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The author reports that U.S. Centers for Disease Control officials are concerned by evidence suggesting Clostridium difficile is spreading out of hospitals and into the community. Cases have already penetrated communities in Quebec, Canada. Massive overuse by hospitals of a class of antibiotics known as fluoroquinolones favored the genetic selection of a tougher form of the bacterium. Hospital spread and case studies are discussed.

The article discusses the outlook for an avian influenza epidemic and the public fear that is being generated. The world's leading flu experts, including the World Health Organization, are warning that avian flu could become an apocalyptic nightmare. This month, Ottawa will host a major international conference to discuss preparations. Helping to accelerate bird flu mania is a growing band of flu bloggers--techno-agitators and armchair epidemiologists who see each new flu report or update as a call to arms, and use their blogs as a medium to inform and scare the daylights out of each other. There is a tremendous amount of hysteria for something that hasn't even happened--and may never happen. Fear has become the epidemic--and safety, or our perceived lack of it, an obsession. Perhaps what's most unsettling is that the definition of what it means to be safe keeps changing. This minute, it means having an ample supply of Tamiflu. Experts are saying that when an outbreak occurs, there will be a critical global shortage of the drug. Governments and multinational corporations are frantically stockpiling it. Ordinary North Americans and Europeans have taken to creating survivalist flu blogs and building their own anticipatory stashes. In Canada, people can't rely on their doctors to give it to them for pre-emptive use because Tamiflu is only licensed by Health Canada for use as a treatment of flu infections that have actually set in. So, in recent months, dozens of websites like Canadian Drug Delivery have sprung up to offer Tamiflu by circuitous means. Bioethicists point out that hoarding a drug that is in precious supply globally poses a bit of a dilemma. It may very well sit unopened in medicine cabinets until well beyond its expiry date--while people in high-risk parts of the world scramble to get their hands on a single pill.

This article focuses on the number of Canadians who are fans of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (Nascar). Mucker Chambers from Saint John, N.B., made the 12-hour pilgrimage to the Pocono Raceway in Long Pond, Pa. With the start of the race less than 12 hours away, there didn't seem much point in sleeping. Up went their Canadian flag. It would be "awesome" if NASCAR came to Canada, Chambers says. "I mean these guys take our hockey players, right? Why not bring the racing to us?" A lot of Canadian NASCAR fans have the same thing on their minds, wondering when the continent's premier stock-car racers will head north. Because right now NASCAR, firing on all cylinders, wants to grow the Canadian market. Landing a Nextel Cup event, NASCAR's premier series, is a long shot. But the Busch Series, the No. 2 circuit in the U.S., is looking a lot more promising. NASCAR oversees three national series: Nextel, Busch and another called Craftsman, for trucks. In March, Busch staged a race in Mexico City, the first NASCAR-sanctioned contest outside the United States that counted toward its driver championship. "I don't know why the hell we don't race in Canada," says Rusty Wallace, the veteran Nextel driver for the No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge. "We're already at Michigan International Speedway." So, in Canada by when? "Oh boy," sighs Robbie Weiss, NASCAR's Los Angeles–based managing director of international operations. "Hard to say. You'd like to think by 2007." NASCAR's Nextel Cup calendar is packed, though, and Canada's window of opportunity, because of the weather, is tight: only June, July and August. In Canada, NASCAR is the No. 1 televised motorsport. This year's Daytona 500, the Super Bowl of stock-car racing, drew an average of 506,000 viewers per minute on The Sports Network, more than double the 240,000 who watched when TSN last televised the contest two years ago.

Highlights several Canadian people and things worth celebrating in light of Canada Day. Popularity enjoyed by junior hockey after the National Hockey League ended its 2004-05 season; Recommendation to visit the Canadian War Museum as part of celebrating Canada Day; Decrease in the value of the Canadian dollar known as the "Loonie"; Estimated number of whooping cranes world wide, noting some of the endangered species were hatched at the Calgary Zoo using artificial insemination; Canadian actresses that can be seen on prime time television in America; Statistics indicating the success of Tim Hortons' coffee shops; Level of foreign aid from Canada to the region affected by 2004's Indian Ocean tsunami; Details of the breakthrough's at Canada's National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg related to the treatment of Ebola and Marburg viruses; Appreciation of the book "Three Day Road," by Joseph Boyden; Assessment of the bipartisanship in the Canadian government; Appreciation for behavioral neuroscientist Brenda Milner.

