Canada

RECENTLY, I REPORTED for The Walrus on how Alberta lost the plot on measles in 2025.

My vantage on the whole thing was near field. I’m a family doctor in Alberta who delivers babies, and for months, it seemed measles came up in most patient visits. Pregnant people wanted to know whether they could get sick. They might. Risks included pregnancy losses, sick newborns, and stillbirths. Measles had been eliminated before I went to medical school, so I had no direct experience of it, but these were all outcomes I knew from my training.

On September 18, 2025, nearly finished my reporting for The Walrus, I decided to submit an Access to Information request to the province, flagging myself as a reporter. Things I wanted to know included: How many confirmed cases of measles in pregnant women had been reported in Alberta since March 1, 2025? Of those with antenatal measles, how many had been hospitalized? How many had preterm labour? How many infants had been diagnosed with congenital measles? And, most crucially, how many stillbirths or neonatal deaths occurred within the first twenty-eight days?

Perhaps because I’d provided too many specifics in my query, the day after, an information officer suggested I amend it to specifically request copies of all communication between Alberta Health Services, Primary Care Alberta, and the Ministry of Health regarding maternal and perinatal outcomes related to measles, from March to the end of August.

I agreed, and two months later, I received a file and was charged $25.

That I was being charged so little did not bode well. I downloaded the file. My heart quickened a little as I clicked on the folder. Waiting inside were a meagre twenty-six pages of emails, much of the relevant information redacted.

Then, buried amongst emails debating the definition of congenital measles, the saddest one of all, from September 17, with the opening line: “Here is the death certificate as we discussed earlier.” Which must have been for the baby whose death was announced in October, two weeks after the request for the certificate was circulated. Today, to check my timeline was correct, I went looking for the news release from the province that must have announced the baby’s death. I could find nothing.

What all this amounts to, for me, is a province that understood the stakes of the measles outbreak and of the impact of preventable illness on a beleaguered health care system, yet failed to share what it knew, in real time, about the harm being done to its most vulnerable citizens. Despite internal emails indicating miscarriages, stillbirths, and at least one infant death, the province released no clear, timely data to clinicians or the public. Heavily redacted records confirmed officials were actually tracking these harms while debating whether—and how—to report them.

A Conservative MP says he is asking the House of Commons to freeze his salary before parliamentarians get their annual pay bump in April.

New Brunswick MP Mike Dawson posted a letter on Facebook where he asks the clerk of the House to "make the necessary arrangements with the payroll and benefits administration" to ensure that his salary doesn't increase.

"At a time when everyday Canadians are struggling to keep up with rising cost of living I cannot in good conscience accept the pay increase," Dawson wrote in his letter.

Employment and Social Development Canada has yet to publish the final indexed rate for 2025, but Dawson indicated in his letter that he anticipates it would be roughly around $10,000.

Based on the annual pay increase schedule, backbench MPs started making a yearly salary of more than $200,000 in 2024.

Salaries for special offices — like ministers, parliamentary secretaries, the Speaker and the prime minister — are higher. Prime ministers make more than $400,000 a year, while ministers and the leader of the Official Opposition are paid roughly $300,000.

Hello PieFed! I feel there's not enough content in regards to tech or self-hosting focused on us Canucks, so I started writing a blog last year. A lot of it fits into anywhere as it's all centered on self-hosting and cybersecurity but I specifically write some posts & chunks of posts, directly for my fellow Canadians!

Welcome to Core Lab =) Operated & Self-Hosted in Canada, by a Canadian.

I personally 'cut the cord' back in 2012 , tired of the high costs and limited options of Canadian cable. Over the last 14+ years, I’ve moved from trying basic OTA antennas (Mohu Leaf anyone?!) to advanced automated self-hosted setups using Plex/Jelly and/or Real Debrid integrations!

I wrote this guide to save you the trial and error. It filters out the outdated advice and shows you exactly which hardware and streaming protocols actually work for reliable, high-quality streaming in Canada in 2026. Let me know if you have any questions or if this guide helped you out!

Disclaimer: This post does contain some affiliate links, but no ads ! I'll never have popup or in-line ads...

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) — A shooting at a school in British Columbia left eight dead including a woman whom police believe to be the shooter, while two more people were found dead at a nearby home, Canadian authorities said Tuesday.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said more than 25 people are injured, including two who were airlifted to hospital with life-threatening injuries, after the shooting at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School.

