Tens of thousands march for LGBTQ rights at Berlin parade

BERLIN (AP) — Around 65,000 revelers marched for LGBTQ rights at Berlin’s annual Christopher Street Day celebration on Saturday, more than three times as many as expected.

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It was the biggest demonstration in Berlin since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

The parade started with a call from Klaus Lederer, Berlin’s senator for culture, to make the city a “queer-freedom zone” in response to deteriorating safety for gays and lesbians in Hungary and neighboring Poland.

“LGBT-free zones” have been declared in parts of Poland, while Hungary recently passed a law banning the depiction of homosexuality or gender reassignment to minors that has been denounced as discriminatory by human rights groups.

Lederer said the situation in the two EU members “sends shivers down my back.”

The senator also noted that the pandemic had been particularly hard for some gays and lesbians at home as shelters were closed. He said “there is still much work to be done.”

Police spokesman Martin Dams initially told The Associated Press that an estimated 35,000 people were taking part in the parade, but this figure was revised upwards later Saturday. Organizers put the figure at 80,000.

They had been expecting around 20,000 people amid social distancing rules and a ban on alcohol to combat the risk of new coronavirus infections.

There was no parade last year due to the pandemic so many people took advantage of the warm sunny weather and relatively low rate of infections to take part in the last major gathering for Berlin’s Pride month.

Nearby, the United States embassy flew a rainbow flag under the American flag.

The parade was led by five trucks that were spaced apart to give demonstrators more room as they danced their way to techno beats past the city's iconic Brandenburg Gate. Organizers made repeated calls for revelers to put masks on and keep their distance – though it wasn’t always possible due to the sheer number of people.

The celebrations were preceded by an apparent homophobic attack on a male couple in a Berlin subway late Friday. Police said the men were sitting in a train when they were approached by a stranger who insulted them and then punched one of the men several times. Other passengers intervened and he was apprehended after fleeing briefly.

Also Friday, Bishop Christian Stäblein asked during a service at Berlin’s Marienkirche for forgiveness from the LGBTQ community for the suffering caused to them by the evangelical church.

Ciarán Fahey, The Associated Press

5 Protest Organizers on What It’s Like Being at The Forefront of The Black Lives Matter Movement

Jada Jackson 1 day ago

Black Lives Matter Organizers

ELLE Canada spoke with five protest organizers from around the world to understand what it was like to be on the frontlines of this movement.

George Floyd’s murder on May 25, 2020 and the international reckoning that ensued brought the world together to fight for the end of racism, systemic oppression and police brutality. Peaking early the following month, Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests got a total turnout of over 26 million Americans, polls show–the largest civil rights movement in U.S. history–setting off a tsunami of support worldwide. Beyond the protests and people, BLM is about government policies and perspectives, and uprooting structural racism in each and every aspect of society, and these global protests are just the tip of the iceberg towards the long path of equity for the Black community.

ELLE Canada spoke with five protest organizers from around the world to understand what it was like to be at the forefront of this pivotal movement.

© Aima (All Black Lives UK) Black Lives Matter
On how they began planning for the protests

Tatyana (@theythemtaty)

Protest organizer and Mutual Aid Coordinator at the Black trans-led organization Brave Space Alliance

Age:23

Location: Chicago, U.S.

“I’ve planned other events before, nothing like a protest, so I started with how I would normally start planning for any other event. I started by creating a Facebook page with a clear message. Then I reached out to people who could help me, and, in turn, I had people reach out to me offering help. I definitely wouldn’t try planning a protest by myself ever again; it was exhausting and I think it’s better to have local organizations involved uplifting their voices along with independent voices in the community.”

Tatyana

© Brian Cassella Black Lives Matter

Ayana (@yana_yz)

Organizer for Black Lives Matter Kansai and Founder of the Black Creatives Japan collective

Age: 35

Location: Kyoto, Japan

“It started with my friend Sam and her friend putting out a poll on Instagram Stories to see who in Osaka was interested in a march for BLM. After I saw and shared the stories, I contacted them and said I could help get a team of people together. I had never organized such a big event but figured a march meant you needed more than three people to help organize. Sam and her Japanese friend were already in the process of getting a permit from the police, so I decided to make a Facebook group to see how many people would be interested in participating.”

Ayana

© Mike Dinsmore Black Lives Matter

Aima (@asapaima)

Co-founder of All Black Lives UK

Age: 19

Location: London, UK

“Everything started with the murder of George Floyd. The video of his killing at the hands of a white police officer made me so angry and upset. I reached out to Tasha, my co-organizer and told her we needed to do something over here in recognition of what was happening in America to stand with our brothers and sisters in the U.S. I then started thinking about the multiple similarities between the way the police in America and Britain treat Black people. After sending out tweets about a protest, we both got loads of responses of people willing to help us out.”

Aima

© Aima, All Black Lives UK Black Lives Matter

Asiyah (@asiyahgoesleft)

Protest Organizer and Annual Giving Coordinator at the University of Victoria

Age: 24

Location: Victoria, British Columbia

“The simplest answer is that I didn’t begin the process or plan the first protest, Vanessa Simon did. She had the drive to pull it together on Monday, June 1st, 2020, and with the aid of Pamphinette Buisa, they started the momentum here in Victoria B.C. When I joined to form the trio the following evening, my approach was to use my previous event planning skill set to ensure that we made the event accessible and impactful for all. My aim was to ensure that everyone was able to engage.”

Asiyah

© Mike Graeme Black Lives Matter

Fatima, (@e6onyy)

Founder of Occupy the Hood Montreal and experimental R&B artist

Age: 24

Location: Montreal, Canada

“It was following countless incidents of police brutality that had happened in May and June where I could feel the frustration of many of my peers and just a collective sentiment of helplessness. Occupy the Hood was a demonstration in support of my community but also in support of artists like myself whose careers have been put on hold due to the pandemic. The virus is real and contagious but social injustices remain one of the biggest viruses out there.”

