how “Cops” is produced. They are chasing down some of the people who were actually the people who are being arrested. One man said that he was threatened with more charges if he didn't sign. In some cases, producers apparently pursued people into court to harass them into signing. One woman was denied bail bond until she signed. And some of these people are, in the end, acquitted. They're not found guilty of anything — that the drugs they seem to find in the cars are not drugs at all. And these cases don't amount to things. But those faces are still on these TV shows and in these reruns. So what effect do you think that has on the people who are actually being depicted in these shows?

AMH: I think it can have lifelong consequences for folks. And it's traumatic in and of itself to have that sort of moment captured and branded and reproduced, repackaged to make you seem in a certain light. I think part of the appeal of “Cops”, and it speaks to like an awful side of humanity, but it's part of the appeal to “Cops”, is people feeling like they're better than, or sometimes the show tends to like mock the people who might be in the middle of a mental health crisis, might have a drug or alcohol problems. And it just really sort of makes a mockery of the pain that many people are experiencing.

CH: That Arisha Michelle Hatch of the non-profit Colour of Change, speaking with As It Happens in June.

[Music]

Green Leader

Guest: Annamie Paul

CH: The Green Party has a new leader. On Saturday after nearly a decade and a half with Elizabeth May at their helm, the Greens picked Annamie Paul to chart their future course. Ms. Paul is Black and she's a Jewish woman -- both firsts for a Canadian party leader. What's less new are the tensions the leadership campaign revealed within the party. Ms. Paul was one of the so-called realists in the leadership race, in contrast with the self-described eco-socialists, one of whom finished second on Saturday. We reached Green Party leader Annamie Paul in Ottawa.

CO: Ms. Paul, first of all, congratulations.

ANNAMIE PAUL: Oh, thank you so much. I appreciate that very much.

CO: You've described your Green Party as the most progressive party of Canada. What message should Jagmeet Singh and the NDP take from that?

AP: I completely leave that up to them, but facts are facts. And we are indeed the most progressive party in Canadian politics. So for everyone out there that seeking that truly progressive home, we're talking about the social policies and the climate policies that matter. That home should be with us.

CO: What are you selling that's different than the NDP? I mean, you're trying to complete the social safety net. You're looking for combating climate change, even the Liberals are doing that. I mean, you have mainstream parties who could actually become the government. How could you attract voters away from them?

AP: We celebrate it because we're very much about cross partisan cooperation, and I think that's more and more what people in Canada are demanding from politicians. So we celebrated when the Liberals and NDP take our ideas and make them their own. But, you know, someone has to be turning out those ideas in the first place, and that's the Green Party. So in the last election when I ran, I did not hear Bill Morneau when he was running and I didn't hear the NDP candidate in Toronto Centre talking about things like a guaranteed livable income or universal pharmacare or decriminalization and a safe supply to avoid the opioid epidemic. I could just go on. I'm encouraging people to think about coming straight to the source for these ideas, because when I think of the other two parties, I really just feel and we can see in the speech from the throne that they're quite intellectually exhausted and the well seems to be running dry.

CO: It sounds like you are taking your cues from what the NDP used to be, which was that they wanted to be the conscience of parliament. They would persuade parties and government to go in directions by offering ideas, but will have no ambitions for power.

AP: Not at all. You know, we continue and will always continue to run to win as many seats as we can. It's clear to any of us who joined the Green Party, the more Greens we have in parliament, the more impact we can have on policy and the better those policies are going to be. And so our ambition now and always in the future is to win as many seats as we can and to form government one day. And I would remind anyone that thinks that that is impossible to look at all of the international examples over the last five years where Greens have made those breakthroughs and are in fact governing successfully, whether in coalition or otherwise.

CO: Your victory is looked at as a victory for moderation within the Green Party of Canada. But there was an activist wing of self-described eco-socialists, one of them, Dimitri Lascaris, who came very close, he was the second place finisher to you. How are you going to bring them into the party or do they have a place in your vision of the Green Party?