This article focuses on the development of drugs and therapies to fight cancer. There are more than 200 different types of cancer affecting humans, and scientists expect no single cure will ever be found. In 1998, Patrick Lee, working out of the University of Calgary, published a groundbreaking study which showed that a common cold virus, called the reovirus, is capable of killing cancer cells. In the process, he helped open what is fast becoming the newest front in the war against one of the world's most deadly diseases. The problem is it takes only a small amount of virus to cause a cold, but, to treat cancer, hundreds of millions of viral particles have to be injected into the bloodstream or the tumour itself. On the survival front, the broad prognosis today is much improved over a generation ago, especially for women with breast cancer and men with prostate cancer, two of the most common forms of the disease. The same holds true for a variety of other cancers, including melanoma, Hodgkin's disease and cancer of the uterus, cervix, thyroid, testis and male bladder. There are only a handful of these medications approved for clinical use in Canada, though others are being tested in trials. Iressa, as well as earlier drugs like Gleevec (for chronic myeloid leukemia), target a chemical receptor called EGFR that helps the cancerous cell grow and spread. Herceptin, also a targeted monoclonal antibody, is used to treat breast cancer. However, in 2000, Genentech, Herceptin's manufacturer, wrote health-care providers to warn them of 62 post-marketing reports of serious adverse reactions, including 15 patients who died, some after experiencing an acute reaction in their lungs. INSETS: TRACKING TUMOURS WITH A FORENSIC MIND;THE ODDS;THE BIG ONES;BREAKING THE CHAIN

This article discusses the issue of importing Canadian prescription drugs to the United States and its impact on the presidential elections in November 2004. It's been running since the summer in U.S. newspapers and magazines and is based on what happened when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration replied to spam from a website offering prescription savings from north of the border. Therein lies the strategy of the big pharmaceutical companies, the FDA and the Bush administration. Question the safety of importing Canadian prescription drugs, and question it often--and protect a U.S. market worth a whopping US $200 billion a year, even from their own increasingly irate citizens. Staunching the flow of cheaper brand name drugs from Canada--where they can cost up to 80 per cent less than in the U.S. because of federal regulations here and the weaker Canadian currency--is good only for short-term profits, argues Rost. Opening the market further to U.S. states, or even the Costcos and Wal-Marts of the world, adds MacKay, would be ruinous for exporters because Canada simply doesn't have enough drugs to supply that kind of surge in U.S. demand.

This article profiles Canadian comic Tom Green. When we met recently, Green was out of work, other comedians had stolen his thunder, and he'd been through a well-publicized divorce from Drew Barrymore that had left a bad taste. The New Tom Green Show debuted on MTV last June. Audience numbers in the U.S. were good to start, more than 800,000 viewers. But by the time MTV cancelled three months later, the figures had sagged to 200,000 and change. Green believes the network could have done more to support the show. But he says ultimately it wasn't a good fit given the preponderance of MTV's 12- to 18-year-old viewers. "I realized I don't want to just do some of the crazy, shock, gross stuff that I did in the beginning of my career," he says. "I want to broaden myself." But what else does Green expect to be known as? So, is Tom Green done? Seems unlikely. In January, he completed a handshake-and-autograph tour with U.S. soldiers in Iraq. He's just finished a book about his career, Hollywood Causes Cancer, due out in September, and he's writing a screenplay.

This article describes the pressures faced by family physicians in Canada. After your spouse and perhaps a close friend or two, your next most intimate relationship could easily be with your family doctor. A survey by "Maclean's" in partnership with "The Medical Post" reveals a vast chasm between doctors' attitudes toward themselves and their jobs, and their patients' understanding of them. By telephone, we quizzed 1,000 patients nationally on what they thought of family doctors and the care they're getting. Four out of five family docs feel their status has diminished over the past decade. While money clearly is at the root of a lot of doctor dissatisfaction, patients have a decidedly different take on that issue. And four out of five say their ability to see patients in a timely fashion has worsened over the past decade.

