More than 2,000 wild species face a high risk of being wiped out in Canada, report warns

Story by Peter Zimonjic • Yesterday CBC

A newly released report on the status of wild species in Canada has cataloged more species than any previous report — over 50,000 — and warns that more than 2,000 of them face a high risk of being wiped out in the wild.

The Wild Species 2020 report, compiled by researchers working for the federal, provincial and territorial governments, says it has delivered "the most complete understanding we have ever had on the status and distribution of wild species in Canada."

"A crucial step in preventing species loss is to identify which species exist, where they are found, and their status. That's why this national assessment, conducted every five years, is so essential," said Terry Duguid, parliamentary secretary to Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, in a media statement.

"You can't do that without a solid baseline of knowledge. Knowledge is power."

The report — the fifth in a series published every five years since 2000 — includes data on the status of 50,534 of Canada's 80,000 known species, up from the 29,848 species covered in the 2015 report. The first report in 2000 covered just 1,670 species.

The authors of the report say they were able to record information on 63 per cent of Canada's wild species through the collaboration of hundreds of scientists working across the country for five years.

Of the species contained in the report, 47,314 are indigenous to Canada, while 3,220 are "exotic" species introduced through human activity.

"Among the 3,220 exotic species identified, the taxonomic groups with the highest number of exotic species were the vascular plants, beetles, true bugs, and moths and butterflies," the report says.

The report's authors said that more work can be done to determine the impact these exotic species are having on ecosystems across the country.

At-risk species

The report covers about 63 per cent of wild species in Canada — about 75 per cent of plants, 77 per cent of fungi and 29 per cent of microscopic wild species.

The three provinces with the most wild species are Ontario at 25,776, British Columbia at 24,540 and Quebec at 21,933.

Related video: Thousands of wild species are at risk of extinction: report
Duration 1:53
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20 per cent of species in Canada at risk of extinction: report


The report identified 2,253 species facing the highest risk of elimination in Canada. They include beetles, moths, butterflies and species such as macrofungi and lichens.

The report says that of those 2,253 species, 105 are only found in Canada — meaning that their survival as a species is in peril.

"The number of species that may be at risk identified in the Wild Species reports has continuously increased largely due to the increased number of species included," the report said.

The report says that about one in five wild species in Canada face some risk of extirpation — of elimination in the wild in this country.

The report said 873 species are critically imperiled — are at high risk of being eliminated in the wild — another 1,245 fall under the slightly less severe category of imperiled, while 2,765 species are considered vulnerable, at moderate risk of being wiped out in the wild.


The North Pacific right whale, like this one pictured in the Bering Sea in 2017, is one of 24 mammals facing the highest risk of extinction in Canadian waters.© The Associated Press

The authors of the report said 9,562 species can be considered apparently secure, or at a fairly low risk of extirpation, while 10,038 species are considered secure or at a very low risk of extirpation.

The report said that of the species that were ranked to determine their status, 80 per cent were considered secure and 20 per cent faced some risk of being eliminated in the wild.

The report said that another 26,000 species were unrankable due to insufficient data.

On the verge of being wiped out

The report said that of the 223 wild mammal species known to exist in Canada, 24 are considered to be at risk of being wiped out in the wild. Those include the Vancouver Island marmot and the Ogilvie Mountain collared lemming, both of which are endemic to Canada.

Other mammals at risk include the common grey fox, the northern elephant seal, the North Pacific and North Atlantic right whales, the Sei whale and the blue whale.

Of the 696 known species of birds in Canada, 50 are at risk of being wiped out in the wild. They include the whooping crane, the spotted owl, the snowy egret and the sage thrasher.

Of 5,324 species of vascular plants, about 598 are at risk of being wiped out, including the false daisy, the compass plant, the juniper sedge and the California sword fern.

Canada is hosting the UN conference on biodiversity — called COP15 — next week in Montreal. NDP environment critic Laurel Collins said Guilbeault should use the conference as an opportunity to address the "biodiversity crisis."

"New Democrats are urging for a real climate plan that prioritizes ending biodiversity loss and stops all fossil fuel subsidies – while protecting workers and Indigenous communities," Collins said in a media statement.

Montreal Biodiversity COP15 

December 2022

BY ROBERT HUNZIKE

NOVEMBER 28, 2022

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Image by Markus Spiske.

What is it about a bunch of high-ranking people getting together at a Conference of the Parties (COP) at some major metropolitan center with plenty of 4-star and 5-star hotels in order to figure out how to save the planet, but it never works!

For example, the tenth (10^th) meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity was held in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, Japan from October 18-29, 2010. More than 13,000 delegates from around the world. The Aichi targets were designed to help, or in the best of cases, save or revive biodiversity.

Zoom forward twelve years to November 11^th 2022: A news release by Climate Change News announces the upcoming COP15 biodiversity conference scheduled for Montreal December 7-19, 2022: “In the past decade, countries agreed to a ten-year plan called the Aichi targets, aimed at halting biodiversity loss. A UN summary report shows countries failed to meet a single one of those targets.” (Source: UN Nature Pact Nears Its ‘Copenhagen or Paris’ Moment, Climate Change News Nov. 11, 2022)

Thirteen thousand (13,000) delegates specially selected by countries of the world to save biodiversity agreed to save nature. Utter failure ensued.

There’s something happening in the world that’s very strange maybe a curse or something “in the air” that hexes these get-togethers. The truth is: Get-togethers by thousands of well-intentioned people to save the planet time and again fail, not just a little bit, but total utter failure. For example, for more than 30 years climate conferences, COPs, e.g., Paris ’15, have miserably failed. Greenhouse gas emissions set new records by the year, which is going backwards, downhill into a deep climate change abyss. Eventually, the abyss will be so deep, if not already, that it’s impossible to climb back out.

More to the point, at some point in time, likely once biodiversity loss turns horrendous, much worse, maybe when humans start killing 200,000,000 million sharks for fin soup per year rather than the current 100,000,000 or as for climate change/global warming, when the Doomsday Glacier, Thwaites, the world’s widest glacier in West Antarctica crashes, leads to Miami Beach flooding, maybe that’s when the various Conference of the Parties, COPs, will turn dead serious and take drastic measures, which, by then, will be too late but maybe, hopefully, only hopefully, take some the edge off these ongoing disasters, even though the marine ecosystem crashes because of loss of its top predator, and desperately the Army Corp of Engineers scrambles to try to save Miami.

Montreal COP15 December 2022

Climate Change News’ intro to COP15 clearly states: “After a two-year delay and a change of location, the UN biodiversity summit aims to halt nature loss by 2030 and restore ecosystems. It could either be a success like the signing of the Paris Agreement or a dramatic failure like the 2009 climate summit in Copenhagen,” Ibid.

Hmm, well the “signing of Paris” was a success; it’s the follow through, emission reduction targets, that miserably failed.