Fatima

© Edouard Pierre Black Lives Matter

On what it feels like to be part of the cornerstone of one our generation’s largest movements

Tatyana: “It feels really surreal. It doesn’t really feel like much is changing though. There was a lot of performative allyship going on (e.g. posting a black square on Instagram, painting Black Lives Matter on the road, etc.) and I want to see things change structurally. I knew that white supremacy and white privilege wasn’t going anywhere after a month of protesting but I need to see our leaders put their money where their mouth is.”

Ayana: “I have mixed feelings. I am happy that many have told me they were glad to see me be a part of the march organization, but I was also very nervous and worried about online hate. Throughout the years, I have seen many of my internet and IRL friends being harassed, receiving death threats and even getting doxxed from others online. Though I have received only a handful of hateful comments myself, one of my teammates got a considerable amount as one of their tweets was shared by Naomi Osaka for the march.”

Asiyah: “I can understand why people would see this as the cornerstone of this movement for our generation. However, in the context of Victoria B.C., to say that would be to disregard the actions that Indigenous peoples have taken to reclaim their right to self-determination for decades. To me, the cornerstone was established through the occupation of the Parliament Building in solidarity with the Wetʼsuwetʼen, led by the Indigenous youth earlier in 2020. That gave us the foundation to build off of. That action and this movement has initiated the formation of an unbreakable bond between Indigenous sovereignty and Black liberation.”

Fatima: “It feels great and it’s scary at the same time. I pressure myself to make my people proud by being a good spokesperson for them. I’m honestly surprised that my life has shifted in such a way but I’m confident that I am the right person to advocate for marginalized people. I look forward to turning this into something even bigger and more powerful.”

© Samantha Milligan Black Lives Matter

On why it was important to position the BLM movement globally

Aima: “I think that often we focus on racism against Black people in America because so much of it is now being recorded and shared on social media that it’s harder for the world to ignore. However, there are similar issues in countless countries around the world. Over here, I feel that people think ‘the UK is the least racist, or the most tolerant country’, but I disagree. And even if we are somewhat better off, it doesn’t mean there isn’t any racism here. The treatment of Black people in police custody, the education system, hospitals and job hiring in the UK is terrible and we need to tackle that.”

Ayana: “BLM means Black lives. Black lives are everywhere. It is a global issue. Every country may not have the same exact problems as the U.S., but in my opinion, almost every country has a problem with oppression and discrimination against Black lives. Japan has an issue that is more subtle, but very problematic nonetheless with their mixed Japanese and Black native residents and Black foreign residents. Japanese schools don’t teach anything in depth about Black history or other cultures. Their media is no better. Black people are shown in a very caricature-like manner, which only strengthens the stereotypes about Black people.

Asiyah: “BLM is a global issue because racism is a global problem, and anti-Black racism is a global problem –and that includes you, Canada.”

Fatima: “Having a BLM movement in Montreal is even more fundamental considering we’re in a multicultural city within a province led by a PM that consistently denies systemic racism. If people like me or others that advocate proudly and fearlessly weren’t there, the oppression would be way worse. I still think Black people are being discriminated against worldwide, hence the importance of the movement spreading worldwide.”

© Brooke McGowan Black Lives Matter

On the importance of having BIPOC with various identities and beliefs partake in BLM

Tatyana: “I love seeing people bring that up when we say Black Lives Matter means All Black Lives Matter, specifically Black women and Black trans people. I think that message gets lost and people don’t care about us as much even though we’re fighting just as hard or even harder than the people who don’t care about our lives. I’m also Black and Asian and I know many Black people with intersecting identities whether it’s being Black and another race, Black and queer, Black and trans, etc. I think our voices are so important and need to be highlighted since they are often forgotten.”

Asiyah: “Historically, women have always been powerful agents within any massive, positive, global movement. But the stories of the women that have led such movements, or been instrumental to these changes, have only recently been highlighted. Still, there are those we may never even hear about. Representation is important and when I was younger, I sought the example of strong, outspoken Muslim women as I never saw myself fit the submissive, “oppressed” image that was depicted by western society. I want to be that representation for other Muslim women and girls.”

Occupy The Hood

© Occupy The Hood Occupy the Hood

On what was most surprising about the overall turnout of the protests

Tatyana: “I literally organized the event the day before and was not expecting that big of a turnout. Granted, it was at the height of protests and everyone was going out to march all the time. I think I was also surprised at how smoothly it went and how attentive people were when listening to speakers.”

Ayana: “I was surprised that so many people came. We knew 200 was a very low estimate and one of our teammates was betting on 3000 but I thought that we’d most likely hit 900 attendees. The crowd was really diverse and I was happy to see a lot of mixed kids with their families and Japanese natives.”

Aima: “I think what was surprising was the amount of diversity there. There were people of all different genders, race, ethnicity, age and sexual orientation. This just proved that so many people agree to the fact that Black people globally face injustice and that things need to change.”

Asiyah: “What surprised me most was the number of Black people on Vancouver Island. Growing up in The Bahamas, I am used to a Black majority environment. Here in Victoria however, I am so used to walking in all-white spaces that I was overwhelmed by the number of people who started coming up to the stage. I was also taken aback by how much I had missed that feeling, and how much strength it gives me to be surrounded by my people.”

Fatima: “The unity of each and every participant and how smoothly things unfolded. Despite having our lawyer present at every demonstration, we are always wary of legal implications. I was also surprised at how big and fast the movement grew, it really feels like we touched a lot of people and it was well needed.”

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The post 5 Protest Organizers on What It’s Like Being at The Forefront of The Black Lives Matter Movement appeared first on Elle Canada.

The Essential Role Of Indie Black Bookstores In The Fight For Liberation

Stephanie Long 

During the summer of 2020, when streets were ablaze with fury and protest, and the Black community mourned George Floyd’s murder, something else was also rising: sales of anti-racist books across the country. Data shows the sales of social justice titles skyrocketed after Floyd was killed, and it was independent and Black-owned bookstores in particular that saw increased demand as many sought broader education about race and anti-racism in America.

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Jeannine Cook, who owns Harriett’s Bookshop (named after Harriett Tubman) in Philadelphia, PA — and recently opened its sister store, Ida’s Bookshop (named after Ida B. Wells) in Collingswood, NJ — experienced this increase in demand firsthand. “Before the summer uprisings in 2020, there weren’t a whole lot of celebratory spaces for activists,” says Cook, whose book stores were founded on a commitment to provide a safe space for activism and community building.