Our battered planet has many wounds, World Wildlife Fund Canada notes this week in its first-ever 'Nature Audit,' a 104-page document subtitled 'Setting Canada's Conservation Agenda for the 21st Century.' The wide-ranging study, borrowing from the world of accounting, tallies Canada's natural capital. It takes stock of our present-day environmental "equity," and compares what's left to the situation prior to European settlement, circa 1500-1600. The 'Nature Audit' concludes that the way we've accounted for nature in the past -- by basically ignoring its destruction -- is a recipe for bankrupting biodiversity. Still, there's room for optimism -- if we're prepared to take action. Several industries and individuals are already finding sustainable solutions to our seemingly perpetual problems. Plans for the gas pipeline in the pristine Mackenzie Valley are taking the environment and Aboriginal peoples into account as never before in this country. To build on this momentum, we have to get away from the myth that Canada is a sprawling swath of untouched landscapes. Despite repeated government promises to turn things around, the natural environment is under siege all across inhabited Canada. In the spring 2000 federal budget, then-finance minister Paul Martin asked an independent advisory body, the Ottawa-based National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, to devise indicators to track the impact that our century-old economic practices have on our natural and human assets. In a report released on May 12, the organization called on Ottawa to make profound changes to the way it keeps the books. To account for the true state of the economy, the report says, federal budgets need six additional indicators -- air pollution, water quality, wetland extent, forest cover, greenhouse gases, public education -- to add meaning to popular yet insufficient indicators like gross domestic product.

Canadians are more than ready for summertime, when the living is, well, easier. We've grudgingly learned to live with the viral scourge from China called severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) as it landed a body blow on the health-care system and our economy. As the weather warms, the backyard and the lakeshore by the cottage could become hazardous to your health. Mark Little was one of the 307 confirmed victims of the West Nile virus in Ontario last year, a figure some experts consider a gross underestimate. Seventeen Ontarians are known to have died. Quebec, the only other province hit hard, had 16 cases and one death, while Alberta reported treating two patients who contracted West Nile outside its borders. An emerging and poorly understood health threat in North America, West Nile put Little, a fit, then 37-year-old electrician in the Lake Erie town of Port Colborne, out of commission for a month. Authorities in Ontario were saying West Nile affected mainly the elderly and those with compromised immune systems. Diseases like West Nile used to fall under the heading of geographic medicine, says Dr. Kevin Kain, director of the Centre for Travel and Tropical Medicine in Toronto. West Nile turned up in birds, mosquitoes, humans and horses in parts of New York, Connecticut, New Jersey and Maryland by late 1999.

As Canadians anguish over how to protect themselves from severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), health authorities take note of what went wrong. All around Hong Kong, people go about their business in masks. The economy's losing tens of millions of dollars, commuters shun public transit and the World Health Organization (WHO), in a rare move, says stay away unless a visit is absolutely necessary. One high-rise apartment tower has been emptied, its residents quarantined in special camps built on the outskirts. The city is trying to come to grips with SARS, the mysterious ailment, likely viral in origin, that had stricken 761 people there, and 2,354 in 18 countries worldwide, by last week, killing at least 85. As labs worldwide--including Health Canada's maximum-security facility in Winnipeg (page 24)--pressed the search for the cause of SARS, the WHO maintained a global health alert, calling for any patient with atypical pneumonia to be isolated and imploring a jittery world to be watchful. In Canada, another global hot spot with more than 180 suspected and probable cases and eight deaths (with a ninth under investigation) by the end of last week, health authorities stress that the risk to the general population is extremely low. There are no non-urgent transfers of patients between health-care facilities, and in the Toronto region, elective surgeries are cancelled and some clinics closed. INSET: HOW A NEW DIESEASE STALKED THE GLOBE.

