TELUS Talks with Tamara Taggart

Across the country, homeless and at-risk Canadians suffer from limited access and other socioeconomic barriers to healthcare. But mobile health clinics are changing that, bringing healthcare right into a patient's neighborhood. Dr. Andrew Boozary is a primary care physician and an executive director at UHN which manages the internationally recognized Toronto General Hospital. He says mobile health clinics offer a more equitable delivery system now and after COVID.

Registered Dietician and author of Good Food, Bad Diet, Abby Langer has made it her life’s mission to debunk fad diets. For more than 20 years she’s watched people struggle with food and their bodies. Her new book examines the negative core beliefs holding us back and weighs the emotional, physical and social costs of focusing on dieting. She asks us to be kind to ourselves, stop obsessing about numbers and to look inside ourselves before jumping on a new way of eating.

Through his extraordinary, best-selling memoir, From the Ashes, Métis-Cree-Scot author, Jesse Thistle, chronicles his life on the streets and how he overcame trauma and addiction. The former high school dropout turned Indigenous scholar and Ph.D. candidate shares his theories with Tamara on the effects of intergenerational trauma, systemic racism and what it has been like for him to carry the weight of his ancestors' history.

Dr. Ryan Hamilton is a sports psychologist and mental health performance consultant with both the NHL and the International Ice Hockey Federation. This year, he was part of the teams that led the Tampa Bay Lightning to win the Stanley Cup and Team Canada to win Gold at the World Juniors Hockey Championship. He talks about how he creates the right psychological environment for winning and shares the skills he teaches athletes that can benefit all of us, like mindfulness and tolerance for uncertainty.

The UN predicts we’ll need to feed 10 billion people by 2050. Currently, the worldwide agriculture industry is trying to balance profitability with sustainability, maintain regular food supply, and manage depleted water and soil systems. Chief Strategy Officer for the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute, Ted Bilyea, discusses how new technologies streamline the end-to-end farming experience, giving us new ways to produce more with less. He explains how all of this directly impacts the food on your table.

The introduction of 5G will make the world profoundly more connected. To understand what that truly means, we speak with Eros Spadotto, Executive VP of Technology Strategy and Business Transformation at TELUS. He explains that 5G is not just another “G”, but a fundamentally different mobile network unlike anything we’ve experienced. It will transform businesses and provide limitless possibilities for average Canadians.

Opioid deaths are on the rise in Canada, with 2020 setting record highs. Dr. Mark Tyndall is an epidemiologist, infectious disease specialist, as well as the former head of the BC Centre for Disease Control. His current focus is on addiction, drug overdose and policy and he’s pulling back the curtain on his work to talk about the importance of harm reduction and how a little compassion can go a long way in supporting vulnerable Canadians.

CBC Dragon, tech entrepreneur and Club Penguin creator, Lane Merrifield is back to talk about how to be a successful entrepreneur and make a difference in the world at the same time. Lane believes the best business ideas have social innovation at the core, are born from change and crisis and are critical to Canada’s economy. He also gives our listeners insider advice on how to get from idea to execution, while sharing stories of his own beginnings.

Dr. Samir Sinha is the director of geriatrics at Sinai Health in Toronto and a passionate advocate for seniors. He shares some sobering stats about the effect COVID has had on seniors and a new survey that reveals more than half of Canadians say the pandemic has changed their opinion on where they want to age. Recently, doctors have become proficient in delivering virtual care, giving seniors more options to live at home longer, so the time to rethink elder care is now.