At COP15 more than 100 nations are expected to meet to agree to “protect 30% of all land and ocean ecosystems by 2030.” So far, the “big-forested countries” China, Brazil, and Indonesia have not accepted invitations to attend.

According to Brian O’Donnell of the advocacy group Campaign for Nature, following two years of online negotiations: “What started as a very good framework has ended up almost all in square brackets… indicating a lack of consensus,” Ibid.

Of concern, even though the original meeting was to be held in China, which is still designated as “presidency of the talks,” China has not officially invited world leaders to the talks, which commence shortly. That very important task has fallen to Elizabeth Maruma Mreman, urging world leaders to attend rather than going to the World Cup. Tough choice to make!

Unfortunately, cynicism, anger, and fatigue are the byproducts of reporting on the various international Conference of the Parties (COPs) to save Planet A. Across the board, the failures of COPs add tons of credibility to the film Don’t Look Up (Netflix, December 2021) winner of the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Original Screenplay.

Don’t Look Up is an apocalyptic political satire about two astronomers played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence that spot an incoming asteroid and try to warn a largely numbed body politic, as party leaders urge their dumbed-down adherents not to look up, a campaign motto. Meanwhile, one of the president’s top funders, who was appointed to head NASA, has no background in astronomy, and stupidly assures, not to worry. The film not only points to the dangers of ignoring science but also targets how badly America has been dumbed down into submissive easy prey for bellicose politicians that care less about social welfare.

The Montreal COP15 most assuredly will be held, speakers will drone on about the necessity of saving Planet A’s basic life-supporting ecosystems, agreements will be touted, hands joined, thumbs up, but when 2030 arrives, well, who knows how bad it’ll be?

Robert Hunziker lives in Los Angeles and can be reached at rlhunziker@gmail.com.

COP15: Will the biodiversity conference meet nature positive ambitions?

NOVEMBER 29, 2022

Next month Montreal in Canada will host the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15). Despite attracting less headlines than its climate change COP-counterparts, COP15 has particular significance as the parties seek to settle a post-2020 global biodiversity framework. This framework will guide the next decade of action on biodiversity.

The lead up to COP15 has been defined by a coordinated campaign for the parties to adopt strong biodiversity targets in the new framework. Recognising the power of ‘net zero’ as a climate change concept, the biodiversity movement is seeking to create a rallying call around ‘nature positive’, reflecting concepts outlined in the Global Goal for Nature:to halt and reverse net nature loss from a baseline of 2020;

by 2030 increase the health, abundance, diversity and resilience of species, populations and ecosystems; and

by 2050, nature has recovered so that ecosystems and nature-based solutions can continue to support future generations.

While many nations have indicated support for protection of biodiversity and nature positive actions, the level of support for specific commitment and action at COP15 is yet to be tested.

SnapshotCOP15 aims to create a strong international framework on biodiversity for the next decade.

There are several campaigns calling for commitment to becoming ‘nature positive’ and protecting 30% of the world’s land and oceans by 2030.

Discourse on nature positive and biodiversity considerations generally acknowledges the interaction of climate change with other environmental concerns, as well as the relevance of human rights to environmental matters.

How did we get here?

The Convention on Biological Diversity (the Convention) emerged from the 1992 Rio Earth Summit and came into force in December 1993. The Convention has three central objectives:the conservation of biological diversity;
the sustainable use of the components of biological diversity; and
the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of genetic resources.

At the 10th COP meeting in Nagoya, Japan, the parties adopted the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity for 2011-2020 (the 2011 Strategic Plan). The overarching aim of the 2011 Strategic Plan was that by ‘2050, biodiversity is valued, conserved, restored and wisely used, maintaining ecosystem services, sustaining a healthy planet and delivering benefits essential for all people’.

Core to the 2011 Strategic Plan were the Aichi Biodiversity Targets. These were 20 individual targets to be achieved by 2020 and covered five strategic goals:addressing the underlying causes of biodiversity loss by mainstreaming biodiversity across government and society;

reducing the direct pressures on biodiversity and promoting sustainable use;
improving the status of biodiversity by safeguarding ecosystems, species and genetic diversity;

enhancing the benefits to all from biodiversity and ecosystem services; and
enhancing implementation through participatory planning, knowledge management and capacity building.

COP15 was originally scheduled to take place in the Chinese city of Kunming in October 2020 and aimed to adopt a fresh strategic plan for the new decade. The Covid-19 pandemic delayed COP15 and in 2021 China hosted an online preliminary conference which adopted the non-binding Kunming Declaration. The first commitment of the declaration is to:

Ensure the development, adoption and implementation of an effective post-2020 global biodiversity framework, that includes provision of the necessary means of implementation, in line with the Convention, and appropriate mechanisms for monitoring, reporting and review, to reverse the current loss of biodiversity and ensure that biodiversity is put on a path to recovery by 2030 at the latest, towards the full realization of the 2050 Vision of “Living in Harmony with Nature”

There are also several state and NGO-led campaigns that are building support for a strong post-2020 biodiversity framework. These largely focus on goals relating to nature positive and specific commitments about conserving land and oceans. These include:The 2030 Nature Compact which was adopted at the June 2021 G7 meeting in Cornwall. This compact records the intention of the parties to ‘halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030’ and to ensure that the world ‘not only become[s] net zero, but also nature positive’.

The Leaders Pledge for Nature was first signed by political leaders at the September 2020 UN Summit on Biodiversity. The pledge calls for biodiversity loss to be halted and reversed with immediate effect. Currently 94 Heads of State and Government, including Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, have endorsed the pledge which explicitly notes the interdependency of the biodiversity and climate change crises.

The Non-State Actors Call to Action has been signed by over 340 organisations and seeks the inclusion of a ‘nature positive mission’ in the post-2020 framework that would ‘reverse biodiversity loss and improve the state of nature by 2030, against a 2020 baseline’.
The Campaign for Nature calls for world leaders to adopt a ‘30×30’ target at COP15. This would require the protection of 30% of the planet’s land and oceans by 2030.

What do we expect?

There is significant momentum towards a strong post-2020 biodiversity framework. The draft text of the framework (the Draft Framework) has been published and still includes many alternatives to be debated by the parties. It remains unclear whether the parties will be able to cement the strongest nature positive and conservation targets in the final text. Whatever the outcome at COP15 there are already clear trends emerging.

The Australian Government is taking action even before the post-2020 framework is agreed. Last month the Government published its 2022-2023 Threatened Species Action Plan which aims to prevent any new extinctions in Australia. It specifically commits to conserve more than 30% of Australia’s land mass and oceans by 2030.

