Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 4h

I know right!!!!!!!!!

Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 6h

I’m thinking of the fire safety demo that took place in my ICU last winter where the unmasked Occ Health worker made sure to emphasize that using a fire extinguisher is an AGMP. In an ICU where everyone had Flu A and no one was masking.

NB COVID info @nbcovidinfo.bsky.social · 8h

Asking NS’s official health AI about airborne transmission, aerosols, etc #NSPoli

Screenshot of asking NS health AI if Covid is airborne. Is Covid airborne?
Wednesday, 10:02 a.m.
0 COPY
• Nova
Wednesday, 10:02 a.m.
The primary method of COVID-19 transmission is through droplets, which quickly settle on surfaces within two meters. However, airborne precautions are used during aerosol-generating medical procedures (AGMPs) to minimize the risk of transmission. More information on AGMPs can be found here.

Screenshot of asking NS health AI about aerosol transmission. Tell me about aerosol transmission
Nova
Wednesday, 10:02 a.m.
Airborne transmission occurs when airborne particles remain suspended in the air, travel on air currents, and are inhaled by others nearby or some distance away from the source. Control of airborne transmission requires control of airflow through special ventilation systems and the use of respiratory protection.
An aerosol-generating medical procedure (AGMP)
is any procedy
production of
+ Go to bottom
aerosols of va
roplet nuclei.
Examples of AGMPs include bronchoscopy

Screenshot of asking NS health AI if breathing generates aerosols You
Wednesday, 10:03 a.m.
Does breathing generate aerosols?
•Nova
Wednesday, 10:03 a.m.
While normal breathing does produce some droplets, activities like talking, screaming, coughing, or sneezing produce larger droplets.
Labour and delivery are also not considered aerosolized events. Aerosol Generating Medical Procedures (AGMPs) are specific medical procedures that generate aerosols.

The AI claimed that breathing generates fewer aerosols than AGMPs so I tried asking for more info. How many aerosols are generated by breathing compared to an AGMP?
0 coPY
Nova
Wednesday, 10:04 a.m.
To best answer your question, could you clarify what context you're interested in? For example, are you concerned about a specific medical setting or a particular activity? #NSPoli

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NB COVID info @nbcovidinfo.bsky.social · 8h

Holy F. NS health is using an AI chat bot called Nova and their recent Facebook post encourages people to ASK THE AI CHAT BOT about their SYMPTOMS. This is absolutely wild. www.yourhealthns.ca #nspoli

YourHealthNS

www.yourhealthns.ca

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Conor Browne @brownecfm.bsky.social · 12h

4. This utterly mistaken but seemingly widespread belief that Covid-19 has somehow gone away is precisely the inevitable result of declaring the pandemic to be over and tacitly allowing people to take that declaration to mean that SARS-CoV-2 has magically disappeared.

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 7h

Seconded. I get a lot of shocked looks and surprise from healthcare workers in particular when I tell them Covid is still around. People have no idea.

Conor Browne @brownecfm.bsky.social · 12h

3. ... my feeling is that their illness *genuinely is a mystery to them*.

This is precisely what happens when a concerted effort is made by governments, public health, and the media to downplay or erase Covid-19.

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Conor Browne @brownecfm.bsky.social · 12h

1. I've had a surprising number of conversations about Covid-19 over the past week or so, all sparked by the fact that I was, as always, wearing an FFP2 respirator. People in healthcare facilities, taxi drivers, people on trains and buses.

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 1d

This video is horrifying and I agree - drivers are so bad now. I’ve started making eye contact with drivers before crossing the street; between walking the dog and walking to work I have close calls several times a week.

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 1d

“Testing is only available at the direction of Occupational Health for staff who have had a high risk workplace exposure to Covid 19”

I would love to know how hospitals are defining this and I’ll say I’m nearly certain that wearing a surgical mask means you were “not exposed”

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 1d

Meanwhile, in healthcare, infection control policies have HCWs using surgical masks even when caring for a known Covid positive patient. And our unions aren’t saying a thing.

Bean & Sprout's Mom @beansproutsmom.bsky.social · 1d

"Blue medical masks and cloth masks are great at helping a sick person keep their germs to themselves. 🚨Only a proper fitting respirator, like an N95, KN95 or CAN95, protects the wearer from germs, especially diseases like COVID-19 and measles, which travel through the air."

😮 Pigs flew today!

The Tyee @thetyee.ca · 2d

The kids are back in school and so is COVID-19. 🏫🦠 #bcpoli #bced

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NB COVID info @nbcovidinfo.bsky.social · 1d

I feel fortunate to be alive at this time when I can learn from people like Link, and pass down these messages to my children. Community and caring and protecting others are the most important things.

borderless @borderless.bsky.social · 1d

Hear ye hear ye a message of hope and inspiration from our courageous leader in exile, Link. May all his loyal followers take heart!