Claire Lewis, the daughter of John and Brenda Lewis, experienced eye problems and headaches.The following week, a neurosurgeon told the family Claire's problem was a benign tumor at the base of her brain, near the pituitary gland. While there were risks, there was also the strong expectation that the surgery would leave Claire completely cured. In fact, it was a success. But then Claire's caregivers at Hamilton's General Hospital, and in particular those at McMaster University Medical Centre's paediatric intensive care unit, committed a series of errors while she was recovering under their watch, after which Claire died. Administrators and staff at Hamilton Health Sciences did not meet with the Lewises until four months after Claire died. Six months after she died, the hospital took responsibility for Claire's death and wrote the family an apology. Middle managers told the couple the hospital's death review committee had concluded that Claire died from complications associated with the operation.The Canadian government was expected to form a national quality commission on health care in time to receive the safety report, says Dr. John Millar, a committee member and a vice-president at the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI). Dr. Philip Hébert, a family physician and bioethicist at the Sunnybrook & Women's College Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, says the country's medical colleges and some hospitals are struggling to develop better safety policies. Since Claire died, the administration has taken several steps--medical records must now travel with patients; staff have been re-educated regarding DDAVP use and electrolyte balance; transcribed drug orders must be word perfect; staff have been urged to pay closer attention to family concerns; senior administrators are to be advised as soon as possible of events involving unexpected harm or death.

Presents the results of a national survey of health problems in Canada. Rates of mental illness; Rise in asthma, high blood pressure, diabetes and arthritis; Epidemic levels of obesity; Incidence of pain and discomfort; Alcohol consumption; Number of Canadians who rated their health as excellent or very good; Increase in life expectancy; Possibility that life expectancies may begin to decline after decades of improving health care; Money that Canadian are willing to spend for their health; Air quality; Life expectancies for rich people.

Focuses on obesity among children and camps for overweight children in Canada. Way that obese children are insulted and hurt by their peers; Percentage of boys and girls in Canada who are overweight; Diseases such as diabetes which can affect obese children; Way that children may lose weight, including watching less television and playing outside more.

Presents the fourth annual 'Maclean's' ranking of healthcare services in Canada, which includes data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information on where Canadians are most likely to survive a stroke. Discussion of how the health regions are divided into three categories for analysis, including communities with medical schools and rural communities; Suggestions for improving health care. INSETS: HEALTH CARE'S VITAL SIGNS;HOW THE RANKING WAS DONE.

Discusses Friesens Corp., Triple E Canada Ltd, and C.P. Loewen Enterprises Ltd. in rural Manitoba that were started by Mennonite families. Discussion of the Mennonite faith, which grew out of the Anabaptist reform movement with a focus on charity and the community; Reputation of the faith as generating talented and hard-working people; Details on Friesens publishing company, Triple E gas company, and window constructor Loewen; Ethnic diversity of the companies.

Discusses life expectancy and quality of life for elderly Canadians. Development of a disability-free life expectancy by the Canadian Institute for Health Information and Statistics Canada; Social conditions, such as education, employment, and poverty which contribute to life expectancy; Efforts of people to stay healthy and able-bodied, including homeopathic treatments; Causes of elderly disability, including heart problems following a heart attack.

Discusses Canadarm2, also known as Space Station Remote Manipulator System. Importance of the robotic arm to the International Space Station; Explanation of how the arm works and its mobility; Canadian involvement of the International Space Station.

Discusses cell phone usage in Canada. Prediction that the popularity of cell phones is growing; Technological advances; The use of cell phones is social settings; The hazards of driving while speaking on a cell phone. INSETS: ANSWERING THE CALL;Brains and cells, by Mark Nichols.

Discusses the potential takeover of Canada Trust (CT) by Toronto Dominion Bank (TD). President and chief executive officer of CT Financial Services Inc. Edmund Clark; His views on the importance of customer service; Worry that customer service will decrease after the merger; Need for British American Tobacco PLC and Imasco Ltd. stockholders to approve the offer because they control CT; TD chairman Charlie Baillie; Finance Minister Paul Martin's approval needed. INSET: Wooing the consumer.