The opening of Harriett’s Bookshop in February 2020 filled a necessary void. When it was temporarily forced to close its doors just six weeks after opening due to COVID-19 lockdowns, Cook kept her business alive by focusing on supporting the community during the pandemic. Essentials for Essentials, for example — the shop’s first project after being shut down due to the pandemic — allowed customers to purchase books and send “prescriptions” to doctors and other essential medical workers, in partnership with local hospitals.

“Instead of the doctors giving you a prescription in the traditional sense, community members sent doctors prescriptions telling them to read for an hour or take a 15-minute break every three hours. It was a way for folks to still be in community even though they couldn’t physically connect,” Cook explains. “Doctors would write us back after they got their books and prescriptions and say, ‘OK, now I want to buy a book for the person who bought me this book.’”

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The initiative sparked word-of-mouth for the bookstore, leading to Harriett’s Bookshop hosting three additional rounds of the program and selling out of books each time. “Folks would be upset with me like, ‘I didn’t get to buy a book for somebody else!’ They were upset they didn’t get to play.” That enthusiasm, Cook says, is what kept Harriett’s Bookshop alive.

Despite print sales remaining high, sales have gone down for some Black bookstore owners, but the mission to serve remains intact. “[I] look at the trial of George Floyd’s murderer, and I wonder how many of those folks that were on that jury became better educated as a result of the moment of last summer and were able to make a more informed decision,” Cook reflects. “Not only did we go out into the streets, but we also [offered] online sales so that people could think about how they wanted to sustain their practice [post that emotional moment].”

Books have been the center of educational hubs for Black folks for decades, particularly in spaces like Black-owned bookstores and Black-led book clubs — the latter of which commercially took off toward the end of the 20th century and played a pivotal role in Black liberation. In Forgotten Readers, Recovering the Lost History of African American Literary Societies, author Elizabeth McHenry notes that the way in which Black book clubs operate as safe spaces and activism centers dates back centuries. In the 19th century, many free Black Americans organized literary societies “as one way to arrest the attention of the public, assert their racial and American identities, and give voice to their belief in the promises of democracy,” she says. Some members of these groups were illiterate due in large part to legislative limitation of Black people’s access to education, so they relied on others to share pertinent information. Today, Black-owned bookstores and allied literary publishers act as vehicles for such information, distributing access to books through various events, programs, and philanthropic efforts. And in their commitment to providing storytelling resources, they have also become a catalyst for social change.

Since last summer, non-profit and independent book publisher Haymarket Books has also seen an uptick in customer demand for books on antiracism, Black liberation and abolition. And for publishers like the Chicago-based organization, making those ideas accessible to as many people as possible is top priority. “Our mission at Haymarket has always been to get radical books into the hands of organizers and activists on the ground,” says Dana Blanchard, who works in Publicity and Development at Haymarket Books. “The antiracist rebellions last summer that deepened the work of the Black Lives Matter movement and brought abolitionist ideas to larger layers of people really pushed us to think about how we could further support these important ideas.”

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Haymarket’s Abolitionist Starter Kit — a specially curated selection of five books by acclaimed organizers and thinkers to help sharpen analysis, ground strategy, and deepen one’s commitment to collective liberation — was created to allow people to get a set of core abolitionist books at a discount. The kit is just one of many ways the book publisher has shown support and increased accessibility for its readers. “This mission to get radical political books to people in the movements has always been a core value and practice at Haymarket, but becomes even more critical and wide-reaching when the movements explode in the streets like we have seen over the last year,” says Blanchard. “In these moments, our books feel even more connected and relevant to the struggles for liberation happening around us.”

Jisu Kim, who oversees marketing, sales, and publicity at The Feminist Press, notes how stories, especially in conversation, are vital in providing narrative shifts or reframing a conversation in order to create social change. “Books are certainly not the only places stories exist,” she says, “but I do think because of their potential depth and scope they play an important role in pushing conversations forward but also holding new ideas to task.”

For bookstore owners, the task is just as evident. Kalima DeSuze, who owns Feminist community bookstore Cafe con Libros in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, infuses her activist roots into her store’s shopping experience in order to advocate for marginalized voices. “When speaking of sparking social change, it can happen in many ways as an owner of a brick and mortar,” she says. “When people walk into a bookstore and they see their issues and identities represented on the shelves, it can enhance their sense of self and their sense of safety in the world, and thus, possibilities expand. I really do believe that we play a major role in affirming identities and affirming cultural issues that people normally wouldn’t see.”

In the age of social media activism, this sort of intentionality is crucial. For DeSuze, who says she’s not a fan of social media but has learned to use it in order connect with and inform her community, it’s important to foster an environment in which those wishing to contribute to the movement of social change be allowed the room to contribute in the ways that are available to them. “I’ve been on the opposite side of people’s criticism, so I try not to criticize folks who are choosing to be those social media activists, because I think that we all play a role,” she says. “We all have a specific place in the movement. And there’s no space for me, in my opinion, for policing other people in the way in which they choose to show up.”

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But accountability also plays a part, she adds.

“You could be married to that movement in a way that’s not healthy. It’s OK to take a step out. It’s OK to prioritize a family. And when you get back, then it’s OK to say, ‘my activism is not going to look the same.’” DeSuze, who recently had a baby, believes it’s important to emphasize that it’s okay to meet activism where you are. “I’m not on the streets because I have a baby right now, but it doesn’t make me any less of an activist,” she continues. “I want folks to know that your priorities change [and] it doesn’t make you any less committed to the movement. It just makes our work look different and our way of engaging the work look different.”

For many shop owners and publishers within the movement, engaging the work on social media includes sharing reading lists that ultimately end up pushing people to their stores and platforms. Amidst protest and hashtags, including #BlackoutTuesday — whose black squares sparked heated conversation surrounding performative allyship — shop owners especially noticed an uptick in anti-racism literature sales amongst white people.