AP: Well, I'm very grateful to all of the candidates who have contacted me, and every single one has either posted online or we've had a conversation at this point. So I'm very grateful that they congratulated me and the members on the choice that they made. And, you know, it's exactly what you want. We had a race full of ideas, ideas on the direction for our party, the direction for Canada, and that's a sign of a healthy democracy. And when we talk about vision, I talk in collective terms because that's how we talk as Greens. So our vision is one that can accommodate all of that. And as long as a member supports the core values of the Green Party of Canada, they're welcome. And I think, again, it's held very healthy for a democracy that we still have at least one party left where all the decisions don't come from the top and all the views don't come from one person.

CO: Well, you say that as long as they subscribe to the core values. That's sounds a bit vague. I mean, what role are you going to have? The eco-socialists have a very very strong views about where the Green Party should go, which would be quite distinctive from the other parties. I'll give you one example of one of the ideas was the idea that the Greens should call for sanctions against the state of Israel. Do you support that?

AP: We have a very clear policy with respect to Israel that our members passed back in 2016. And I said throughout the election that I support that. We have a policy convention coming up in the early part of next year. And that's going to be a really important opportunity for our members who are the ones that develop and vote on the policies that the leader represents, to have exactly those discussions about anything that they think we should be doing more of or less of. I can't wait for it. We're all very excited. It only happens once every two years. But every person who ran in our race said that they supported the member policies as they were. They said that they supported the six core Green values. And that is really all we need in order to have a foundation to work on.

CO: Right. But it's not just the party. You are now the party leader. And you represent certain values that you have brought to this convention and this leadership. And it's not clear how you're going to include what some called the fringe elements of your party. How are you going to bring them in? It's not to say that it would depend on the convention, the policy convention, to find common ground. How will you find common ground for them?

AP: Well, first, Carol, I was elected on Saturday [chuckles] so in terms of that, as I said, the outreach has already started. All of the candidates were very very gracious in contacting me and congratulating me and congratulating the members. That's already a very powerful signal, I think, to everyone that we all understand that we are Greens and that the things that we share in common are much greater than any policy differences that we might have. I'm going to expect a very robust debate between our members about the direction that we want to head in and the platform that we want to have in the next election. But I hope you'll give me more than 24 hours to have those conversations with them. All of those from the various, and again, I would not use the word that you used to describe the members of our party, the various points of view, all of those people are welcome. You know, my job, as I said, is to represent our values and our policies as they exist and as we create them in the future.

CO: Ms. Paul, we will be watching. Thank you.

AP: Oh thank you so much.

CH: Annamie Paul is the leader of the Canadian Green Party. We reached her in Ottawa.

[Music]

Onions

CH: They've been called sweet and round, but it's hard to imagine that Walla Walla onions could be described as sexy. And yet Facebook thinks so. Or at least the Facebook algorithm thinks so. Over the weekend, Gaze Seed Company in St. John's, Newfoundland, discovered that its innocent ad for Walla Walla onion seed was deemed overtly sexual. Jackson McLean, the manager of Gaze Seed spoke with the CBC's On The Go about the unintended eroticism of his product.

JACKSON MCLEAN: On Saturday, I was looking at our website because we're trying to digitize all our products now that COVID has kind of changed everything. We're trying to make it easier for people to order online. And I noticed that one of our products -- there was a warning coming up saying it wasn't allowed to be posted on Facebook, which I found confusing. So I looked into it, then I saw that they thought our onions were too sexual.

TED BLADES: Now, who's making that decision?

JACKSON MCLEAN: As far as I know, it's some sort of algorithm that analyzes the photo and I guess they saw that there was two round shapes that could be if you turn them a certain way and looked at them...

TED BLADES: Something else.

JACKSON MCLEAN: With a good imagination, you might see them as a pair of breast.

TED BLADES: Did Facebook take any other action against you other than saying no, that image can't go up?

JACKSON MCLEAN: No, luckily, they didn't disable our account or anything. And I'm hoping that we'll get some sort of human to review it and notice that it's not actually sexual. It's just a basket of onions.

TED BLADES: Are your onions particularly any aspect, I run the risk of losing our broadcast license if I make any illusions, but you know what I mean.