We expect that whatever form the post-2020 Biodiversity Convention framework takes, it will increase pressure on business to act on biodiversity protection and better monitor and report on progress. The Draft Framework includes target 15 which, among the various alternatives, seeks to require business to assess, monitor, and disclose regular evaluations and accept responsibility for dependencies and impacts on biodiversity and human rights (including on the rights of mother earth). It also calls for business to reduce negative impacts on nature by half, increase positive impacts, and ensure legal responsibility, including redress for damage. We expect that these requirements, even if they are not incorporated into the international framework, will become best practice expectations for firms as the focus on nature increases.

Governance tools are increasingly seeking to assist companies to consistently and efficiently address climate and broader environmental risks and impacts. For example, the Taskforce on Climate-related Financial Disclosures established in 2015 has now been joined by the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures. This new taskforce was set up in 2020 and recognises that US $44 trillion of economic value generation is moderately or highly dependent on nature. The TNFD reporting framework builds from the TCFD concepts and framework and is expected to be finalised in September 2023.

We will monitor the outcomes at COP15 and provide a further update in due course.

By Heidi Asten, Melanie Debenham, Kathryn Pacey, Peter Briggs, 

with Harrison Jones 

AUSTRALIAN LAW FIRM

OPPORTUNIST SILVER LINING

How a corrupt Dominican senator is blocking a Canadian gold mine

Story by Tom Blackwell • National Post

The Canadian mining company Goldquest had just enough money left in 2012 to sink two more boreholes in the southwestern hills of the Dominican Republic. If they turned up nothing, exhaustive exploration efforts would be for naught, similar to the vast majority of such searches worldwide.


Felix Bautista official photo.

Then, on number 14 of 15 holes, the team hit paydirt, literally. The core removed by the drilling pointed to a rich deposit of gold and copper, the estimate later being that it could deliver up to three million ounces of gold alone — about $5 billion worth.

By late 2015, the company had completed its feasibility study, including a plan Goldquest thought would temper any potential environmental concerns, and applied for an operational permit. That would allow it to move to the next stage — an environmental and social-impact assessment that was still no guarantee the mine could actually be built.

Decisions for or against such permits typically come within a few months in Canada.

But seven years and $44 million in investment later, the firm is still waiting for an answer. Two consecutive Dominican presidents have let the application languish on their desks as a vocal protest movement led by environmentalists and politicians turn the mine into a partisan hot potato — before a shovelful of dirt is excavated.

The most prominent face of that protest is the senator for San Juan province, Felix Bautista, once named among the most corrupt individuals in the world and sanctioned under the U.S. Magnitsky law for, among other things, allegedly ripping off Haiti’s earthquake recovery efforts.

He led a protest march against the proposed mine just last month, with another local leader telling the crowd “that Canadian company, Goldquest … is an enemy of this society .”

There’s certainly no shortage of horror stories about Canadian mining corporations in developing countries. But Goldquest argues that its opposition is built on lies — primarily that the company will use cyanide to process the extracted minerals and draw water from a local river, both of which it has stressed repeatedly will not happen.

“In my experience, this is totally unprecedented,” Toronto-based chairman Bill Fisher, a veteran of the mining industry in the Dominican Republic and elsewhere, said of the delay. “In terms of this political hold-up … I’ve never seen it before.”

A local supporter of the “Romero” mine, who asked not to be named because of sensitivities around the project, was more blunt.

“It’s a freaking nightmare,” the person said.

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But an environmentalist fighting the project suggests the alleged misinformation about cyanide and taking water from the San Juan River are in essence red herrings.

The chief issue is situating a mine on top of a mountain range, sucking up rainwater that is crucial to sustaining farms and homes in the much-drier valley below — just as climate change makes that precipitation a rarer commodity, says Ariel Zoquier, president of the ecological society of San Juan province.

“Mining activity would reduce agriculture, which has been the province’s economic engine for more than 150 years, generating more than 28,000 jobs and some 1.7 billion pesos a year,” he said in an interview by text. “The Romero project contemplates about 800 jobs and a durability of 7 years.”

As for Bautista and Manuel Matos — another mine critic and the senator’s rival candidate in the last election — they are just two among countless opponents, said Zoquier.

Related video: Why has Canada ordered Chinese firms to divest from the country’s mining companies?

Duration 3:05   View on Watch

The National Post asked the Dominican embassy in Ottawa about the delay repeatedly, starting 10 days ago, but the mission had not offered comment by deadline.

There’s no question that environmental concerns about mining — gold mining specifically — can be very real, including in the Dominican Republic.

The country is home to Latin America’s largest gold mine, Pueblo Viejo , which leached acid into local waterways during an environmentally disastrous period under local ownership from 1975 to 1999. Photographs show rivers tinted an unnatural reddish colour with the pollution.

Canada’s Barrick bought it in 2006 and has spent millions on remediation, boasting that water quality in the area has improved dramatically. But opponents still blast its stewardship of the site, and a $1.3-billion plan to expand the open-pit mine has faced stiff resistance, including from a group of 44 i nternational NGOs who wrote to Dominican officials recently.

For its Romero project in the Central Cordillera geological region, Goldquest developed a plan that seemed to anticipate at least some of the environmental fears.

Cyanide diluted with huge amounts of water is often used to separate gold from the ore extracted from mines, creating potential hazards to drinking water, ecology and farming. Goldquest opted instead for a physical method of isolating the gold that is more costly, but less risky.

The need for water was massively reduced and it plans to rely on rain that would be funnelled into two ponds, the water recycled over the course of the project, needing to be replenished only because of evaporation. The mine would not touch the nearby San Juan River, Goldquest says.

Lastly, it would be underground, not the type of open pit mine that can scar a landscape and feed opposition.

“The design was a good design, it was the right one,” insists engineer Robert Crowley, who was Goldquest’s social and corporate responsibility lead but now heads the RWC Technologies consulting company. “They made a decision to make less money for a better environment.”

The company has also promised to pay for reforestation of local hillsides stripped largely bare by agriculture — and says tax revenue and salaries would effectively double San Juan province’s GDP. The Dominican Republic’s per-capita wealth is one-sixth of Canada’s.

The Dominican mines ministry recommended it receive an exploitation permit that would pave the way for the environmental and social impact assessment. But the president must also sign off, and that’s where the roadblocks have built up.

The previous holder of the top post, Danilo Medina, refused to make a decision before the 2020 election, despite entreaties from Canadian, U.S. and Swiss ambassadors, representing investors from each country, says Fisher.

When he took power in 2020, current President Luis Abinader started the process all over again, with the mines ministry once more recommending he issue Goldquest a permit. But still, nothing has happened.

Meanwhile, the opposition seems to have built up steam, spearheaded now by Bautista, who alleges that cyanide will, in fact, be used.

The merits of the cause aside, the senator does not exactly give the opposition a blemish-free face.