I appreciate all the people showing love and support to me. I’m so grateful honestly. It means a lot. The ban isn’t that big of a deal for me. I think it was wrong and the explanation was bullshit. But that’s ok and I accept. Social media comes and goes. I’m grateful for all the connections I was able to make and all the people I get to be connected with off Bluesky. More importantly, the world needs more people to give a fuck. More people to give a fuck about Palestinians, more people to give a fuck about disabled folks, more people to give a fuck about our queer and trans siblings, more people to give a fuck about Black liberation. The world, and Bluesky, is full of bootlickers who will do anything to avoid doing anything to upset the status quo. These people are cowards groveling to those in power in hopes of protection. I just hope people continue to show love and care and kindness. Mutual aid is so important. Give when you can, boost when you can. We only survive this together.

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Drop Site @dropsitenews.com · 2d

“I urge everyone to join the global uprising for justice, freedom, and equality. And to apply real pressure on our governments and institutions to fulfill their legal obligations to ensure human rights for everyone. We have truth, morale, international law, justice, love, history, solidarity with...

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Drop Site @dropsitenews.com · 2d

Greta Thunberg: "I could talk for a very, very long time about our mistreatment and abuses in our imprisonment. Trust me. But that is not the story. What happened here was Israel… continuing to worsen and escalate their genocide and mass destruction with genocidal intent, attempting to erase an...

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Da(N95)iella @sharpflower.bsky.social · 2d

Disappointed but not surprised that the only person not wearing a mask at the packed Long COVID exhibition event in Vancouver yesterday was the doctor who runs the pan-Canadian Long COVID network. I guess “masks required” didn’t apply to her.

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Julia Doubleday @juliadoubleday.bsky.social · 2d

Nobody has Long COVID, but everybody has brain fog, cognitive decline and memory loss. I talk about the overwhelming scientific evidence that COVID damages the brain, and the overwhelming social unwillingness to acknowledge it in my latest:

www.thegauntlet.news/p/when-will-...

When Will the Lion Concern Himself

Joking memes make light of the uncomfortable reality: everyone's got a little of that post-COVID brain damage these days

www.thegauntlet.news

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 4d

Love this idea

Michael Rancic @therewasnosound.bsky.social · 7d

31 DAYS OF HORROR! every day this month i'm going to recommend a different horror film available through Toronto Public Library, via streaming services Hoopla or Kanopy.

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C.H. Romatowski @chromatowski.bsky.social · 4d

Want to pull out this slide: people deserve to know there’s a growing mountain of evidence finding more Covid infections = more likelihood of being left chronically ill.

There’s a temptation to think that if you recovered ok last time, then you will next time too, but that’s not what the data say.

Researchers in Spain assessed over 190,000 participants, using data from a public health research network, in a study published in the journal Vaccines. They found that Long COVID prevalence was three to 10 times higher in individuals with three or more reported infections (about 600 people in the dataset) than in those with only one infection.

They also found that the number of thrombotic events, including strokes and pulmonary embolisms, in people under 60 doubled from 2020 to 2024, in both people who were and weren’t vaccinated. The authors concluded that policymakers should prevent the spread of SARS-CoV-2 and that healthcare workers should continue wearing protective masks.

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Da(N95)iella @sharpflower.bsky.social · 5d

There are many other important things happening but Public Health is Dead took home Gold at the W3 Awards in Science & Tech for our work on Something’s in the Air: The Airborne Transmission Error with @ukhadds.bsky.social and Katie Randall. Feel free to let a public health leader near you know.

Graphic for Public Health is Dead podcast episode showing an old black and white engraving of Icarus falling on top of a background of a green and gold microscope image of H5N1. There’s a gold sticker on the bottom left identifying it as a 2025 Gold Winner at the W3 Awards

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 4d

😂

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Tim Onion @bencollins.bsky.social · 5d

I am just so fucking proud of her.

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 4d

Yeah this is really gross

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 5d

Thanks for this important book @georgemonbiot.bsky.social and @peterhutchison.bsky.social!

Colour photo of the book Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism by George Monbiot and Peter Hutchison. A pug dressed as a turtle is in the background.

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Preorder Read This When Things Fall Apart @mskellymhayes.bsky.social · 5d

I’m on the ground at a prayer vigil near the Broadview ICE facility outside Chicago.

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Ottawa Citizen @ottawacitizen.com · 7d

Ottawa's Clarence Street supervised consumption service discontinued ottawacitizen.com/news/ottawa-...

Ottawa's Clarence Street supervised consumption service discontinued

Ottawa Public Health needed the endorsement of Ontario's Minister of Health to get a federal exemption — but didn't get it.

ottawacitizen.com

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 6d

Healthcare is so far off the rails that I’ll admit I sometimes struggle to see how we get through this. People don’t even mask around heart transplant patients in my ICU.

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Kristin Meekes @kmeekes.bsky.social · 6d

I wish I’d had my Aranet with me because the testing room is so hot and stuffy but of course that is completely ignored 😵‍💫

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