JACKSON MCLEAN: No, as far as I'm concerned, they're just regular looking onions. I mean, you'd have to look at them in a very different way to see something sexual or attractive about them.

TED BLADES: Any human looking at it can clearly tell you, those are some onions.

JACKSON MCLEAN: Yeah. I mean, the nice onions, but they're still just onions.

TED BLADES: It's a strange world we live in where computers are making these kinds of calls.

JACKSON MCLEAN: Yeah. They also told us that our peas are promoting alcohol consumption for some reason. So I had to look into that as well.

TED BLADES: How?

JACKSON MCLEAN: I have no idea. Unfortunately it doesn't give a reason. It just says what it found then it's up to us to figure out why.

CH: That was Jackson McLean, manager of Gaze Seed Company speaking with CBC Newfoundland and Labrador's Ted Blades.

[Music]

Part 3: Cineworld Closing Theatres

Cineworld Closing Theatres

Guest: Ken Thewes

CH: It's one of the biggest cinema chains on the planet, and today Cineworld has confirmed that it is temporarily closing all of its theatres in the US and the UK. Starting Thursday, it says more than 500 of its Regal Theatres in the US will be shut, along with more than 100 in the UK. It's no secret the industry has been hard hit by COVID-19. Several potential blockbusters, including, most recently the new James Bond flick "No Time To Die" have been delayed. Ken Thewes is the chief marketing officer of Regal, the US subsidiary of the Cineworld Group. We reached him in Knoxville, Tennessee.

CO: Mr. Thewes how did Cineworld come to this decision to shut down its theaters in the US and the UK now?

KEN THEWES: We know it wasn't really an easy decision whatsoever. We shut down in March originally and then started opening up back in August when various states were allowed to open. And as others were coming on board, right now, 48 states allow theatres to open. And the only ones that don't are New York and New Mexico. And really the issue is with New York.

CO: And what is the issue with New York?

KT: Well, it's such a critical market as you can imagine, the population in New York that studios don't want to release their big budget movies if they can't have New York up and running and having people see their movies. New York and L.A. are by far the two largest markets. So what we've seen as well, smaller movies have been opening up without New York. The big budget movies have continued to push further and further back. And really, the straw that broke our back was MGM moving their new Bond movie, No Time To Die, from end of November, into April. And we don't really blame them. We know it's because they didn't have New York to open up. And New York has really paralyzed the rest of the industry because studios just won't bring us their movies. And it's impacting not just us, but the entire world.

CO: So do you lay this at the feet of New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo?

KT: Yeah. I mean, at this point, we do. We certainly recognize he's done a good job of getting COVID under control in his state. But at this point, we feel like he's got really arbitrary and subjective rulings on not allowing theatres, movie theatres to open up, but he will allow indoor dining and gyms and bowling and casinos to open up, all of which we would argue with the safety protocols we've put in place are less safe than movie theaters. We recognize nothing is risk free, but we believe we are much safer than many of these other industries that he's allowed to open.

CO: But of course, in New York, COVID-19 has killed more than 30,000 people. Do you think that might be motivating him?

KT: Well, I think that's what he says. But again, he's allowing these other businesses to open up and being open in 48 states and around the world in most countries, to date, there has been no contact tracing that's linked COVID back to a movie theatre. And again, we shared with him and we've tried to lobby him. And our CEO has written a personal email to him, making sure he understands what we're doing to make our industry and our theatres at Regal safe. And I don't know if he hasn't read that or if he's ignoring it, but he's made comments that just absolutely aren't true. And again, he's arbitrarily saying theatres can't open, movie theatres, but all these other industries that you could question have just as much, if not more risk to them.

CO: But can you understand also how people themselves might be reluctant to go to a movie cinema to watch "No Time To Die" in the midst of a pandemic?

KT: Of course. And we're not asking him to mandate people go to the movie theatres. We're asking him to let people make the choice. And as we're open in most of the rest of the country, we've interviewed and surveyed are customers who are coming to us, and 95 plus percent of them are relaying that they feel incredibly safe with all of the protocols that are in place in our movie theatres and that they'll come back. And we're confident New York would be no different. Certainly, some people may not want to go and we'll welcome them back when they're ready to come to a movie. But we just don't think it should arbitrarily other industries be allowed to open and not movie theatres. Let the consumers make the choice.