Focuses on employment in Canada as of May 31, 1999. Importance of feeling challenged and making an impact on a person's job satisfaction; Reasons for ambivalence and discontent, including stress; Details of a study by Aon Consulting Inc., an international human resources consulting firm, on the attitudes of employees; How employers can improve work conditions and satisfy employees; Comments from Caroline Armstrong and others.

Discusses the crash of Swissair Flight 111 off the coast of Nova Scotia. Investigation of the crash; Details on victims; Efforts of area residents to search for survivors; Background on the Boeing MD-11 aircraft; Search for reasons for the crash which is daunting. INSET: A terrible toll.

Discusses how seven nuclear plants have been shut down in the wake of a stunningly critical study in Canada. Impact of the report, written by a six-member team of United States nuclear experts led by Carl Andognini; Examples of allegations in the report involving seven of Ontario Hydro's 19 CANDU reactors; Resignation of Ontario Hydro Chief Executive Officer Allan Kupcis.

Discusses circumstances surrounding the ice storm that struck Canada on January 5, 1998. How the cities of Montreal, Ottawa and communities from Kingston, Ontario to Nova Scotia's Annapolis Valley resembled battle zones; The power failures at the hospitals, the failure of traffic lights, the closing of the subway system, and the radio and television station's loss of their broadcast signals; One of the greatest ironies of the storm. INSET: Blame it on El Nino, by Mark Nichols.

The article ranks universities in Canada and focuses on the University of Waterloo which retained its number one position on the Comprehensive Ranking list. Waterloo is internationally recognized for the unparalleled success of its more than 100 undergraduate and graduate co-op programs, which place more than 11,000 students in paying jobs with roughly 3,500 employers annually. President David Johnston notes that Waterloo accounts for 22 per cent of all the technology-transfer companies spawned by research at Canadian universities, and in its brief history has created more than 250 companies. One of the most dramatic success stories belongs to Mike Lazaridis, the university's chancellor who once studied engineering at Waterloo, and, most notably, invented the BlackBerry and founded Research in Motion Ltd. Waterloo was good to Lazaridis, and he's shown his gratitude, donating $50 million to his alma mater's Institute for Quantum Computing. Other universities included on the list are Victoria, Guelph, Simon Fraser, and Memorial.

This article discusses the efforts of Canadian health minister Ujjal Dosanjh to put an end to the Internet pharmaceutical industry in Canada. Despite recent and mildly conciliatory words about not wanting to put the kibosh on a $1-billion-plus business, Dosanjh has made it abundantly clear in the past month he is prepared to take on Canada's Internet pharmacies. Canadian companies selling prescription medication to U.S. patients they've never seen is unethical, argues Dosanjh, and could lead to drug shortages and cost increases in Canada. He's mulling the creation of a registry to track drugs that are running low. His all-out offensive follows Bush's visit to Canada in early December, when the President raised the issue of Canadian drugs undercutting U.S. retailers with Prime Minister Paul Martin. If the Internet drug trade went under in Canada, up to two million Americans would find themselves without a ready source of affordable medicines. Because of government price controls here, the same drugs from Canadian pharmacies -- many originally shipped north from their U.S. manufacturers -- can cost anywhere from 40 to 80 per cent less than from their U.S. counterparts. Manitoba employs the most Internet pharmacy workers in the country, with other provinces -- primarily British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick -- bringing the total number of workers nationwide to about 4,000. Early this month, the Commons Standing Committee on Health requested the health minister not act until committee members had a chance to study the Internet pharmacies, which, despite their name, do the vast majority of their business by fax, phone and the mail. For workers in the business, the uncertainty is taking its toll.

This article presents observations of a group of Canadian army reservists on a weekend training exercise. There's nothing quite like the deafening rat-tat-tat bursts of machine-gun fire to focus your attention. Kris Karpinski had ordered his men--and three women--to hold their fire until he started the ambush with a burst from his own rifle. Today there are more reservists serving Canada overseas than at any time since the Korean War: 276 in Bosnia, 119 in Afghanistan, and a handful in missions in places like Sierra Leone and Congo. The training exercise began on a Friday evening, with about 30 infantry members assembled at the Moss Park Armoury in downtown Toronto, home to the 48th Highlanders. Raymond Morrell, 28, seated on the floor in the armoury's parade hall, looked up from a ration serving, or individual meal packet in army bafflegab, and tried to explain what he was doing. The practice mission required the platoon to attack an observation post, then move on to the bridge The platoon spotted an enemy truck, but seemed to be intent on creeping off into the woods away from the vehicle. I decided, inexplicably, it would be all right to wander over and fraternize with the enemy. The next thing I knew I was under attack.

