City
Morning Brew: June 4th, 2008
Photo: "O HAI" by Adam Schwabe, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.
Your Toronto morning news roundup for Wednesday June 4th, 2008:
Remember a few years ago, when that Air France jet attempted to land at Pearson Airport, in bad weather, and it ended up overshooting the runway's end and bursting into flames? Now, Air France is suing the Greater Toronto Airports Authority, the federal government, and the air traffic control agency for a whopping $180million because they're all alleged to have cut corners on safety.
While I sometimes admit to feeding my addiction to coffee while writing the blogTO Morning Brew (I'm sipping on a fine Vietnamese Arabica/Robusta blend right now), being 3 times over the legal blood alcohol limit at 11:30am while driving a TTC bus is not something I'll ever have the opportunity (or enough lack of better judgment/control) to do. Clearly this man needs help.
Scarborough appears to be seeing some of the "Transit City" dream come true. Two new (and much needed) Light Rapid Transit (LRT) lines, that will fill some voids in the troubled transit system, are in the environmental assessment stages and we could see shovels in the ground as early as next year.
--
The day after the devastating news that four manufacturing plants are destined to close and many jobs will be lost, GM unionized workers have set up a road block on the route into the company's headquarters in Oshawa. Other than making things even more difficult, I can't see this action making much difference. If the company wants to close a plant because it's not making the desired profits, they will.
Halton region Catholic School Board trustees have they heads up their ____s. Reality is that the overwhelming majority of youngsters will not choose to practice abstinence over sexy-time, no matter what they're taught at school. Rejecting the HPV vaccine on scientific grounds may have merit, but to do so on ethical grounds is outright foolish because it's a rejection of reality.
Discussion
33 Comments
Sort By Oldest First / Newest First
Subscribe
As for the TTC (alleged) drunk driver, I guess there's at least one member of the union that's worth less than a million.
If I were the union, I'd be sueing for the difference in the wages they -should- have earned had they not agreed to the wage freeze.
Yes. We will place whowever is in charge of that road on Notice if that happens.
That being said, it will be a cold day in HELL before I let my daughter have that vaccine.
And I will be lobbying my school board... Toronto French Catholic... to object to it as well. And I'm ok with it being for religious reasons, whatever it takes to prevent our children from being guinea pigs to this vaccine.
Care to elaborate on your concerns about the HPV vaccine?
Cervical cancer affects only .002% of the female population and is rarely fatal.
Cervical cancer is considered to be 90% preventable with screening and treatment.
Since the introduction of the Pap test in Canada, the cervical cancer death rate has dropped by half. In the US, the incidence of cervical cancer fell by 74% between 1955 and 1992.
The HPV vaccine is one of the most expensive universal vaccines ever made.
http://www.cwhn.ca/resources/cwhn/hpv.html
As Jarrold said, the vaccine is untried, and untested. We are using our children as guinea pigs, and there have already been serious side effects.
The HPV vaccine only protects against a small fraction of the strains that are found in our population.
And, most importantly, if gives us a false sense of safety. It is NOT a cure, It is NOT even preventative, unless you are lucky enough to catch one of the few strains it protects against.
BB, I concur, thank you.
As for Air France - landing 4,000ft down a 9,000 foot runway in a thunderstorm is a bad plan end of story. Unfortunately this is likely to mean GTAA gets stuck with 10 or 20% contribution to the damages which means higher airport fees for airport users.
"Halton trustees also voted to have the board increase its efforts to impress students that abstinence before marriage was an important feature of the Catholic faith."
It reminds me of when people are against the morning after pill, where with a little digging you realize it's not that they consider it an abortion so much as they just don't want teenagers having sex before marriage.
So you can make all the points you want about the actual effectiveness of the vaccine, and in the end, I guarantee you that it has more to do with it's association with teenage sexual activity then whether it is a worthwhile expenditure.
And as we know, preaching abstinence just leads to more oral and anal, not less sex.
There are many types of HPV, this only guards against one. It's still untested, and the risks are still unknown. If I were a parent, I wouldn't want this forced on my child - it should be the choice of my child's or my own (once having the proper choice).