CO: Now, what about the people who work there? You have 40,000 employees across the US obviously impacted by this decision, obviously needing work. How are they going to be supported through all this?

KT: Well, I think that's the heartbreaking thing in all of this. You know, the challenge of having one state be so important to our industry, but we're going to go through a lot of furloughs, so we're not going to necessarily let them go permanently. They will have a home to come back to at Regal. But we recognize at this point the stress that just being furloughed causes, and again, I think, you know, Governor Cuomo has said movie theatres aren't an essential industry, but certainly to our employees and to all of the other workers in our industry, we're pretty essential. And again, it's frustrating that New York won't open -- but not only won't open, won't really give clear guidance on what it would take to open and are allowing other industries to open that have questionable safety protocols in place like we do.

CO: The COVID-19 death rate in the United States is now almost 210,000 people and no end in sight. We don't see a vaccine on the horizon yet. Do you see this as being the end of the movie theatre experience for some time?

KT: Not at all. I mean, certainly we're going to be closed until, first, New York opens up and then, second, the studios come back with bringing their product into the movie theatres. But certainly, as I mentioned, New York has done an admirable job of getting COVID under control. And I think in most of their state, it's well under control. They've got a few hot spots still. And I think that's similar to the rest of the country. I mean, there were spikes over the summer that were alarming and we were closed through all of that. But I think it's just it's impossible to expect that you can just shut the country down for an indefinite period of time. And again, that's all we're asking for. We've increased our cost gladly to put more of these safety protocols in place. And we'll continue to do that if and until a vaccine is in place.

CO: We'll leave it there. Mr. Thewes thank you.

KT: Thank you very much. I appreciate the interest in having me on.

CH: Ken Thewes is Regal's chief marketing officer. We reached him in Knoxville, Tennessee.

[Music]

Strip Clubs

CH: Schools, gyms, bars and restaurants are still open in Ontario as the province and much of the country grapples with a second wave of COVID-19 cases. But there's one kind of establishment that has been shut down for a second time: strip clubs. In Toronto, there have been two outbreaks of strip clubs that have garnered a lot of attention, and with it snide remarks. The CBC spoke with two performers about losing work and about some of the comments that have been made about what they do.

VOICE 1: Dancers are sad and angry that we've been made a scapegoat for COVID. Like that implies that we're somehow the vectors of spreading disease, which is an inaccurate assumption and a really mean spirited assumption.

VOICE 2: Then you see people online saying things like, "Oh well, COVID is not the only thing that you're going to catch at the strip club. [Making laughing noise]" And I'll be honest, it's extremely hurtful to have my craft and my profession impugned in this way.

VOICE 1: To do our jobs, many municipalities require us to have a license that we pay to the city. So they are taking our money while making fun of us.

VOICE 2: I do not personally think that given the numbers we're seeing, it's a bad idea or inappropriate or imprudent to close strip clubs. However, I believe that the delineation between strip clubs and other forms of nightlife and entertainment is simply a function of anti [inaudible] stigma.

VOICE 1: Although I've had conventional jobs through my adult life, dancing is the job that I've had for the longest. There's an aspect of it that is quite beautiful.

VOICE 2: I think that in order for it to be safe to go back to the strip clubs is exactly the same thing as what would it take to be truly safe going back to bars, going back to theaters, going back to circuses.

VOICE 1: Our argument is treat us the same as nightclubs. We feel we're being treated unfairly.

CH: The CBC agreed to protect that dancer's identity because she fears she'll lose her job for speaking out. Before her you heard Chelsea Edgell, also known as Rhapsody Blue. The two exotic dancers in Toronto spoke with the CBC's Haydn Watters about the province of Ontario's order to close strip clubs because of the high number of COVID-19 cases.