Looks at World Youth Day, which was held in Toronto, Ontario in 2002. Pilgrims which arrived in Toronto from a number of countries; Journey of Pope John Paul II to Toronto for the event; Opposition to the church from groups such as Challenge the Church.

Focuses on the rise in methadone-related deaths in Ontario. Concerns of Dr. James Cairns, Ontario's deputy chief coroner, over the growing numbers of youths who are using methadone; How Cairns is investigating deaths involving methadone; Expansion of Ontario's methadone program for drug addicts; Background on methadone and its risks; Accounts of methadone-related deaths.

Examines the telecommunication industry in Canada as of August 2001. Success of iMagicTV Inc., which offers video-on-demand television services; Trend of companies attempting to offer several services over a single network, for a single bill; Outlook for the industry.

Reports on the Canadian video game industry as of June 2001. Projected growth of the video game market which will be caused be the release of the Nintedo GameCube and the Microsoft Xbox; Focus on Silicon Knights, a Canadian video game developer; Outlook for the industry.

Discusses contaminated drinking water in Canada as of May 21, 2001. The health risks associated with waterborne bacteria, viruses, and protozoa; The identification of several waterborne diseases; Discussion of Cryptosporidium, E. coli 0157:H7, Norwalk, Shigella, Giardia, and Toxoplasma; The public demand for governmental water regulations in Canada.

Reports an investigation that confirmed that Canada Customs inspectors routinely allow pirated merchandise to enter the country unhindered. Duties and taxes collected on the illegal merchandise; Legislation which does not give customs agents at the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency the authority to seize pirated merchandise; Comparison of the number of seizures made by the International Anti-counterfeiting Coalition in the United States to those made by Canada Customs.

Reports on the unrest that unionized workers all over Canada are feeling as anger about the continuation of corporate downsizing and renegotiation of contracts has threatened their jobs. Number of strikes that occurred in Canada during 1998; Expected disruptions that could take place in British Columbia and Quebec; Concerns expressed by the National Federation of Nurses' Unions.

Discusses the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory in Inco Ltd.'s Creighton Mine outside the Northern Ontario city of Sudbury. Cost of the project; Physicist Duncan Hepburn being the site manager; Organizations that are paying for the project, including the Canadian government and the National Research Council of Canada; The agreement of scientists that the research has Nobel Prize potential; When the existence of the elusive neutrino was first postulated; Contact points for more information. INSET: How to `see' a neutrino.

The article discusses the adverse effects of Depo-Provera and the use of the injectable contraceptive in native women in Canada. The pharmacological sterilization of First Nations and Metis women with Depo-Provera, while temporary, is nonetheless raising serious health--not to mention ethical--concerns among community leaders, physicians and academics. Doctors suggest Depo-Provera's use among Canadian Aboriginal women is between 10 and 20 per cent of those who practise contraception. Caroline Tait, who teaches women's and gender studies at the University of Saskatchewan, worries Depo-Provera is being prescribed to Aboriginals without proper monitoring. Both Health Canada and Pfizer Canada caution that just because someone reports an adverse reaction doesn't prove the medication is responsible. Maclean's randomly picked 30 women from the Health Canada drug database, their claims included such side effects as cervical cancer, vaginal hemorrhage, suicidal tendencies, depression, panic, weight gain, lethargy and nausea.