“We’ve probably sold more books in the last month than we sold our entire first year in business,” Jazzi McGilbert, owner of Reparations Club in Los Angeles told The Washington Post in July 2020. Books seeing a rise in sales around that time included Ibram X. Kendi’s Stamped From the Beginning and Ijeoma Oluo’s So You Want to Talk About Race, which each sold close to 3,000 copies between March and April 2020, then skyrocketed to 139,928 and 191,262 copies sold respectively between May and June 2020. “Since the protest started, we are seeing pretty overwhelming support from what, based on the reading list, appear to be well-intentioned white folks that are trying to educate themselves about race in America and anti-racism.”

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And while intentions may be good, it’s going to take more than a well-curated reading list, says Cook, who has had customers make frantic inquiries regarding what books they should read in order to reach peak radicalization. “[They’ll read a book and then come to me and ask], ‘What should I read now?’ And I’m like, hey, hold up, pump the brake. If this was the doctor’s office, you wouldn’t come in here talking about ‘just give me some pills, give me some medicine, give me any medicine.’ We have to break down where you are, what’s your quote unquote illness. I can’t just produce a list for just anybody and say, ‘Here’s the list and now you’ve got it.’ I think that’s the problem,” she says. Sometimes, reading and educating yourself is a form of activism on its own, and this is what book stores like Harriett’s Bookshop are equipped to offer. “If you are self-emancipated, you are self-liberated, you figure out how to go find information on your own. If you look to other folks for your liberation, it’s never going to happen that way.”

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Black leaders rally to preserve cemetery next to skate park

NEWNAN, Ga. (AP) — Black community leaders are calling on officials in a city south of Atlanta to preserve a cemetery for African Americans that they say has long been neglected and is under threat from a city skate park

.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Crews building the adjacent park in Newnan have dumped debris on the burial site, desecrating an important legacy of the city's Black residents, community leaders say. The site is believed to contain the remains of slaves, and locals worry additional construction around the site may follow.

“This is our history. This is our heritage, and we have to preserve it," Render Godfrey, a Black pastor who lives in Newnan, said Monday. “There are citizens like me that still live here that care about this cemetery because my heritage is laying in one of these graves.”

Godfrey and other organizers gathered at the roughly 4-acre (1.6 hectare), wooded burial site. There are no visible grave markers, but Ayisat Idris-Hosch, another organizer, pointed out depressions in the ground where she said people were buried. The site is believed to contain more than 200 graves and date back to at least the early 19th century.

Construction equipment working on the adjacent skate park could be heard in the background.

The city said in a statement it had held numerous public meetings about the skate park project and remained "committed and open to receiving feedback from residents regarding the city’s redevelopment projects.”

Godfrey and Idris-Hosch said Newnan officials had not reached out to leaders in the Black community to get its feedback. Black people make up about a third of the roughly 40,000 residents in Newnan, which lies about 40 miles (64km) southwest of Atlanta.

Godfrey and Idris-Hosch marched with about a dozen other people later to the historic Coweta County Courthouse, where they rallied with signs that read, “Don't Dump on Our Ancestors” and “This Disrespect Would Never Happen in Oak Hill.”

The nearby Oak Hill Cemetery contains the graves of Confederate soldiers and is well-manicured and marked.

“We cannot allow our legacy to be forgotten, to be dumped on and to be disrespected,” Idris-Hosch, president of Newnan's African American Alliance, said at the rally.

The city has made improvements to a museum next to the African American burial site and planted flowers on the property, spokesperson Ashley Copeland said in an email. She said no one from the city was available for a phone interview.

Lillie Smith, another member of the African American Alliance, said the city has invested much more money in other historic sites. She wants it to beautify and clearly designate the Black cemetery.

“We’re not here to blame anybody for anything. We’re not looking for apologies,” she said. "We want the cemetery to be a place where people drive by and say, 'That’s an enslaved African American cemetery.’”

Sudhin Thanawala, The Associated Press

P.E.I. becomes latest province to sign on to Liberals' national child-care program

CHARLOTTETOWN — Prince Edward Island has become the third province to sign on to the federal government's national child-care program, allowing it to receive about $120 million from Ottawa for $10-dollar-a-day child-care spots by the end of 2024.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made the announcement Tuesday in Charlottetown alongside Premier Dennis King. Trudeau said the deal would apply to children under the age of six.

The deal would also cut average child-care fees on the Island in half by the end of 2022 for children under six and create more than 450 new spots in the province within two years, the prime minister said.

"This ambitious timeline goes to show not only how dedicated P.E.I. is to making life more affordable for families. It’s also an example of how working closely with the federal government means real change that happens fast," Trudeau said.

The prime minister made his announcement Tuesday at the Carrefour de l'Isle-Saint-Jean in Charlottetown, a French-language school and community centre. Before speaking to reporters, Trudeau played briefly with some young children at the centre and spoke to them in both official languages, as they showed him their clay creations and plastic toys shaped like fruits and vegetables.

Nova Scotia on July 13 became the second province, after British Columbia, to sign on to the program, allowing it to receive $605 million from Ottawa to lower child-care fees to $10 dollars a day in five years. Trudeau said his government has also signed a child-care agreement with Yukon.

King recognized that while the deal would create 450 new child-care spaces on the Island, that wouldn't be enough for all the province's children. He said he would announce other programs "in the days ahead" regarding how his government would add more spaces.

"I think it's fair to say our desire here is, in the shortest amount of time as possible, we want to make sure this is available to every child in Prince Edward Island no matter how much money your parents have, or where you live, or what your background is."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 27, 2021.

Teresa Wright, The Canadian Press

GOOD, TOOK LONG ENOUGH

Trudeau says Ottawa withholding health-care transfers to N.B. over abortion access


MONCTON, N.B. — New Brunswick is failing to live up to its obligations under the Canada Health Act because it continues to make it difficult for women to access abortions, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Tuesday.

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As a consequence, the federal government is withholding health-care transfers to the province, Trudeau told reporters in Moncton, N.B.

"Making sure that every woman across this country has access to reliable reproductive services is extremely important to us, and that’s why we’ve continued … to impress strongly upon the government of New Brunswick how it needs to keep up its obligations under the Canada Health Act," Trudeau said.

The prime minister initially said Ottawa was holding back millions of dollars in health-care transfers to New Brunswick, but a spokesperson from the Prime Minister's Office said after the news conference the correct figure is $140,216.

