Results tagged “publichealth”

In a spun-out economy like ours, the idea of black market poultry shouldn't be that surprising. And yet, with news like the following from the Toronto Police Service, the mental image of a Trailer Park Boys-style chicken heist is enough to merit an early morning spit-take.

Photo taken just after midnight on Friday by Jonathan Goldsbie. The "For Renovations" part of the sign has since been torn off.

This what a bioterrorist looks like, according to the FBI. Dr. Steven Kurtz (right) is a Professor of Art at SUNY Buffalo and member of Critical Art Ensemble (CAE), an art and theatre collective co-founded by Kurtz and his late wife, Hope. In May 2004, the Kurtzes were preparing a piece called Free Range Grains, which allowed participants to test food for the presence of genetically modified organisms, when Hope died of heart failure...

Toronto councillor Paula Fletcher wants Toronto Public Health to officially categorize bedbugs as a "health hazard," as opposed to their current status, "nuisance,"—that's not a joke; "nuisance" is apparently the official term—after our dear city has seen a recent upsurge in the pests. And for all you folks living in highrises, don't get too smug, because it seems "there is no community that hasn't been affected." Fletcher is also urging officials to implement a bedbug furniture pick-up system similar to the one used in Cincinnati, where city employees collect infested furniture if it's covered in plastic. And it looks like Fletcher's getting somewhere because an "expert panel discussion" is being held tonight at the WoodGreen Community Centre.

First the OPP, and now the Toronto Public Health department—everyone's getting Facebook! A few weeks ago, a woman went to the Toronto Wildlife Centre to drop off a bat that (unbeknownst to her) was infested with rabies. The health department wanted to warn her, so they tried all their top-secret official government methods of tracking people down (apparently consisting of the "telephone book" and "Google") but nothing panned out. So they did what any reasonable person would do and turned to Facebook (though they had to get special permission to use it, thanks to Gerry Phillips). They quickly found her.

From mid-September through year-end, all City Community Centres will be closed on Mondays. Skating rinks won't open until January. Fewer potholes will be repaired. Snow won't be cleared unless there is at least 15 cm of it (the current minimum is 8 cm). New materials from Public Health will only be available in English.

Toronto has an unusual problem: too many mayors' offices. After the dying years of the last century saw Metro's five cities and one borough reduced into a single bureaucratic mess, the city was left with the prickly issue of what to do with the palatial digs of Alan Tonks and six mayors left sitting barren in the far-flung civic centres and City Halls throughout the megacity (which, when pronounced with the proper cynical inflection, rhymes with mendacity).

According to the Public Health Agency of Canada, child sexual abuse “occurs when a child is used for sexual purposes by an adult or adolescent.” In Canada, about 8,800 cases of such assaults were reported in 2002. More often than not, victims keep quiet about the abuse they experience usually because they fear retaliation from the abuser, blame themselves for the ill-treatment, or are ashamed of their predicament. So it would be more than nice if you could help put an end to this by participating in Youth Out Loud’s Walk to End Child Sexual Abuse today.

Yesterday, the province gave Toronto $52,000 to test recycling programs in apartment complexes as part of the goal to divert 70 per cent of waste from landfill by 2010.

Although numerous studies link good health and good teeth, dentistry is not yet covered by OHIP (unless it requires dental surgery that takes place in a hospital). Rumours abound about places in the GTA that offer inexpensive and even free dentistry. It turns out that these inexpensive dental options actually exist—and Torontoist has looked them up for you.

Next time you visit the library, take a look at the carpeting and furniture. Does it make you want to linger with a good book or run through the checkout as fast as possible?

It seems to us that everybody we know has been under the weather lately. So we called Dr. Herveen Sachdeva, Associate Medical Officer of Health for Toronto Public Health to find out what diseases are out there and how we can avoid them.

Happy December Torontoist readers!

You can play for Toronto FC next year. They are holding open tryouts at the end of December as long as you're willing to pony up $115. And if you don't make it, you also get a T-shirt and two free tickets to a game in their first season.

We know those nights are getting longer and colder and it's only natural that some of us will go out on Friday night looking for that special someone right now to warm up those frigid fall nights but we thought we'd point out these little health notes from the people at Toronto Public Health.

The OPP report that 800 traffic tickets were given out on this province's busy highways. The worst offenders included a woman not wearing a seatbelt to be able to play with her chihuahua, and a driver in his underwear holding a bottle of vodka.