The Pulse: Feb. 5, 2021

Alberta is pressing ahead with reopening plans on Feb. 8, which will allow limited in-person dining at pubs and restaurants and one-on-one training at fitness centres, but owners are being warned there are no guarantees against future lockdowns. 

"If the variants take over, we might have to go back to a harder policy than early December," Premier Jason Kenney told a Facebook live audience Feb. 3.

That would be tough news for a group representing almost 200 Alberta gyms and fitness studios, which expects half will not survive another two months under the new limits. The newly formed group argues there were four million workouts in the province at facilities between June and November with only 147 COVID-19 cases. "But as it relates to fitness, we feel Stage 1 has missed the mark on a number of areas by simply limiting access to private training sessions," Scott Wildeman, of the Fitness Industry Council of Canada, told CBC News.

Also on the sidelines are event organizers. The Weeknd has postponed an Edmonton concert until 2022 but operators of Rogers Place are hopeful some of the 34 concerts booked for the facility this year will go ahead. “We are working on comprehensive health protocols to ensure we can host events safely at Rogers Place in the future,” Oilers Entertainment Group spokesperson Tim Shipton told the Edmonton Journal.

• Dr. Deena Hinshaw said COVID-19 variants are being found in "additional locations" at a news conference on Feb. 4. Eleven more confirmed cases were announced.
• Showbie announced Feb. 4 it raised an additional $7.5 million in a Series A funding, bringing the total for the round to $12.5 million, for its tools to assign, collect, and review student work that are used in over 135 countries.
• Get ready for some chilly weather. A polar vortex will bring some of the coldest temperatures we've seen this year to Edmonton this weekend.
• CBC Edmonton compiled all of the mayoral candidates in the municipal election so far.
• Forty local hockey players are trying to break the record for the world's longest hockey game in support of "a clinical trial for a precision cancer drug discovered by University of Alberta cell biologist Luc Berthiaume."

Mayor Don Iveson plans to ask the federal government for more housing and transit funds at a meeting with senior government officials next week.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities Big City Mayors' Caucus is meeting from Feb. 8-12 to discuss the upcoming federal budget with the provincial and federal governments. Ahead of the meeting, the federation put together a list of priorities which include funds for supportive and social housing, rent subsidies, green infrastructure, and doubling the gas tax fund, which is a major funding mechanism for cities' infrastructure.

Iveson, the chair of the caucus, said one of his top priorities heading into the meeting is expanding the rapid housing initiative.

"We're going to be pressing very hard for more housing dollars," he said. "We've shown that we can rapidly mobilize on delivering housing through the federal government's rapid housing initiative. The first billion dollars is going out the door, we've got units under construction, and we're ready if more funding comes."

Surgery 101 is one of Edmonton's great podcast success stories, garnering millions of downloads and educating med students all over the world. Hosted by Dr. Jonathan White, who co-founded the podcast with Dr. Parveen Boora at the University of Alberta in 2008, this series is an outstanding example of the power of the medium to transfer knowledge.

"If I publish an academic scientific paper, I bet you a hundred people will read the title in the first year after publication. Maybe 50 people will read the abstract, 20 people will get the paper and five people will make it to the end of the paper. One or two people will get the point and change something based on the paper," White told University Affairs in 2017. "If I publish a podcast, I get 10,000 downloads in the first couple of weeks. Tell me again why I’m publishing papers when I can reach so many other people through podcasts?”

Most of the episodes are very instructional in nature, such as this one on chronic pancreatitis. But Surgery 101 has had a lot of fun over the years, conveying some lessons with the help of Lego, Muppets, and Star Trek.

Recommended for all listeners, regardless of whether you're an aspiring doctor, is Inclusive Medicine with Dr. Dinesh Palipana. In this special episode, he tells the story of how he became Australia's first quadriplegic ER doctor, and why inclusive medicine is so important. And, as he notes along the way, Surgery 101 was part of his education.