When reached for comment Tuesday, a spokesperson with the office of New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs referred The Canadian Press to a news conference the premier gave on July 23. Higgs had told reporters he found it "disappointing that every election the Trudeau government wants to make (abortion) an issue." The premier had said the Horizon Health Network didn't think it necessary to add abortion services in the province.

New Brunswick law bans government funding for abortions conducted outside three approved hospitals. The provincial government subsidizes abortions at two hospitals in Moncton and one in Bathurst, but it won't cover the cost of the procedure at Clinic 554 in Fredericton.

Trudeau said his government will work to ensure everyone in the country has access to abortion, including at Clinic 554.

A New Brunswick judge in June authorized a national civil liberties group to mount a legal challenge to the province's abortion law. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association says the law limits access to abortions, particularly for poor and marginalized people.

New Brunswick's government had opposed the association's bid for standing, arguing the group didn't have a specific connection to the province.

Court of Queen's Bench Chief Justice Tracey DeWare, however, said that stance was "unreasonable,'' and she wrote in her ruling, "with all due respect to the position of the (province), it is without merit and given the jurisprudence directly on point, surprising.''

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 27, 2021.

The Canadian Press

‘We don’t deserve this’: new app places US caregivers under digital surveillance

Virginia Eubanks and Alexandra Mateescu 

THE GUARDIAN


For years, LeDanté Walker set aside what little extra cash he could find so no matter the issue with his health insurance coverage, his caregiver was always taken care of.

Walker, who sustained a spinal cord injury when he was ejected from the back seat of a car in a 1997 accident, relies on a home care worker for many day-to-day functions, from moving from his bed to his wheelchair every morning, to helping him shower, get dressed, go to the bathroom and prepare meals.

But earlier this year, Walker abruptly had to dip deeper into his rainy day fund than ever before, after his caregiver’s paychecks fell $900 short of what she was owed. Walker offered her every spare dime he had saved, preferring to pay out-of-pocket to maintain the freedom and stability his worker provided than see her left in a financial lurch.

“I want to be independent,” he says. “That’s my right.”

The missing wages were caused by flaws in a new digital tool called electronic visit verification (EVV), an app downloaded to a home care worker’s smartphone that tracks their daily work output, physical location and hours.

Tech companies and lawmakers promise that EVV will increase efficiency and accountability in home care and will reduce fraud, waste and abuse in government-funded programs. But the tool has been a catastrophe for many in Arkansas, like Walker, and thousands of others across the nation. Advocacy groups and people with disabilities warned from the start that EVV systems would erode clients’ autonomy, make home care more difficult and threaten the progress of the disability rights and independent living movements.

At the heart of these disagreements are clients and workers – often women of color or immigrants – who feel as if they are constantly surveilled and under suspicion.

The Obama administration passed legislation requiring that EVV be implemented to manage all in-home personal care services paid for by Medicaid, the program that helps poor and working families in the US with healthcare costs. And on 1 April, under a federal deadline to implement or lose a percentage of its Medicaid funding, Arkansas rolled out EVV for self-directed clients like Walker who manage their care workers directly rather than go through a home healthcare agency. Most other states are also currently unveiling EVV systems.

According to Walker and dozens of other program participants in Arkansas, the implementation has been a disaster. Walker didn’t get official notification of the state’s digital transformation until four days before the EVV rollout. He called and texted his support coordinator, but she wasn’t answering. He was eventually guided to a training video on YouTube aimed at home healthcare agencies, not self-directed clients like him. It didn’t answer his questions.

Walker spent hundreds of dollars to purchase an extra cell phone for his home care worker, who asked not to be named in this story. She downloaded the state’s EVV app, called AuthentiCare, and began to use it. But it was frequently glitchy. Her 13-26 April timesheet was denied for “insufficient funds,” which made no sense to Walker, who carefully reconciles his worker’s schedule with the care hours the state allows him.

She was out $900 for two weeks’ work. Walker’s cash helped her keep groceries in the fridge and the lights on in her house, but it wouldn’t last long.

“It was chaos,” Walker says.

He adjusts his mask and pushes his waist-length dreadlocks out of his face. “I’ll be okay, because I worked out a system with my caregiver,” he says. But there are more than 2,000 people like him who receive self-directed services through ARChoices, a waiver program intended to help disabled and older Arkansans receive Medicaid-funded care in their own homes. He knows that few of them have the resources to underwrite their home care workers’ paychecks.

“We’ve been together 10-plus years,” Walker says. “If we were new, she’d be gone.”

The care crisis is especially acute in Arkansas. Pay here is notoriously low: after a decade, Walker’s caregiver still makes just $12.08 an hour, barely more than Arkansas’ $11 minimum wage. The cost of in-home care in Arkansas is 17% lower than the national average, in part because of low pay and high turnover. If Palco, the contractor that provides financial management services for self-directed clients in Arkansas, doesn’t pay his worker regularly, Walker knows, she might find work elsewhere through an agency or leave the industry altogether.

In a 18 June joint statement, Palco and Arkansas DHS conceded: “When we went live April 1 with the EVV system for self-direction clients, there were more issues than we anticipated.”

But self-directed clients and their advocates have been warning that the roll-out would fail for years. The state and its contractor, they say, were just not listening.

As far back as April 2019, Brenda Stinebuck, the executive director of Spa Area Independent Living Services, worried that the system would be a catastrophe. Arkansas did not include self-directed clients or live-in caregivers in pilot testing. DHS had no communication about EVV with her office. “The ability to direct your own care is getting harder and harder and harder,” she said at the time.
‘She’s with me 24/7. I don’t get overtime’

The move to EVV has also made the jobs of family and live-in caregivers more difficult.

Nancy Morell, 60, rises at 4am every day to bring her older sister Carolyn her coffee, bathe her, dry her hair and dress her. She sets her up to watch TV in the living room, with its broad windows overlooking the Ozark mountains outside Eureka Springs. Carolyn, who has cerebral palsy, can’t talk or move much, but they’ve found other ways to communicate.