Transparency International named him as one of the world’s 15 most corrupt individuals or groups in a 2014 report. Dominican prosecutors accused Bautista of using a previous position as head of the country’s public works department to award contracts to 35 of his own companies, only for the case to be thrown out by a judge from the same party. Then in 2018, the U.S. imposed sanctions against him under its Magnitsky law, designed to penalize foreign figures guilty of corruption or human-rights abuses. It cited allegations Bautista used connections and bribes to win reconstruction contracts in neighbouring Haiti, receiving $10 million for one project that was never finished.

Goldquest and its supporters are skeptical of Bautista’s motives around their protest. Crowley, who has lived in the Dominican Republic for 40 years, believes he and other local politicians see the proposed mine as a hot-button issue they can exploit to win votes, vowing to fight off the “big, bad” Canadians.

“Mining is unfortunately around globe the lowest-hanging pinata that a person running for office can have,” he said. “A five-year-old can hit it and get the candy out of it.”

Bautista could not be reached for comment.

Zoquier said it doesn’t matter what’s driving the politicians. Located 1,300 metres above sea level, he says, the mine would consume runoff from the rains that are crucial to agricultural land below, as climate change makes precipitation less plentiful.

Luis Carvajal, a biology professor at the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo, conceded to a Dominican news outlet recently that the Goldquest plan would make it relatively safe as such projects go. But he still opposes it, saying previously that green-lighting Romero and other proposed mines in the region would be “opening doors to disaster .”

With another election two years away, it all means Abinader may be hesitant to further stir the pot in San Juan by giving the mine a permit, said Crowley.

Goldquest says it would just like a decision — thumbs up or down. Ten years after that penultimate bore hole came back golden, Fisher is getting inpatient, but isn’t ready to give up.

“The problem is this deposit is so sweet — it’s a beautiful deposit,” he says. “So we’re sticking with it because we’re very proud of it, of our geologists — Dominican geologists — who found it. It’s something the country should be proud of, too.”

CHINA FIRE SALE
RBC raises competition concerns as it strikes deal to buy HSBC Canada for $13.5B

Tuesday 29, 11, 2022

TORONTO — Royal Bank of Canada has struck a deal to pay $13.5 billion in cash to swallow up HSBC Bank Canada, the seventh largest bank in the country by assets and — since the Big Six banks are largely untouchable — the biggest takeover prize around.


RBC raises competition concerns as it strikes deal to buy HSBC Canada for $13.5B© Provided by The Canadian Press

The deal means one less competitor in an already concentrated market, but chief executive Dave McKay said that while it's a big win for the bank, at less than two per cent of market share he doesn't see taking over HSBC Canada as negatively affecting competition.

"It doesn't change any of the market structure," said McKay on a conference call.

"We operate in a hugely competitive banking sector."

The takeover, which would see RBC absorb HSBC Canada's 800,000 clients, 4,200 employees, 130 branches and $130 billion in assets, will need approval from the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, the Competition Bureau, and the Ministry of Finance.

The Department of Finance issued a statement Tuesday saying that its review may take into account the rights and interests of consumers and business customers, the impact of the transaction on the level of competition, and its effects on the stability of the financial sector.

While it's a minor player, the loss of HSBC Canada could have some effect on consumer choice, said Robert Clark, an economics professor at Queen's University.

“They're kind of a competitive force in the market, and so they could be exerting pressure on the rates that people get with other lenders."

He said that past bank mergers going back to the 1990s led to some effect on choice in some local markets, but that the market has changed considerably since then with the growth of online banking.

RBC is aiming for cost savings of about $740 million for 2024, or about 55 per cent of HSBC Canada's current expense base, through a combination of integrating technology, potential job cuts and branch closures.

The reduction of branches could still have an effect on consumers, especially older Canadians, who still avoid online banking, said Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch.

“Further concentration in an already very concentrated oligopoly market is very likely to hurt financial consumers with higher prices and interest rates.”

He said he would like to see RBC release data on its lending practices to minorities, low-income clients and small businesses, as banks have to do in the U.S., and for the federal government to use the data as part of its review of the suitability of the deal.

"Why would you allow a bank that serves people poorly to get bigger?"

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh also raised concerns about the deal, saying in a statement that the deal is an opportunity for RBC to make more money while hardworking people can't get ahead.

"Today's news of the potential merger of two large banks is only going to decrease the options for families in Canada and put more money into the pockets of big bank executives."

McKay said the deal will create compelling value for shareholders, but also clients and communities.

"This is good for Canada. This is good for taxpayers in Canada who will receive a lot more tax revenue. This is good for shareholders, which are largely pension funds, and that's average Canadian pension funds."

He said that while the deal could lead to job cuts, the bank does have about 6,000 open positions and it's too soon to say how many will end up staying on.

"Our hope is to accommodate the vast majority of the players, there may be some individuals who choose not to be part of this.”

Overall, the deal gives RBC a chance to add clients in the commercial side, as well to a wealthy client base and to increase exposure to the growing number of immigrants coming to Canada.

"It's a unique, once in a generation opportunity to leverage all the investments we've already made in building a world-class retail and commercial bank," said McKay.

"That we're bringing in, first and foremost, commercial banking capability, globally connected clients, trade finance and multi-currency accounts, and preferential access to the next generation of clients."

Analysts said the deal, which while a higher dollar value than expected, is still compelling.

"We believe that this is an excellent transaction for (RBC) and should garner strong accretions to both earnings and profitability," said Barclays analyst John Aiken.

"While we believe that the deal will ultimately be approved, there is a risk that it may not ultimately be consummated in its current form."

The last time Canada's banking industry saw a deal of this scale was TD Bank Group's acquisition of Canada Trust in 1999 for about $8 billion, which when adjusted for inflation is the equivalent of about $13.1 billion.

TD made the deal after the federal government blocked proposed mergers between RBC and Bank of Montreal as well as between TD and CIBC in 1998, which established a convention that mergers between the Big Five banks would not be allowed to go ahead.

RBC said it expects the deal to close late in 2023, subject to closing conditions and regulatory approval.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 29, 2022.

Companies in this story: (TSX:RY)

Ian Bickis, The Canadian Press

The disturbing links between climate change and modern-day slavery

Opinion by Gary Haugen, opinion contributor • Tuesday - The Hill

On Sept. 12, a disturbing new report by the International Labour Organization (ILO), Walk Free and International Organization for Migration (IOM) revealed that the number of people in modern slavery has risen by approximately 10 million since 2016. Fifty million women, children and men are exploited through forms of slavery like forced labor and sex trafficking on any given day.



The report pointed to climate change as a significant contributing factor to the world’s growing slavery epidemic.

In 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted that the greatest impact of climate change could be on human migration, with millions displaced by erosion, flooding and food system disruptions. Now, forecasts from the World Bank warn of more than 200 million environmental migrants by 2050.

International Justice Mission (IJM), a global organization that protects people in poverty from violence, observed this connection in South Asia where we combat forced labor slavery. The IJM casework data indicated that 78 percent of rescued forced laborers had come from regions where impacts from climate change had placed their fundamental livelihoods at risk.