As for vaccinating the entire population from influenza. That's also another waste - the vaccine only works against certain strains that scientists predict will take hold. This year, they were wrong, and many still got sick. Vaccines like this one should only be used on those most at risk - the elderly and infirm. By letting the strains that have been correctly guarded against to take hold among the people whose immune systems are not compromised, the vaccine becomes more effective for those who have taken it (ie. less of a chance they'll be exposed to one of the unguarded flu types).
It sounds good to spend money on these initiatives, but sometimes politicians don't know squat and actually put people at greater risk.
Sexuality shouldn't be taught, restricted, condoned, regulated, etc. by schools. That's really something that responsible parents have to talk to their kids about. As a future educator - I really don't want any part in that.
But i don't want to remove the choice from others... I didn't mean it to sound that way. I would encourage the school boards to stop this from happening within the school. Make parents go to the doctor to discuss it before giving it to their children.
And as a Catholic, who will be sending her child to a Catholic School come Sept... I believe in sex ed. Abstinence is not really the way society works these days, and giving our children the information they need goes a lot further in keeping their pants on then banning it completely.
Sexuality SHOULD be learned from parents... problem is, it isn't necessarily so. I don't worry about my daughter's sex ed, since I'll be giving it to her. I worry about a classroom full of kids who may, or may not, have had the same kind of chat with their parents.
There are three groups of people.
1) Those who are against the vaccine
2) Those who are for the vaccine
3) Huh? What Vaccine?
If the vaccine is given in schools, 1) still has the option to say no. 2) is benefited by the ease at which it is available and the fact that it is free (at least directly). Not all parents can afford to take the time off work and pay to have their child vaccinated. And, finally the kids of parents '3)' shouldn't be penalized because their parents aren't informed. The default should be a yes to the vaccine to ensure these kids aren't forgotten about.
Telling groups 2) and 3) they can't have the vaccine because group 1) is uncomfortable with its religious and cultural implications is absurd. Now, if the issue was the effectiveness of the vaccine or its dangers, I can understand the concern, however, that doesn't seem to be what most people are upset about.
I'm not sure about this on the grounds of its effectiveness. Also, if your young daughter's going to be sexually active, it would also be best to take them to a doctor and put them on the pill if you think she's (and also the guy, but you don't have as much control over that in THIS instance) going to be irresponsible about it. While you're both there, better to get the shot too.
I wonder if mups would cause muppetitis?
grade 6 - measles
grade 7(or8) - hep b, series of 3 shots
grade 9(or10) - tetnus/diptheria/polio
Here we have a vaccine (just like all the others, I also got measles and hepB through school, and paid for my hepA before a trip) that shows promise in preventing horrible conditions, why wouldn't I take advantage of it???
http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/publicat/ccdr-rmtc/97vol23/23s4/23s4b_e.html
For reasons as to why parents might choose not to have their children given the HPV vaccine, check out this link:
http://www.vran.org/vaccines/hpv/hpv.htm
For example, they claim that 11 people have died total(that number is wrong regardless if you check the source.)
Then later claim that incidences of cervical cancer are low and only amount to 3 or 4 per 100,000 per year.
Of course saying 10,000 to 15,000 a year isn't nearly as helpful towards your argument. Especially when you forget to mention that 3,700 women die each year from the disease. Also mentioning the 35% fatality rate of cervical cancer wouldn't be smart either.
I emphasize a year, because the vaccine has been out for two as of this time, so you'll have to double those death numbers to compare properly.
So 20,000 to 30,000 cases of cervical cancer with 7400 deaths in the same time frame as the 11(?) vaccine deaths were caused.
So, as you can see, their -shocking- statistics aren't very relative to the actual hpv problem.
It only *appears* that most people are upset about the vaccine for silly peripheral reasons is because the media continue to portray it that way.
There are plenty of very serious and legitimate concerns around this vaccine, that should make anyone wonder how in hell Merck managed to push this through into our schools.
For the record, there is absolutely no doubt that ...
a) Cervical cancer is extremely rare in Canada, and fatalities are are rarer
b) Cervical cancer is 90% preventable without the vaccine
Obviously this does not warrant a universal vaccination program.
And it certainly should not allow a company like Merck to spend millions of dollars
confusing and scaring young girls into thinking they need this vaccine.