Morell, a slender woman with shoulder-length blonde hair, is a natural planner, running a complicated multigenerational household with grace and focus. She does Carolyn’s shopping and laundry, prepares her meals, carries her to the bathroom and shifts her between a beanbag, recliner and sofa to keep her comfortable. In good weather, she takes her to the back porch and they watch the hummingbird feeders together. She trims Carolyn’s nails, puts on her deodorant and lotion, and takes care of any other personal needs that come up before her sister goes to bed – she shares a room with her 85-year-old mother– at about 8pm.

Morell attends Carolyn 16 hours a day, seven days a week – and she’s always available if there is an emergency in the night. “She’s with me 24/7. I don’t get overtime,” Morell said. Even so, the Arkansas department of human services (DHS) has determined that Carolyn’s needs can be met with 8 hours of care a day, so Morell is paid about $550 a week after taxes.

Before the EVV rollout, Morell attended one of only two trainings offered by Palco. She downloaded the 43-page manual. She watched the YouTube video.


She’s with me 24/7. I don’t get overtime

Nancy Morell

Despite all her efforts, Morell couldn’t access the system for two weeks. When she finally succeeded, her paycheck was three weeks late. She logged on to the website to find out why it was delayed, and saw the system had red-flagged all 16 of her shifts. In the 13 years she’s worked for her sister, she’s had just two shifts red-flagged by Palco, and the problems had been quickly resolved. Now, like Walker, she couldn’t get through to a support coordinator on the phone.

But for Morell, the real problem is that EVV’s inflexibility adds new and seemingly arbitrary responsibilities to an already demanding job. Morell has to clock in and out of the app as often as four times a day, and on a fixed schedule, even though Carolyn gets care whenever she needs it, not at predetermined times. She sets alarms on her phone, terrified she’ll miss a clock-in because she is preparing meals or helping Carolyn to the bathroom. Her mother, who is Carolyn’s legal representative, has to sign the app at the end of every day.

The 2016 federal law that paved the way for EVV – the 21st Century Cures Act – requires that the systems be “minimally burdensome.” But Arkansas, like many other states, appears to have implemented an approach with burdens galore.

As Morell wrote in an 11 June letter to Arkansas DHS: “What took a total of 15 seconds – to sign a timesheet and submit to Palco – now takes many hours; hours that should be given to the client for care.”

Related: What happened when a ‘wildly irrational’ algorithm made crucial healthcare decisions

EVV vendors promise their solutions will save states money by cutting down on what they claim is pervasive fraud and waste. A 2016 federal report claimed that EVV use across the country would eventually lead to $290m in cost savings over a ten year period, in part by reducing improper billing.

But in practice there is little evidence to suggest fraud is either widespread or significant. Only seven people were charged with fraud in self-directed personal care services in Arkansas in 2020, out of a workforce of more than 4,500, according to data collected by Applied Self-Direction, a Boston-based consultancy. The state secured three convictions, recovering $1,930 total – $643 per case. The EVV system has cost the state $5.7m so far.

And its human costs continue to mount.

Recent complaints to Arkansas’s DHS, acquired through a public records request, illustrate the life-altering consequences of the widespread delays in payment. DHS made the following note about a voicemail the agency received from a home care worker: “She said she cannot buy groceries, her utilities are being shut off and she has an eviction notice.”

In their statement, Palco and the Arkansas DHS say that “the EVV system is working and caregivers are getting paid. There is a very low error rate for submitted claims – just 2 percent.” Since Palco processes approximately 25,000 claims every two weeks, a 2% error rate affects the lives of 500 caregivers each pay period. And a single missed paycheck can quickly spell catastrophe for a low-wage worker.

“There are, to this day, still beneficiaries trying to get their caregivers paid back to early April,” said Trevor Hawkins, staff attorney at Legal Aid of Arkansas, in an email. “There were no accommodations made to cover them while the bugs were worked out.”
Digital timesheet or ankle monitor?

For some, the new system feels like being under house arrest. The EVV app incorporates GPS to verify a home care worker’s location and a feature called “geofencing”. It establishes a maximum distance around a client’s home inside which a care worker is allowed to clock in or out without getting flagged as noncompliant.

“The metal building down there, we know we can go that far,” says Melissa Harville, 46, standing near her front porch in rural Greenbrier, about 40 miles north of Little Rock. “And to the end of the driveway.”

Harville used the EVV app to map out how far away from her home she is allowed to go without triggering an “unauthorized location” alert that will have to be resolved by her agency before she can be paid. In May, Harville and her partner Kevin Hoover, 57, were sitting outside their simple log home as bees buzzed loudly in the early summer sun. She was pointing out the boundaries of what the couple characterize as an invisible dog fence for humans. “It’s like living in a box,” she says.

EVV has eroded both her and Hoover’s autonomy.

Before the home care agency she works for started using the AuthentiCare app in November 2020, she and Hoover, who has used a manual wheelchair since he lost the use of his legs in 2009, were always on the go. She could take him to therapy, grocery shopping, to see friends. “And now we can’t. You have to be at home to clock in and clock out,” Harville says.

The intentions behind using GPS to verify a home care worker’s location might be to keep workers accountable and clients safe, but the implications are digital borders that undermine the philosophy behind independent living, advocates say.

For more than six decades, disability activists have asserted the right to autonomy over one’s life and the ability to live, work and receive services within the broader community. Geo-fencing in EVV is built on a premise that contradicts this: it assumes that people like Kevin Hoover, who loves to fish, work on cars and play music with his friends, are homebound, not living active and vibrant lives.

The state and Palco say that federal law requires them to log the location at which services are provided, and that the exception notices that caregivers and agencies perceive as errors are simply “informational geofencing messages” and “do not mean that time outside of the home will not be paid.”

But the National Council on Independent Living conducted a survey of home care recipients and their care providers across 36 states in 2020, and found that one-third of respondents said that they “stay at home more often than prior to EVV use, due to fear that geofencing limitations will flag a visit as fraud or cause delay in or loss of provider wages.”

What’s more, because workers and clients tend to be nearby when care services are delivered, “what EVV is doing is unintentionally tracking the recipient of care,” says Kendra Scalia, director of policy for the grassroots campaign Stop EVV.