School shootings are rare in Canada.

The town of Tumbler Ridge, which has a population of about 2,400 people, is more than 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) north of Vancouver, near the border with Alberta. The provincial government website lists Tumbler Ridge Secondary School as having 175 students from Grades 7 to 12.

RCMP Superintendent Ken Floyd told reporters that investigators had identified a female suspect but would not release a name, and that the shooter’s motive remained unclear.

“We are not in a place to understand why or what may have motivated this tragedy,” Floyd said.

He added that police are still investigating how the victims are connected to the shooter.

When officers entered the school on Tuesday afternoon, they found six victims deceased, RCMP confirmed.

An individual believed to be the shooter was also found deceased with what appears to be a self‑inflicted injury.

Two victims have been airlifted to the hospital with serious or life‑threatening injuries. A third victim died while being transported to hospital. Approximately 25 others are being assessed and triaged at the local medical centre for non‑life‑threatening injuries.

The active shooter alert was lifted at 5:46 p.m. PT.

It would be awesome if Canada could do this.

"Every time a European taps a card, pays online or splits a bill with friends, the transaction flows through infrastructure owned and operated by American companies."

Archive: [ https://archive.is/kaz19 ]

Another of these sources said the Premier recounted to them that Mr. Ford had advised Mr. Carney to trigger an election. Mr. Ford won a third majority government after he called an early election last year, saying he needed a mandate to take on U.S. President Donald Trump.

On a quiet Montréal street of low-rise brick apartment buildings on one side and cement barrier wall on the other, a crowd has gathered, binoculars around their necks and cameras at the ready. A European robin has taken up residence in the neighbourhood, which is sandwiched between two industrial areas with warehouses and railway lines and, a few blocks away, port facilities on the St Lawrence River.

Ron Vandebeek from Ottawa, Ontario, is here on a frigid February morning hoping to see the rare bird, which was first spotted at the beginning of January.

This is the first recorded sighting of a European robin in Canada, and only the fifth or sixth in North America. That it has taken up residence in Quebec is a source of delight but also consternation for birders. How did it travel thousands of kilometres from its home territory, and will it survive a very cold Montréal winter?

A conservative Canadian broadcast news network is incorporating propaganda from U.S. dark-money-funded think tanks directly into its regular programming. The decision by federal regulators to boost its reach looks increasingly dubious as Canadian institutions — and by extension our sovereignty — are being undermined by other right-wing media and in the swamps of social media.

In November 2022, the News Forum received Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission approval as a licensed national news network that must be included in Canadian television providers’ offerings to subscribers. That decision is key to the News Forum growing its audience.

The English-language network recently expanded its national operations with a new Western Canada bureau, and plans to strengthen its online footprint with a particular focus on attracting young viewers, including via a $500,000 national youth scholarship program focused on “Canada’s energy future.”

The network’s CEO is Tore Stautland; together with his spouse, Julie Stautland, the couple hold the largest share of ownership of the News Forum but not a majority. Other investors in the network have previously been described as “like-minded” and “anonymous.” Tore Stautland is a broadcast executive with more than 25 years of experience in “Christian market” programming for television networks in Canada, in the United States and around the world. Notably, there are increasingly established links between Christian nationalism and the political right in Canada.

John Rustad was accused of fearmongering and spreading misinformation about Indigenous land rights at a town hall-style event he hosted in Smithers last weekend along with two fellow Conservative MLAs.

The former Conservative Party of BC leader was joined by Bulkley Valley-Stikine MLA Sharon Hartwell and Abbotsford South MLA Bruce Banman at a meeting billed as an opportunity to discuss B.C.’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, or DRIPA. But the panel was criticized over the lack of First Nations representation and the venue’s lack of space. About 100 people packed inside the Smithers legion and at least a dozen more were turned away after the hall reached capacity on Saturday evening.

Many took to the microphone to speak in favour of DRIPA — groundbreaking legislation that passed unanimously in the B.C. legislature in 2019 and is meant to provide a framework to guide reconciliation in the province.

Although Rustad voted for DRIPA, the Conservative Party of BC has now promised to repeal the legislation if it forms government.

An early comment that First Nations “wouldn’t exist” without Canada elicited gasps and some comments from the packed hall.

PM explained to Trump that Canada paid for Windsor-Detroit crossing and that Michigan owns part of it

The MP overseeing foreign aid says Ottawa wants to focus its international assistance efforts on countries that can generate economic spinoffs for Canadians.