[Music]

Dutch Lesbos Flights

Guest: Rikko Voorberg

CH: A Dutch NGO decided it wouldn't just advocate for its government to accept asylum seekers stuck in overcrowded camps in Greece, it would go get the asylum seekers itself. This morning, members of the organization, Let's Bring Them Here, left on a 737 and tried to fly to the island of Lesbos. They had planned to lobby the Dutch government to let them bring a plane load of refugees back to the Netherlands, but their plan hit a snag. Rikko Voorberg is the head of the organization Let's Bring Them Here. We reached him in Athens.

CO: Rikko you're now on a boat leaving Athens. Where are you headed?

RIKKO VOORBERG: Yeah, I'm heading for Lesbos. But we didn't plan to go there by boat. We wanted to fly there with our plane.

CO: And what happened to cut that short? Because you were on the plane going to Lesbos this morning. What happened to that trip?

RV: Yeah, we rented together with thousands Dutch citizens, a plane to start evacuating refugees from former Moria camp. But then half an hour before we reached Lesbos, the captain all of a sudden said, we have to return now to Athens. So he made a sharp turn and we went up through to the captain and crew saying like, what's going on? Security reasons, they said. Air traffic control had forbidden us all of a sudden. We had the clearance, but all of a sudden they had forbidden us to land in the Mytilene airport. And now we went to Athens. But that was not the place where we wanted to be.

CO: And Mytilene airport was the closest you could get to the Lesbos camp, the Moria camp. And then you hoped to do what when you got there?

RV: Yeah, we had 189 empty seats sponsored on this plane by Dutch citizens who were very frustrated about the way Europeans were treating refugees at their borders. And we wanted to start evacuating them. So we said to the Dutch government, you have to say the word that we are not waiting for it, we were already just starting our plane and just go over there. You have to fill that plane with 189 refugees to bring bringing to the Netherlands and to continue their procedure in humane circumstances.

CO: What were the chances that that was going to succeed?

RV: Well, that's a question we get a lot and I always reply with this one: what is the chance that Dutch citizens in one and half week put funds together to rent a complete Boeing 757 to send it to Lesbos to rescue people? Once that happens, anything can happen. I mean, why would the government or governments stop our plane if there wasn't a chance of us succeeding? So apparently we were getting a little bit too close for their comfort.

CO: Were you trying to make a point? Because it was fraught with difficulty that you'd be able to bring these people back to the Netherlands. Was that of a larger context that you were trying to make a point, to make publicity for this, for the situation, for the plight of these people?

RV: It's, of course, everything that leads up to the thing we really want is great. And if that's publicity, that's fine. But the intention of all the people of Let's Bring Them Here movement already when we started four years ago, was to really start relocating people with our politicians. So first we drove to the city of The Hague and we said, here we are ready with 250 cars. And we said, you promised to bring in 8000 people from Greece and from Italy. You're not doing it. So here we are with 250 cars, we are ready to drive now. There is a support base. And then we went to Athens with a big bus and did the same. Now, here we were on an airplane. So it's not symbolic. We were trying to do the real thing. And every symbol that is taken from it is a great thing. I mean, if people say, hey, I see in this that there's a large support base, that's great.

CO: We have spoken with many people dealing with the Moria camp that went before it burned, after it burned, after all those people were stuck on a road with no place to go. And then this second camp, as you point out, many people saying it's even worse than the first. But at the same time, is there a danger that you that you give them hope that you were going to take these people back when there really were so many obstacles to doing it? I mean, did you give them a sense of false hope? Is there a danger of that?

RV: Well, the thing of false hope is first, Europe is giving people false hope. I mean, they have all these universal basic human rights and these refugee conventions, and then you end up in European soil and you see these as false hope. The thing that we ask our friends who were in refugee camps all over Europe is, hey, do you get false hope from our initiative? But they understand. I mean, these people are not stupid. They have been revolting or protesting in their own countries and they understand how you do protest, how you try to bring change. And we have to be sure written letters in all languages we can think of through people in the camps. And then we have our friends there saying, hey, the chances are very very very limited. Our government has to say yes. But even if it fails, we have to try. We cannot sit still and and let you down. And the response we get is that people say it's very hard for us to believe that Europeans care, that there are actual people who are different than the barbed wire and the procedures and the highest camp commanders we are meeting. That there are actual people saying, hey, this is your place too. So that's a clear message. And that's an actual hope that maybe give them another week or another month or if it must, another year to survive all the dehumanizing procedures that are put upon them.