Additionally, IJM finds that in places where people profit from enslaving and exploiting human beings with next-to-no risk of legal sanction, the same offenders often also profit from exploiting and destroying the natural environment without risk of punitive action. Slavery and environmental destruction flourish where criminal impunity prevails and legal protection for both people and the environment is lacking.

IJM’s 25 years of experience combatting violent crimes and a growing body of outside research tell a brutal story about the connection between the wanton destruction of the environment and the exploitation of people.

The illegal logging industry in Brazil is a powerful example of the way ineffective regulations and an absence of law enforcement enable the cycle of human exploitation and environmental degradation. On Sept. 4, a front-page report in the Washington Post highlighted failures of law enforcement and government intervention to address deforestation in the Amazon. On Sept. 28, a report released by the Department of Labor found Brazilian timber among the list of goods produced with slave labor. And the Department of State’s 2022 Trafficking in Persons Report, released in July, noted that while Brazilian authorities made efforts to reduce the demand for forced labor, “the inadequate criminalization of these crimes hindered efforts to combat labor trafficking.”

IJM has seen similar law enforcement failures in the fishing industry in Southeast Asia, where forced labor and illegal overfishing are pervasive. In the palm oil and cocoa industries of West Africa, the scourge of forced labor and illegal deforestation also thrive in the absence of meaningful criminal sanctions. Modern slavery and environmental destruction remain largely risk-free endeavors for offenders, who stand to make a lot of money from exploitative practices.

At the same time — we now know what stops this high-profit, low-risk exploitation. In multiple projects around the world, IJM has worked with local authorities to strengthen justice systems so they better protect their most vulnerable citizens — and the data is clear. Potential criminals are decisively deterred if there is a meaningful threat of going to jail for operating these exploitative enterprises. This deterrence is not only a sign of an effective justice system, but it is also the core of IJM’s model. We have seen it prove effective in reducing illegal exploitation by up to 86 percent in multiple jurisdictions around the world.

It always made sense that slavery and environmental destruction would thrive if there were massive profits to be made with virtually no risk of punishment. And now for slavery, we have proof of the opposite — that slavery enterprises collapse when there are effective and sustained legal actions taken against the perpetrators. Likewise, we can expect that illicit enterprises of environmental destruction will be dramatically reduced when justice systems are finally strengthened to impose swift and reliable criminal penalties.

In either case, for the pragmatic and profit-focused criminals, the decisive factor is not the mere existence of laws and regulations — it’s whether the justice system has the strength and will to enforce them. The exploiters of humans and the environment always have their eye on the risks of legal accountability. Now is the time for those who want to end these crimes to develop the same disciplined focus.

Gary Haugen is the founder and CEO of International Justice Mission, a global organization that partners with local authorities in 29 program offices in 17 countries to combat slavery, violence against women and children, and other forms of abuse against people who are poor.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M
Interpol confirms red notice for Angolan billionaire Isabel dos Santos

Story by Reuters • Yesterday .

LISBON (Reuters) - Global police agency Interpol confirmed on Wednesday it had issued a red notice for Angolan billionaire Isabel dos Santos, daughter of the country's former president, asking global law enforcement authorities to locate and provisionally arrest her.


Isabel Dos Santos, daughter of Angola’s former President and Africa's richest woman, sits for a portrait during a Reuters interview in London, Britain© Thomson Reuters

Dos Santos, who has repeatedly denied wrongdoing, has faced corruption accusations for years, including allegations by Angola in 2020 that she and her husband had steered $1 billion in state funds to companies in which they held stakes during her father's presidency, including from oil giant Sonangol.

Portugal's Lusa news agency reported on Nov. 18 that Interpol had issued an international arrest warrant for dos Santos. But Interpol told Reuters it had issued a red notice instead at the request of Angolan authorities.

It explained that a red notice was "not an international arrest warrant" but a "request to law enforcement worldwide to locate and provisionally arrest a person pending extradition, surrender, or similar legal action".

A source close to dos Santos said on Nov. 19 that she had yet to be notified by Interpol. A spokesperson for dos Santos did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment.

According to Lusa, an official document related to the request made to Interpol mentions that dos Santos is often in Portugal, Britain and the United Arab Emirates.

The same document cited by Lusa said dos Santos, 49, was wanted for various crimes, including alleged embezzlement, fraud, influence peddling and money laundering.

Dos Santos has given interviews recently, telling CNN Portugal on Tuesday the courts in Angola were not independent" and judges there were "used to fulfil a political agenda".

(Reporting by Catarina Demony and Patricia Rua; editing by Aislinn Laing and Mark Heinrich)

Opinion: Religion needs to be on Canada's census

Opinion by Joseph Wiebe • Tuesday

On Oct. 26, Statistics Canada released another set of data from the 2021 census which included information on immigration, ethnocultural and religious diversity, and migration. Many have been eagerly awaiting this release, especially those working in the field of religion because the question of religious identity is still only asked every decade in Canada.


University of Alberta students and staff walk through the HUB building, in Edmonton Wednesday Feb. 8, 2017. New census data shows Edmonton among Canada's fastest-growing cities.© Provided by Edmonton Journal

Not only has the available data been outdated by 10 years, some Canadians forget that the 2011 census was erroneously made voluntary under the Harper government.

The skewing of the picture that resulted from having only 68.6 per cent of Canadians turning in the long-form National Household Survey that year is well-documented (and lamented) by policymakers in labour, health, and other fields where a clear data picture is crucial. The choice to go voluntary by Harper’s government led to the resignation of then-head of Stats Canada, Munir Sheikh , who emphasized that the voluntary survey could never replace a mandatory one.

While the move away from compulsory data collection on the census was reversed by the Trudeau government in 2015, the 2011 issue has continued to be a burden for scholars of religion and social policy-makers. A secondary policy of Statistics Canada is to only ask about religious identity every decade, leading to long gaps between particular demographic questions; and this has huge implications on both our shared society and how we understand it.

We currently live in a world where religion and its intersections with public life dominate headlines and have a huge impact on peoples’ lives. In Canada, we have pressing matters of religious freedom like Bill 21 in Quebec, immigration and migrant identities on the topic of integration, and the problems of religious discrimination, hatred, and even violence against religious minorities.

Related video: African students call out racist immigration system in Canada

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Let’s not forget that the murder of the Afzaal family in London, Ont., was merely 18 months ago. As political rhetoric here and with our neighbours becomes increasingly divided, oftentimes, claims of racial and religious superiority are used to justify discriminatory rhetoric and policies. Religious data helps us better understand the diversity in Canada and to counter narratives of homogeneity in populist discourses.

And the stats show a telling picture : the majority of Canada’s population remains Christian; however, significant shifts have also occurred. Not only is the Christian share of Canada decreasing, it’s not being lost to the groups that hate-mongers would normally target as the reason.