“The first priority is focusing our development dollars in a trade and development nexus,” Randeep Sarai, secretary of state for international development, told The Canadian Press.

“Due to the new trade realities that the world is facing — and specifically Canada — I think we need to use development as a positive tool to help create new pathways and create mutual prosperity for the partner countries as well.”

Sarai’s comments come as the federal government moves to slash $2.7 billion from the foreign aid budget over four years. Ottawa insists the cuts will bring Canada’s spending back to pre-pandemic levels.

The aid sector has argued that by cutting aid and pushing to spend less on global health, Prime Minister Mark Carney is breaking his promise during last year’s election campaign to leave the aid budget alone.

...

Sarai said he also wants to engage Canadians on Ottawa’s support for “many of the lands and diasporas that they come from — not just the two or three that are usually loud in the media.”

That means more federal top-ups for Canadian programs in regions like Latin America, Africa, the Caribbean and small Pacific islands, he said.

Jimmy Lai's niece in Niagara-on-the-Lake says it's a "sad day for Hong Kong" after the pro-democracy activist and media mogul was sentenced to 20 years in prison under a China-imposed national security law.

"This is an example of just how much has changed in Hong Kong in terms of freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of press. My heart breaks for Hong Kong," Erica Lepp told Metro Morning on Monday.

In custody since 2020, Lai was found guilty in December of conspiring with others to collude with foreign forces to endanger national security and conspiracy to publish seditious articles. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.

In sentencing the 78-year-old on the weekend, Judge Esther Toh said 18 years of his term should be served consecutively to his jail term in his fraud case, for which he received a sentence of five years and nine months. Lai can appeal his case.

...

Hong Konger-Canadian groups across Canada — including in Vancouver, Saskatchewan, Toronto and Montreal — have also denounced the sentencing of Lai, calling it "draconian."

In a joint statement, the groups said keeping an "elderly prisoner" who is diabetic and has already spent much of his 1,800 days in custody in solitary confinement is "cruel," "degrading" and a "violation of international human rights."

Lai, a fierce critic of Beijing, founded Apple Daily, a pro-democracy newspaper in Hong Kong that ran for 26 years until it was shut down in 2021. He also owns several hotels in the Niagara Region.

...

"Niagara-on-the-Lake was very much his home in Canada," said Lepp.

She added that the small town's community is tight knit and always asks about Lai.

"No doubt with the news last night ... that it will be on all of our local newspapers, and we will receive a lot of messages about it. It's a wonderful community who loves my uncle and our family deeply."

...

• The Indo-Pacific is Canada’s second-largest regional merchandise export market, after the United States, with annual two-way merchandise trade valued at $262 billion in 2024.

• Singapore is Canada’s largest source of foreign direct investment (FDI) from Southeast Asia. In 2024, FDI from Singapore to Canada totalled $7.8 billion and Canadian direct investment in Singapore totalled $22 billion.

• In 2024, Canada-Singapore merchandise trade totalled $3.7 billion, up from $3.2 billion in 2023. In 2024, Canada’s merchandise exports to Singapore were valued at $2.2 billion, and its merchandise imports from Singapore at $1.5 billion.

• Vietnam is Canada’s largest merchandise trading partner in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations region. In 2024, Canada-Vietnam merchandise trade totalled $15.7 billion, up from $14 billion in 2023.

The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership has been in force in Vietnam since January 2019.

Ottawa has started to make payments for key components for 14 additional U.S.-built F-35s, even as the Carney government has been reviewing future fighter-jet purchases in the context of trade tensions with Washington, sources have told CBC News.

The money for these 14 aircraft is in addition to the contract for a first order of 16 F-35s, which will start being delivered to the Canadian Armed Forces at the end of the year.

According to sources, the new expenses are related to the purchase of so-called “long-lead items,” which are parts that must be ordered well in advance of the delivery of a fully assembled aircraft.

Canada had to make these expenditures to maintain its place in the long-term delivery schedule and avoid being replaced by other buyers in the queue, sources said.

Some bottles of MAR-Amlodipine could mistakenly contain midodrine

Kleptocrat Party of Canada surprised when wealthy party members carefully selected for their high likelihood to vote for Dollar Store Trump surprised when the sticky fingered assholes steal everything in sight.