This article focuses on the study of astronomy in Canada. Canadians are masters of the universe. Sure, the U.S. leads the world in spending on space research, laying out roughly US $7 per American each year, while Britain, France and Germany budget between US $4 and US $5 for every citizen. Canada spends just US$1 per capita, less even than Australia. Yet by one important measure -- the confidence of their peers -- Canadian astronomers produce some of the best astrophysical science on the planet. Thomson Scientific, a Philadelphia-based information clearing house, reported Canadian scientists published 4,836 research papers on space in the past decade. Those studies in turn were referenced 76,921 times in other scientific papers, for an average citation rate of 15.91. If one were to list Canada's 150 most cited scientists from the many different fields of study, about 15 would be astronomers, say Jaymie Matthews, associate professor of astronomy at the University of British Columbia. William Harris, a frequently cited astronomer at McMaster University in Hamilton, likens the Canadian success to a talented student making a movie with next to no money. The young director is forced to be innovative. Lack of funding has forced scientists to pick their projects wisely, observes Ray Carlberg, an astrophysics professor at the University of Toronto. Last year's most quoted paper -- cited 1,058 times -- mapped the radiological afterglow of the big bang, in the process helping confirm theories of how the universe came to be. What Canada lacked until only recently was the ability to make observations from space. That changed with MOST, a suitcase-sized, $10-million rocket-borne telescope that was blasted into space in 2003. Backed by the Canadian Space Agency, MOST has already outlived its life expectancy and has another two, maybe three years to go, says Matthews, the project's mission scientist.

This article discusses how retail company Victoria's Secret may be destroying the habitat of the caribou in Canada in order to create its catalogs. Victoria's Secret, the U.S. purveyor of much bodacious lingerie, is struggling to assuage critics who accuse it of contributing to the demise in Canada of the threatened woodland caribou. Victoria's Secret prints and mails, on average, well over one million catalogues a day to promote its form-enhancing women's undergarments, sleepwear and clothing. But according to ForestEthics, a San Francisco-based environmental watchdog, about 25 percent of the paper in those catalogues comes from trees felled in Canada's virgin boreal forest, where the caribou live. Last fall, ForestEthics launched a cheeky ad campaign dubbed "Victoria's Dirty Secret." Featuring an arresting photo of a woman in a black merry widow wielding a chainsaw, it calls on the public to pressure the company to stop using paper from endangered forests, to use more recycled paper, and to stop publishing so many catalogues. Anthony Hebron, spokesman for Limited Brands, the Columbus, Ohio-based parent company of Victoria's Secret, says its catalogue practices are changing.

This article discusses the way that health officials in Canada are preparing for a possible breakout of the avian flu. For months now the warnings have been relentless: the avian flu, rampaging through Southeast Asia, could morph into some sort of monstrous microbe. Currently, this particular strain has devastated commercial poultry flocks in Vietnam, Cambodia, South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, Japan, Hong Kong and large parts of China. This much is true: H5N1 has a lot of people worried, and for a host of good reasons. Still, a significant segment of the health-care community questions whether this particular bird flu will be the one that triggers a pandemic. Neither the flu nor the threat of a pandemic should be taken lightly, says Dr. Richard Schabas, chief of staff at York Central Hospital in Richmond Hill, Ont., and a former chief medical officer of health for Ontario. Earl Brown, a University of Ottawa professor who specializes in flu virus evolution, says that while H5N1 concerns him, suggestions it could kill one in six people on the planet are way out of line. The 1918 Spanish flu killed so massively because of circumstances unlikely to repeat themselves, argues Paul Ewald, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Louisville in Kentucky. The H5N1 strain was first discovered in Hong Kong in 1997, where six of 18 hospitalized patients died. Infection was linked to bird farms and markets teeming with live poultry. There have been three serious pandemics in the past century: 1918 and two milder outbreaks, which nevertheless killed millions, in 1957 and 1968.

This article focuses on the use of alternative energy sources in Canada. Collectively, our best bet in meeting our Kyoto obligations seems to depend on the willingness of individuals, government and industry to conserve more -- and go whole hog on clean and renewable energy. Now, Canadians face the challenge of finding the right mix of energy alternatives, from wind to geothermal to solar. On the geothermal front, Manitoba has been aggressive, with 650 new heat pumps installed last year, up from 512 in 2003 and 190 in 2000. Governments at all levels, says John Bennett, a senior policy adviser with the Sierra Club of Canada, have to make a conscious effort to back renewables. Although some people consider windmills eyesores, wind is the fastest growing source of electricity in the world. Where to get new energy is a hot-button topic in Ontario. Everyone can chip in, by conserving more -- and by getting inventive.