It is true that Muslim populations in Canada have more than doubled since 2001 (up to 4.9 per cent from 2.0), along with a similar doubling among Hindus and Sikhs; however, in the past 20 years alone, the proportion of the population claiming no religious affiliation has more than doubled and now encompasses one in three Canadians. And immigrants aren’t the cause of this shift either, as some would claim, given that the vast majority of immigrants do have some religion coming into Canada. Rather, it is believed that many who previously reported a religion, now, no longer do.

Indeed, these changes are fascinating and there are numerous other data points for researchers to now explore, with religion as the primary lens. For most scholars of religion, there is little of the artificial separation between religion and public life that so many proclaim, with different religious beliefs and ways of life being carried by the majority of the country’s population, and still others arguing that even secular ways of life still constitute a kind of religiosity with inherited assumptions, myths, and traditions.

The point is that religion has a major impact on society, especially in the diverse religioscape that is Canada and it should not be relegated to the sidelines of our data picture. This is especially true when we consider how central religions often are to the identities of those adhering to them, and how politicians and pundits weaponize that with dire social consequences. Religion is not just “part” of the overall picture; it’s inextricable from the whole of it.

With the release of this critically important data, which does help us understand Canada’s diversity in deeper ways, Stats Canada clearly noted that information on the religion of the population in Canada informs government, organizations, researchers, and other key policymakers for the development of programs, services, laws, religious-building zoning, and other key quality of life factors. With this in mind, our hope is that Canada can include this important question on every census going forward.

Joseph Wiebe is associate professor of Religion and Ecology at the University of Alberta Augustana, and the interim director of the Chester Ronning Center for the Study of Religion and Public Life.

Calls grow to disestablish Church of England as Christians become minority

Story by Robert Booth, Pamela Duncan and Carmen Aguilar García • Tuesday

THE GUARDIAN

Census results revealing that England is no longer a majority-Christian country have sparked calls for an end to the church’s role in parliament and schools, while Leicester and Birmingham became the first UK cities with “minority majorities”.

For the first time in a census, less than half of the population of England and Wales – 27.5 million people – described themselves as “Christian”, 5.5 million fewer than in 2011. It triggered calls for urgent reform of laws requiring Christian teaching and worship in schools and Church of England bishops to sit in the House of Lords.

Across England and Wales, the Muslim population grew from 2.7 million people in 2011 to 3.9 million in 2021. While 46.2% of people said they were Christian, 37.2% said they had no religion – equivalent to 22 million people. If current trends continue, more people will have no religion than Christianity within a decade.

Many of the biggest falls in Christianity were in parts of the north of England, where only a decade ago seven out of 10 people said they were Christian, but now only half do.

The Office for National Statistics 2021 census data on ethnicity, religion and language published on Tuesday also revealed that:

59.1% of the people of Leicester and 51.4% of the people of Birmingham are now from ethnic minority groups.

81.7% of the population of England and Wales is now white, including non-British, down from 86% in 2011.

The ethnic minority population increased from 14% in 2011 to 18.3%. Of these, 9.3% of the population is Asian British, up from 7.5%, 4% is Black, Black British, Black Welsh, Caribbean-African and African, up from 3.3%, and 5% are from mixed and other ethnicities.

Romanian is the fastest-rising language, with 472,000 people now describing the romance language as their main tongue. Polish is the most common main language aside from English or Welsh.

The fastest-rising religious identity is Shamanism.

The ONS census deputy director, Jon Wroth-Smith, said the figures showed “the increasingly multicultural society we live in”, but added that despite the rising ethnic diversity, “nine in 10 people across England and Wales still identify with a UK national identity, with nearly eight in 10 doing so in London”.

The 10-yearly census results heralded a new era of “super-diversity” in some places. Fourteen local authorities recorded more than half of their usual residents as identifying with an ethnic group other than white, with the highest proportion in the London boroughs of Newham, Brent and Redbridge.

Outside London, the highest non-white proportion was in Slough in Berkshire, followed by Leicester, Luton and Birmingham. One in 10 households in England and Wales now contain people of two or more ethnicities, and across England and Wales, the mixed-race population grew by half a million people to 1.7 million, though the rate of increase was slower than over the previous decade.

The plunging figures for Christianity come after King Charles took on the titles Defender of the Faith and supreme governor of the Church of England upon the death of Queen Elizabeth II. They look likely to pose a challenge to how he frames his monarchy, although he has already said he will serve people “whatever may be your background and beliefs”.

The Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, indicated that the Church knows it faces a struggle to arrest the decline, saying it “throws down a challenge to us, not only to trust that God will build his kingdom on Earth, but also to play our part in making Christ known”.

Lynne Cullens, the Bishop of Barking, insisted the church should not feel “defeated”. “We are like the Nike tick,” she said. “We have to go down before we go up. We will evolve into a church more attuned to the worshipping needs of the communities as they are today.”

But secularists and others now want an end to the Church of England’s position as an established church which requires King Charles to make an oath to preserve the Church of England, guarantees Church of England bishops and archbishops 26 seats in the House of Lords, and means state schools can be required to hold Christian worship.

Vernon Bogdanor, professor of government at King’s College London, said the results make the argument for keeping Church of England leaders in the House of Lords “more difficult to justify” and “raises the issue of the disestablishment of the Church of England”.

“Some will argue that there should not be an established church which represents only a minority of the population,” he said. “Others will respond that the archbishops and bishops seek to represent all faiths, bringing a different perspective to the Lords and that the system works​.’”

The National Secular Society’s chief executive, Stephen Evans, said the current status quo was “absurd and unsustainable”, while Prof Linda Woodhead, head of the department of theology and religious studies at King’s College London, said: “The fact that Christianity is no longer the majority religion means policy is out of step with society.”

Dr Scot Peterson, scholar of religion and the state at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, said: “It’s been difficult to defend having an established church since the beginning of the 20th century, but it now becoming a figment of the imagination. The king being the head of the Church of England made sense in 1650, but not in 2022.”

The places with the highest proportion of people saying they had no religion were Caerphilly, Blaenau Gwent and Rhondda Cynon Taf, all in south Wales, and Brighton and Hove and Norwich in England. They were among 11 areas where more than half the population are not religious, including Bristol, Hastings in East Sussex and Ashfield in Nottinghamshire, most of which had relatively low ethnic-minority populations.

The places with the lowest number of non-believers were Harrow, Redbridge and Slough, where close to two-thirds of the populations are from minority ethnic backgrounds.

Shamanism, pagans and wiccans: trends from the England and Wales census


There are more pagans, fewer French speakers and 2.5 million households are of more than one ethnic group

People celebrating the summer solstice, a pagan festival day, at Stonehenge in 2019.