CO: When do you think that you will arrive in Lesbos?

RV: Tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock we will be able to meet our friends on Lesbos. Then the boat will arrive.

CO: And any chance the same thing will happen that the authorities will stop you or turn you back?

RV: Well, if we can start on this boat, then we might be able to land. One never knows. There's is a famous saying of Martin Luther King which I don't know by heart but I do know the start "If you can't fly, then run. If you can't run, then crawl. And if you can't crawl..." I don't know what you have to do then, but keep moving. So that's all we're doing together with all those people we've been supporting this action in such a tremendous way.

CO: Rikko we will be following your progress. And I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

RV: Thank you so much Carol.

CH: Rikko Voorberg is the head of the Dutch organization, Let's Bring Them Here. We reached him in Athens, Greece.

[Music]

Ideas Promo: The Idea of India

CH: On Ideas tonight, a look at the contested legacy of Gandhi. In his own time and today, Gandhi has been called a racist, a misogynist, and a defender of India's caste system. However, with a rise in communal violence under a Hindu nationalist government, citizens are revisiting Gandhi's vision for an independent India.

SHRUTI KAPILA: Gandhi is in a way grappling very early on that how do you institute a new political language, a new agenda for political action? And unlike whether it is the radicals who are really quite popular, they are quite cultish figures in this period. And unlike even the dominant liberal oriented, constitutionally minded Congress at this point, that it actually does all of this on its head. And he says, no, the sight of transformation has to be the individual self. The self will become both the agent and the conclusion of political change. Gandhi doesn't want to change institutions. He doesn't want to appeal to them. He certainly doesn't want a violent confrontation with them. But what he determines in his swaraj is that if there's a transformation of the self, then the world can change.

CH: Shruti Kapila on Gandhi's politics of the self from the first episode of a two part series called The Idea of India. That's coming up next on Ideas with Nahlah Ayed after As It Happens.

[Music]

Brent Lakatos

Guest: Brent Lakatos

CH: After 90 plus minutes, it came down to two seconds. This weekend, Canadian Brett Lakatos pulled off a razor thin win at London's wheelchair marathon. The seven time Paralympic medalist has dominated wheelchair racing sprint distances for the better part of a decade. Two years ago, he won his first marathon in Berlin. And yesterday, drenched with rain, he added London Marathon champion to his ever growing list of achievements. We reached Brent Lakatos in London, England.

CO: Brent, congratulations.

BRENT LAKATOS: Thank you very much.

CO: How are you feeling?

BL: I am feeling in less pain than yesterday so that's a good thing.

CO: [Laughs] And have you had a chance to celebrate yet?

BL: [Chuckles] A little bit. We had a nice meal yesterday thrown by the organizing committee. My coach was there and teammates and stuff. And yeah, that was really nice. But no official celebrations. I just got back home today.

CO: And you were in pain I guess yesterday.

BL: Yeah. Yeah. The marathon takes a lot out of you. [Chuckles] I had sore muscles, yeah. It hurts after one of those, but I was happy so that kind of takes the pain away also.

CO: You know, what was the best thing was to see the look on your face after you crossed the finish line, the smile you had -- your face lit up. So you still had some energy left in you in some place.

BL: Yeah, it's the smile of 'I've won' and 'It's over so I'm happy.' Yeah, I know it was a great race and I was really lucky to be able to do something like that with everything going on. And so I'm really happy that London Marathon pulled it through. They did a great job protecting us as well. So it was a great experience from start to finish.

CO: You mean with everything going on, you mean including being in the middle of a pandemic?

BL: Yes, exactly. Yeah. They set up a bubble for us and everyone was tested before we left. We were tested upon arrival. We had all sorts of social distancing stuff. They had technology there warning when you got too close to everybody. So they made it as safe as possible for everyone involved.