Karin Willison, disability editor at the digital health blog The Mighty, has argued that “electronic visit verification is the equivalent of putting an ankle monitor on people with disabilities and telling us where we can and can’t go.”
‘We don’t deserve this’

The EVV rollout tells a wider story about misplaced priorities. State Medicaid programs face perennial pressures to patch budget deficits by restricting eligibility, slashing benefits and suppressing worker wages.

In this environment, tech solutions that promise cost savings appear appealing. But the human costs of EVV, whether financial or personal, may well exceed any gains in efficiency.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that home health and personal care aides will be among the fastest growing occupations in the coming years. But on top of low wages, these jobs typically do not come with standard workplace benefits like health insurance, paid sick leave, vacation or disability insurance. This leads to chronic labor shortages, which will only be worsened if care workers feel forced to abandon the profession because of delayed paychecks and digital surveillance.

“Just stop,” says Nancy Morell, the woman who cares for her sister in Eureka Springs. “That app on your phone? It doesn’t guarantee that the work is being done any more than a paper timesheet does. Go back to the way it was before. That will attract people back into the job they signed up for. This job takes people with heart. We don’t deserve this.”

‘They need to listen to people with disabilities’

From the start, disability and labor advocates have been vocal about their concerns, providing input on ways to design systems that are less onerous and invasive. In California, the labor union United Domestic Workers and Disability Rights California collaborated with clients, workers and state officials to design an in-house web portal that did not collect GPS data or require workers to log their hours in real-time.

However, the federal government said that this system would not be compliant, stating that web-based timesheets alone do not provide auditable confirmation of data submitted.

Palco and the Arkansas DHS insist that EVV is inescapable.

But the federal mandate is not inflexible. The state of Virginia chose to exempt live-in caregivers from EVV requirements entirely. Geofencing is optional, as well.

To LeDanté Walker, the lack of consultation with the affected communities feels like contempt. “They need to listen to people with disabilities,” he says. “Ask. The. People.”

This article was supported by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

COVID-19 no longer top issue facing Canadians ahead of possible election: poll
David Lao 1 day ago

© Provided by Global News Canada's elections watchdog says a Quebec engineering firm illegally donated more than $46,000 to federal political entities over a period of seven years. A voter walks past a sign directing voters to a polling station for the Canadian…

As rumblings of a possible federal election continue across the country, a new poll has found that, for the first time since the start of COVID-19, the pandemic is no longer the top issue on most Canadians' minds.

The new Ipsos polling, done exclusively for Global News, comes as provinces continue their reopening efforts and cases of COVID-19 continue to decrease nationally.

According to the poll, the current top-of-mind issues Canadians are now thinking about the most are healthcare, affordability and cost of living, climate change and the economy -- largely remaining the same from two years ago.

And while the poll now points to the same big box issues now facing Canadians coming back to the forefront in a post-COVID-era, Ipsos' CEO of Public Affairs Darrell Bricker says that the absence of COVID-19 from country's top worries comes as quite a surprise -- especially ahead of a possible federal election coming just around the corner.

Read more: Liberal majority government in ‘doubt’ as lead over Conservatives shrinks, poll finds

"I think a lot of strategists were thinking that the government's performance during COVID would be the big feature element of this campaign," said Bricker, who described the return back of other issues as the "important pushing of the urgent."

"Right now what we're finding is that what was previously urgent is now being displaced by what was previously most important."

The issue of COVID-19 now stands as the fifth most important problem for Canadians, with taxes, housing and poverty rounding out the latter half of the top ten, according to the poll.

Other issues on Canadians' minds include unemployment, government deficit, and seniors' and Indigenous issues -- the latter of which Bricker points to as probably coming to the forefront now amid the recent discoveries of unmarked burial sites at former residential schools.

The poll also asked Canadians which issues they found as the most influential in their vote choice, and found that the Liberals were seen as the best party to tackle three of the top five most important issues to them -- healthcare, climate change and COVID-19.

Video: Global National: Jul 24

"The issues that have been coming up, it's a bit more of a mixed bag," said Bricker. "Health care, the Liberals lead on, but it tends to be a bit of a nonpartisan issue.

"Nobody thinks anybody's great on health care and the reason is because they don't think that anybody really has a plan that will completely reassure them, so I think emotionally, people think that the Liberals would do a better job."

Read more: If a federal election were called, would Conservative premiers take on Ottawa again?

As for the topic of COVID-19 as an issue for voters, the Liberals have a "commanding" lead, with 40 per cent perceiving Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government as the most competent to handle the pandemic, and all other parties lagging more than 20 points behind.

The Liberals have an eight point lead over the NDP when it comes to tackling healthcare, while the party is nearly tied with the Greens at 27 per cent.

Video: Liberal lead softens ahead of possible election

Among Canadians that say the economy is the main issue influencing their vote, the Conservatives hold a healthy eight point lead over the Liberals at 35 per cent.

Bricker says that that lead has got to be "problematic" for Trudeau's Liberals.

"Because as we move out of the urgent set of issues and we start moving on to the important ... they're eight points behind on the economy," said Bricker.

"That has to be concerning for the campaign planners."

For this survey, a sample of 1,001 Canadians aged 18+ was interviewed online. Quotas and weighting were employed to ensure that the sample’s composition reflects that of the Canadian population according to census parameters. The precision of Ipsos online polls is measured using a credibility interval. In this case, the poll is accurate to within ± 3.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, had all Canadians aged 18+ been polled. The credibility interval will be wider among subsets of the population.

THE ONLY REPUBLICAN PROVINCE IN CANADA

COVID-19 spreading faster in Alberta than during peak of 3rd wave

Sarah Rieger 2 hrs ago
© 

Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press An entrance to the Peter Lougheed Centre hospital in Calgary was blocked off in April 2020, to screen essential visitors for COVID-19. Doctors and scientists say the virus is now spreading faster in Alberta than during the…

Health and infectious disease experts say the rate at which COVID-19 cases are growing in Alberta is alarming, as it spreads faster than it during the height of the pandemic's third wave.

The R-value, which represents the number of people infected by each infected person, was 1.48 (with a confidence interval of 1.38-1.59)in Alberta as of Sunday, according to Alberta Health.