 Photograph: Martin Dalton/Rex/Shutterstock

Robert Booth, Carmen Aguilar García and Pamela Duncan

Tue 29 Nov 2022 THE GUARDIAN


1) Shamanism is on the rise

Shamanism is expanding faster than any other religion, with the number of people saying they practise it rising from 650 in 2011 to 8,000 in 2021 in England and Wales. The result might prove controversial, as the Shamanism UK website asserts “it is not a religion, more an authentic expression of mankind’s spirituality”.

2) Pagans and wiccans are becoming more established


England and Wales now minority Christian countries, census reveals

More established are pagans, who number 74,000 people (up from 57,000 in 2011) and who gather most in Ceredigion, Cornwall and Somerset, and wiccans, who number 13,000. Wicca is sometimes described as a witchcraft tradition whose roots lie in pre-Christian religious traditions, folklore, folk witchcraft and ritual magic.

3) Romanian is the fastest growing language

“Bine ati venit!” Welcome to the fastest growing language in England and Wales: Romanian. 472,000 people now describe the romance language as their main tongue – up from 68,000 in 2011. The centre of the Romanian-speaking population is Harrow in north-west London.

4) There are more mixed ethnicity households

The census recorded that 2.5 million households consisted of members identifying with two or more different ethnic groups – an increase of half a million on 2011. Among individuals identifying as mixed ethnicity the largest increase was among those identifying as “other mixed or multiple ethnic groups” rather than white and black, or white and Asian.

5) Cornish people are feeling more Cornish

In Cornwall 14% of the population (80,000 people) selected only a “Cornish” identity – an increase from 9.9%, or 53,000, in 2011.

6) There are fewer French, Gujarati and Bengali speakers

Languages you are less likely to hear as someone’s main tongue in England and Wales are French, reflecting a fall in the number of people identifying their nationality as French (down from 147,000 to 120,000), and Gujarati and Bengali, perhaps suggesting successive generations after earlier migrations from south Asia are speaking those languages less.

7) Polish is most widely spoken after English and Welsh

On the rise, though, is Polish, now the most popular main language after English and Welsh. To have the best chance of hearing it, head to Boston in Lincolnshire, a hotbed of Brexit support in the 2016 referendum, where 5.7% of the population – about 4,000 people – speak Polish as their main language.

The Polish restaurant in Boston, Lincolnshire.

 Photograph: David Sillitoe/The Guardian

8) Manx Gaelic speakers are in single figures

The rarest language in England and Wales is Manx Gaelic, which is spoken as a main language by just eight people, followed by Ulster Scots (16) and Irish Traveller Cant (36). Those worrying about the demise of Cornish can rest a little easier: 10 more people said it was their main language than in 2011 (567 people in 2021) and Yiddish has undergone a mini-revival, up from fewer than 4,000 speakers as a main language to 5,356 over the decade.

9) There was a small rise in numbers of Buddhists

Despite the growth in mindfulness meditation practice over the last decade, the number of people following Buddhism, from which the practice derives, saw just a modest increase of 0.1 percentage points, from 249,000 to 273,000 people identifying as such in England and Wales. The highest concentration of Buddhists was again found in Rushmoor in Hampshire – home to the Aldershot Buddhist Community Centre – where the census counted 4,732, up from 3,092 a decade ago.

10) There are more British Sign Language users

British Sign Language (BSL) was the main language of 22,000 people – an increase of over 6,000 since 2011. The hotspot is Derby, with 400 users, and much of this is likely to be down to the location of the Royal School of the Deaf.

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2022/11/uk-satanism-and-devil-worship-is-on.html

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2022/11/what-does-end-of-christian-era-mean-for.html

DOWN HWY 93

Banff council given extension to decide on emergency response plan in Kootenay National Park

Google map shows location of Highway 93 in Kootenay National Park.

Story by Olivia Condon • Yesterday - Calgary Herald

The Town of Banff will have more time to decide what type of emergency response service — if any — it will offer along Highway 93 S. in Kootenay National Park, after Parks Canada granted an extension on a contract it had previously terminated a year early.

At a Monday meeting, Banff council heard they’ll have until Dec. 31, 2023, to decide if and how the Banff Fire Department will respond to emergencies on the highway when the current contract with Parks Canada ends.

The contract, signed in 2014 between the town and Parks Canada, was set to expire at the end of next year. Earlier this month, Parks notified the town the contract would be terminated a year early, only to walk that back and grant an extension to the original end date.

Banff’s fire chief and protective services director Silvio Adamo told council Monday that before signing the contract in 2014, the department has been providing emergency services along that stretch of highway in partnership with the Town of Invermere since as long as the organization has existed, without any formal agreement or compensation.

In the past nearly nine years, the department has been compensated by the federal government to provide response services for road rescues and medical emergencies, as well as fire and hazardous material incidents.

One option is to enter an agreement with Emergency Management British Columbia (EMBC), Adamo said, adding he has concerns with this choice because of the specific and restrictive nature of EMBC’s response strategy and compensation.

“EMBC will not compensate a municipality or an agency for responding for medical emergencies, hazmat, fires, and the one thing that dictates their compensation is if someone is entrapped or needs extrication out of a vehicle or structure,” he said.

EMBC will pay $360 an hour only if someone needs to be extricated from a vehicle, regardless of how many apparatus the fire department brings to the scene or the time of day.

“When we set the pagers off for our membership during the day, it costs us somewhere between $1,000 to $1,200 to do that, and after the hours of 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. it’s double that,” he said. “So as far as cost recovery, it doesn’t come even close, and again there’s a large gap in what they will compensate for and what we normally respond to in emergencies.”

The Town of Invermere is also concerned about having to pick up the slack if the Banff Fire Department elects not to enter an agreement with EMBC once the contract expires, after which it will have no legal obligation to respond to emergencies in Kootenay National Park.

Adamo said the choice is between moral responsibility and cost.

“Obviously, we always want to do the right thing, that’s the business we’re in is helping people and we want to do the right thing regardless, but we are doing it at the expense of our ratepayers and it will increase that expense as we move forward outside of this contract and if we enter into an EMBC contract,” Adamo said.

Coun. Chip Olver said Monday that the issue is putting the fire department and the town in an uncomfortable situation.

“I’m concerned for the people on that highway when this contract ends, that if their vehicle is squashed enough that they need to be extricated that they will get a certain level of response but for other situations they won’t, and I think it’s a busy highway and it’s unfortunate that this is changing. Really unfortunate,” she said.

The moral effect of the situation is one Mayor Corrie DiManno said she’s relieved council doesn’t have to make right now, but acknowledged it will ultimately have to be made.

“There’s a real sense of a moral obligation to try and do our best to respond to incidents on that section of highway,” DiManno said. “Those could be visitors to Banff, those could be residents of Banff, and that’s where that sense of moral obligation really comes from.”