CO: How different was it then to race in those conditions?

BL: It was very different. Yeah, I first off, there are less people there than normal. The top marathon guy from the US had to pull out just a week before, I guess, I don't know, he was afraid to travel or something. So it was a very different feel than normal. And everything was different from the meal to even the warm up tent. They had individual porta potties for us instead of sharing them which is quite nice in fact. But yeah, everything about it was different. There weren't fans along the streets and everything. So very very different experience.

CO: You finish in one hour, 36 minutes and four seconds. What gave you the strength to push through that last sprint?

BL: It was a sprinter's course. It was a nice flat course, which I really like. I don't like the hills -- uphills and downhills. I enjoy a flat race. And then they had all those bonus money points, charity things thrown on in the middle. And so the pace of the race was very up and down, up and down, which suits a guy like me who comes from the track. And so I think I had more in reserve than the other guys simply because of the way the pacing of the race unfolded.

CO: Expand on that a bit, if you would?

BL: So this course was a 20 lap race. It was a two kilometre lap approximately and about 20 of those laps. And four of those laps, they had a section designated where whoever did that section the fastest, not who got to the finish of that section, but whoever did the section fastest got some prize money. So I think it was laps five, eight, 14 and 18, something like that. And so not only was the lap where that sprint happened affected because of the sprint, tiring people out and trying to recover, but the laps leading into it and afterwards were affected by people trying to, you know, recover enough to do well in the sprint and that sort of stuff. So the pacing of the marathon was very different than a normal one.

CO: And how did you recover from those and be able to get the energy back?

BL: [Laughs] You just kind of take a breather. There's a little downhill section afterwards, but I think I'm accustomed to that just due to the fact that I train on a circuit like this and it's 2.6 kilometre circuit that I use. And there's a downhill, there's an uphill. And so I'm used to having to do a strong uphill and then recover or speed down the downhill and then maybe coast a little bit at the bottom. So I think I'm used to that, and I think my body deals well with it.

CO: Learning when to coast.

BL: Exactly. Get your breath back. [Chuckles]

CO: How much training do you put into it?

BL: My training is gotten really well. They asked us at the beginning of the summer what interest there would be in an elite-only field. You know how they're trying to gauge how many people they could get in this pandemic world that we live in. And from that email, if anyone can pull it off London can. And so that gave me plenty of motivation to get in the best shape I could. And so my training's been going really well from most of the summer on, and especially in the last month.

CO: You said that you were motivated. What does motivate you to keep on going? I mean you've been doing this for a long time now.

BL: Yeah. I just really really love racing. I don't really like the training, and so I struggle for motivation. But thinking about, you know, making it to the Paralympics and that's sort of in-race environment where everybody's at their best, and you get to compete and see what you've got against the rest of the world, that's what drives me. And so even on the days where it's tough and I don't want to get out there, I've got that in the back of my mind. And so with Tokyo next year, fingers crossed, I've got plenty of motivation coming.

CO: I guess you need motivation yesterday with that rain.

BL: Yeah, well, once you're there and you find out it's going to be a wet day, there's no turning back. You've just got to deal with it. Everyone does. And I've kind of had those races in the past where I struggled with them. And so I've learned from those experiences. And I was ready for it yesterday.

CO: You have won seven Paralympic medals, two marathons, 11 world track titles. What are you preparing for next?

BL: So I want to try and -- I won't say go out with a bang -- but I want to try and do Tokyo with a bang. And so I'm trying to prepare every distance for Tokyo. So my goal is to do from the 100 metres up to the marathon and see how well I can do there.

CO: I doubt that you're going out Brent with a bang or otherwise.

BL: [Chuckles] My wife would say something similar.

CO: [Laughs] And she's right. Anyway, again, congratulations. It's great to watch you and to see your successes. So thank you.

BL: Thank you very much.

CH: Brent Lakatos is a seven-time Paralympic medalist and now a two-time wheelchair marathon champion. We reached him in London, England.

Back To Top »

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

October 05, 2020 Episode Transcript

More Stories Like This