That number — which has doubled in recent weeks — means 100 people with the virus will spread it to 148 others.

"The current R-value provincewide is one of the highest we've seen throughout the pandemic. So although the numbers are low today, the rate of viral spread is really as fast as we've seen at any other point during the pandemic," said Craig Jenne, an immunologist and microbiologist at the University of Calgary.

"This really is the foundation for what everybody refers to as exponential growth … it is definitely laying the potential and the groundwork for a large surge of viral cases in the coming weeks."

During the pandemic's third wave, when around 1,500 new cases were being reported in Alberta each day, the R-value hovered around 1.15.

A rising R-value is more concerning than rising case numbers, says Carolyn Colijn, a Canada 150 research chair in mathematics for infection and public health at Simon Fraser University.

"It's faster and faster increases, not just increases," she said. "So that change not only is a pretty big change, but it's also a change from declining to growing."

Case numbers and positivity rates are currently low, but surging, driven by the more infectious delta variant. Alberta had 1,173 active cases on Tuesday with a test positivity rate of 2.54 per cent.

"Those are all indicators that we're on our way to a fourth wave," said Dr. James Talbot, a former chief medical officer for the province and a public health adjunct professor at the University of Alberta.

"For me, if I had family members or friends or neighbours that I knew weren't immunized, my alarm bells would be going off right now."

Of particular concern, Talbot said, is how many people remain unvaccinated. Vaccination provides strong protection against contracting COVID-19, and more protection against serious outcomes.

Of Alberta's total population, 35.8 per cent of people still haven't received a single vaccine shot (25 per cent of those eligible) and 45.7 per cent aren't fully vaccinated, according to Alberta Health.

That means more than 1.5 million people in the province, about half of whom are children under 12 and are not eligible to be vaccinated, still have no protection against COVID-19.

"It's like forest fire season," Talbot said, "25 per cent [unvaccinated] is like having 25 per cent dry wood kindling in the forest, and you get a hot enough blaze with the delta variant — it's not going to be good."

Talbot said doctors expect most new cases will be among unvaccinated people.

"They have a choice. They can get immunized, in which case their chances of having a severe outcome are one in 100,000, or one in a million. Or they can choose to wait for the virus to infect them, in which case the chances of getting serious disease are about [one in 100]," he said.

Talbot says there are also concerns for those who contract COVID-19 but aren't hospitalized, who may still experience a lengthy, unpleasant illness or long-term disability. There are also concerns for immuno-compromised people for whom vaccines don't offer as much protection.

As for what's causing the increasedspread, Jenne said there are likely multiple drivers. The province lifted public health restrictions on July 1, and many people are no longer wearing masks or are holding larger gatherings indoors. He said contact tracing will be an important element in understanding this possible, new wave.

The source of transmission for 40 per cent of active cases is unknown. As of July 16, Alberta Health Services had 2,095 case investigators and contact tracers, down from 2,500 earlier in the pandemic.

"If this trend continues, we will once again be facing a situation where we need extra [contact tracing] staff to stay on top of the newly identified cases every day," Jenne said.

Jenne said there are some positives — with so many older people vaccinated, surging cases may not translate into the same mortality rates as in previous waves.

But there are still unknowns.

"I think the remaining question is, though, how big will this surge get?"

IN JUST SIX MONTHS

Cost of data breaches in Canada hit new record in 2021: IBM

CALGARY — The average cost of a data breach in Canada hit a record high last year as companies grappled with new cybersecurity risks during the COVID-19 pandemic.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

According to a new report from IBM Security, the average cost of a data breach in Canada was $6.75 million per incident in the 2021 survey year. That's up from $6.35 million the year before and the highest since IBM first included Canada in its survey seven years ago. It's also higher than the 2021 global average of US$4.24 million ($5.34 million), which in itself is a 10 per cent increase from the prior year and the highest global average in the survey's 17-year history.

The study suggests cybersecurity efforts may have lagged behind as companies were forced to rapidly adapt to remote work during the pandemic, said IBM Security associate partner Ray Boisvert.

"This to me is a wake-up call," Boisvert said, adding companies reported data breaches last year that were not only costly, but also hard to contain. For example, companies surveyed reported a mean time of 164 days to identify they had a breach and 60 days to contain it, one week longer than the prior year's report.

According to the study, data breaches cost $1 million more on average when remote work was indicated as a factor in the event.

“There was certainly a strong link to remote work," Boisvert said. "We're now living in a perimeter-less environment . . . and trying to defend a multiplicity of inputs becomes very difficult."

Charles Finlay, executive director of the Rogers Cybersecure Catalyst at Ryerson University, said the sheer volume of varying devices and network connections used by remote workers during the pandemic posed a cybersecurity threat.

"Employees are working from home using insecure Internet networks and computers, and the kind of security measures that would be imposed in a corporate environment in a workplace just are not always present,” Finlay said.

He added that a crisis like the global pandemic can also be easily exploited by cybercriminals — for example, through a phishing email that poses as official health advice.

"We know that fake websites have been set up purporting to provide information on COVID-19," Finlay said. "So COVID-19 has provided a lot of opportunity, unfortunately, for malicious attackers and cybersecurity. I’m not surprised by IBM’s findings.”

The survey found nearly half (44 per cent) of the breaches analyzed exposed customer personal data, such as names, emails, passwords, or even healthcare data. It found compromised user credentials (such as stolen passwords) were the most common method used as an entry point by attackers, representing 20 per cent of breaches studied.

Ransomware attacks are also growing increasingly common, said Finlay, pointing to high-profile incidents so far in 2021 like the Russian-linked cyberattacks on Colonial Pipeline and JBS Foods.

“When I look back at the last year, the most serious development that I see is around the increasingly serious ransomware attacks, in particular around critical infrastructure," Finlay said. "Ransomware is exploding as a major international security problem. It is a multi-billion global industry.”

The IBM survey analyzed real-world data breaches experienced by 500 organizations worldwide (26 in Canada) between May 2020 and March 2021. It factored in costs to companies ranging from legal, regulatory and technical responses in the event of a cyberattack to loss of brand equity, customers, and employee productivity.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 28, 2021.

Amanda Stephenson, The Canadian Press