Further discussions with EMBC and the town of Invermere are in the works before council will hear back from administration to make a final decision no later than the third quarter of 2023.

ocondon@postmedia.com

‘Silent pandemic’: Antimicrobial resistance a growing threat to Canadians, experts say

Story by Teresa Wright • Yesterday 

Jean Lee, a PhD student at Melbourne's Doherty Institute, inspects the superbug Staphylcocus epidermidis on an agar plate in Melbourne on September 4, 2018.

© WILLIAM WEST/AFP via Getty Images

Rachel Sears was only 17 years old when a simple blemish on her face became a terrifying, painful ‘superbug’ overnight.

She had been working as a cashier at a grocery store and it’s there her doctors told her she must have picked up the antibiotic-resistant bacteria, possibly from some cash handled by an infected person.

She likely scratched or simply rubbed the blemish on her forehead - nothing out of the ordinary - and inadvertently infected herself, she said.

Read more:
Superbugs to kill nearly 400,000 Canadians by 2050, report predicts

“I remember thinking, ‘Oh, it has a weird, swelling feeling.’ And I went to bed like nothing,” Sears said, recalling the hours after her shift.

“I woke up the next morning and it was so swollen. It was humongous.”

She immediately went to the hospital where, 12 hours later, physicians determined it was methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and she was placed on intravenous antibiotics, used for infections that are resistant to oral antibiotics.

Sears, now 32, says the experience was “traumatic,” as she was only a teen at the time.

“My mom was like, ‘What's happening? This is my baby.’ These are like big, scary words,” she recalled.

“Then you do some Googling after and you think, 'what if it didn't work? What if antibiotics didn't work? Then what?' Then I'm screwed because they used the most potent antibiotics,” she said.

“So, that was scary.”

Unfortunately, it was not to be her last time contracting an antibiotic-resistant infection.

Read more:
How antibiotic resistance has an impact on future diseases

Sears says she contracted at least two staph infections from routine abrasions, such as cuts from shaving, in the ensuing years. Then, a year after her son was born, she was diagnosed with the intestinal superbug Clostridioides difficile, better known as C. difficile.

Eventually, she turned to help from naturopathic doctor, which she says has resulted in a marked improvement in her health.

“I just can't help but think that it goes back to contracting that first superbug and then those antibiotics,” she said.

The rising threat of so-called superbugs, or antibiotic-resistant infections, is just one of a number of concerns in what some experts say is a dangerous worldwide increase in antimicrobial resistance (AMR) – a phenomenon that occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites no longer respond to antimicrobial agents like antibiotics, fungicides, antiviral agents and parasiticides.

It’s a problem that may not receive regular attention in the public or the media, but concerns about this growing phenomenon have become so prevalent, it is being called a “silent pandemic” that is contributing to millions of deaths every year, according to global infectious diseases specialists.

A large group of researchers looking at the burden of AMR worldwide in 2019 estimated that antimicrobial resistance in bacteria caused an estimated 1.27 million deaths in that year, according to their study, published in The Lancet.

Dr. Susan Poutanen, a medical microbiologist and infectious disease physician at the University Health Network and Sinai Health, says in Canada, an estimated 14,000 deaths every year are associated in some way with antimicrobial resistance.

“This is somewhat of an unrecognized, quiet or silent pandemic,” Poutanen said.

“Every year there's increasing resistance, and yet there's not the same face to the problem as you might have with, say, cancer or with heart attacks and strokes and the amazing public campaigns and awareness (of those health risks).”

This lack of public awareness means not only that Canadians are left in the dark about the threats of AMR, but also that investments and research into solutions are also not getting priority treatment, she added.

Read more:
Antibiotic-resistant ‘superbugs’ killed over 1.2M globally in one year: study

The main driver of antimicrobial resistance is the misuse and overuse of antibiotics, both in human disease management and in industrial agriculture and food production, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

And the COVID-19 pandemic has only exacerbated the problem of overprescription and overuse of antibiotics, experts say.

Early on in the outbreak, many patients admitted to hospitals with SARS-CoV-2 were given antibiotics, even when it was not clear that a bacterial infection was present, Poutanen said.

Antibiotics are not effective against viruses and should only be used in cases of bacterial infections, she noted.

“We know when someone presents with what's most likely a viral illness from the best judgment of a clinician, there's still often a, 'Well, what if? It may not be,' reaction of giving an antimicrobial, even if it's predominantly likely not a bacterial infection,” she said.

“We've certainly learned since some of that data was shared with clinicians that there's very few (COVID-19 patients) that are coming in with a bacterial infection, and that certainly improved some of that empiric choice of using antibacterials.”

But the current surge in respiratory illness across Canada is now also likely sparking “increased use and an overuse” of antibiotics, which only stands to heighten the concerns and prevalence of drug-resistance, she added.

The overuse of antibiotics in Canada is not limited to health care. Producers of major crops like citrus and rice often make heavy use of antimicrobial sprays; antibiotics are often used as growth promoters and given proactively to prevent infection in livestock and antifungals used by the tulip industry and other agriculture crops are also contributing to a growing resistance to fungal infections, says Dr. John Conly, an infectious disease physician and professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Calgary, who has been working in the field of antimicrobial resistance for the last 25 years.

“We're seeing this huge over-usage of antibiotics and we're seeing ever-increasing rates of resistant organisms,” he said.

For example, in Canada, about 26 per cent of infections that occur are resistant to first line antibiotics, he noted. Experts in this field predict this resistance could grow exponentially in the coming years, with some estimates at anywhere from 40 to 100 per cent resistance to first line antibiotics and antifungals by 2050, Conly said.

Read more:
McMaster researchers want Canada to expedite approval of ‘newer’ antibiotics

“That's a major concern.”

That’s why specialists and leaders from around the globe have been increasingly trying to shine a light on this issue, with the help of the WHO.

Last week, the WHO held its third global "high-level ministerial conference on antimicrobial resistance," where a manifesto was created that set three global targets to tackle this challenge.

The targets include: reducing the total amount of antimicrobials used in agrifood systems by at least 30-50 per cent by 2030; ending the use of medically-important antimicrobials for growth promotion in animals; and ensuring a specific category of 48 antibiotics that are affordable, safe and have a low AMR risk (known as ‘access group antibiotics’) represent at least 60 per cent of overall antibiotic consumption in humans by 2030.

Read more:
Drug-resistant superbugs are the other thing keeping researchers up at night

Conly says more rapid diagnostics in clinical settings – to reduce over-testing and preemptive prescription of antibiotics – as well as digital guidelines on the use of antibiotics in health care would also help to curb the progression of antimicrobial resistance.

Ultimately, if more is not done to address this problem, more superbugs will spread more widely, leading to more preventable illness and death in Canada and around the world, he said.

“It's like a tsunami that's emerging, but it's far out to sea and you don't see it,” Conly said. “And then one day it's just suddenly going to emerge and we're going to say, ‘Did we not see this coming?’”