This article presents a profile of the Sault Ste. Marie Group Health Centre in Ontario, Canada. Her regular family doctor wasn't available, so restaurateur Rosetta Sicoli acted on the recommendation of an acquaintance and tried Sault Ste. Marie's Group Health Centre. With 58,000 registered patients on its roster, its strength lies in the full spectrum of what it offers under one roof--from family physicians and specialists to laboratory services, a pharmacy and an eyeglass dispensary--and its impressive degree of personalized care. Health czar Roy Romanow has cited the Sault model as the way of the future. Her two elderly parents, who speak only broken English, get almost all their care at the centre, and their doctors phone Sicoli to update her on their conditions. One of the first larger facilities to get into electronic record-keeping, Group Health's file-searching capabilities have improved treatment for diabetics and helped cut hospital readmissions for congestive heart failure by at least 30 per cent, says Dr. Lewis O' Brien, a family doctor and the lead physician in the electronic data project.

The article reports on surprising popularity of ice hockey in the sunny U.S. state of California. The game Canada exported to the south is undeniably popular. There are 34 million inhabitants in California, including as many as one million Canadians. This Canuck contingent is a significant source of hockey fans, rec-league warriors, and parents who want to sign up kids to play a game that brings back memories of home. Their deep-rooted enthusiasm for hockey rubs off on Americans in a state better known for tan lines than blue lines, and where in so many ways, really, hockey has no business being. And yet, the game thrives. California's three National Hockey League teams are doing relatively well at the box office. The game's current success in the state likely would not have been possible without Brantford, Ont.'s No. 99. "You talk to absolutely anybody, and everyone will tell you the exact same thing," says Cassar emphatically. "Hockey? No one even knew what it was till Wayne Gretzky came to town." [Actor Kiefer] Sutherland and [Television producer Jon] Cassar are great ambassadors for the game. Sutherland does promotional TV spots for the NHL. Cassar is so enthusiastic he keeps a stick and tennis ball in his office (Sutherland borrowed Cassar's stick when the TV crew that shot a recent NHL promo showed up without one).

This article focuses on the efforts of Brantford, Ontario to remediate eight neglected industrial sites. History of the area as a farm equipment manufacturing center; Amount of money building owners owe in back taxes.

This article discusses the efforts of Canadian neighborhoods to clean up toxic waste and pollution.Known as brownfields, they are typically littered with abandoned buildings, all sorts of rubbish, leaking tanks and rusting drums of "could be anything." Some brownfields are so far gone--like the infamous tar ponds in Sydney, N.S., and the uranium mine tailings by Lake Athabasca in Saskatchewan--that no authority wants to touch them.

It was not what health-care officials had hoped for, to say the least. Only a week earlier, one of Health Canada's leading authorities on infectious diseases had speculated that SARS -- severe acute respiratory syndrome -- might actually be "easy to control." How quickly things change. By last week, the numbers had more than tripled, and SARS had infected hospital workers who worked far away from the departments where patients were being treated. While it still looked as if only close contact spreads SARS, health authorities directed more than 1,000 people possibly exposed to the mysterious virus in Toronto to be quarantined in their homes. Don't panic -- that was the word from just about every health official who had anything to say. The progress of a potentially fatal disease with no known cause and no cure created fertile ground for public apprehension, not to mention a run on sales of surgical masks. Canada was definitely a hot spot in the world outbreak of SARS, its confirmed cases reaching 28 in and around Toronto, and one in Vancouver. There have been three deaths from SARS, all in Toronto. Still, doctors in Ontario stressed that last week's surge in numbers was among health-care workers who tended SARS patients before anyone knew they should be taking precautions -- wearing a mask, gloves and a surgical gown. Health Canada noted that all Canadian patients had travelled to Asia or had contact with SARS cases in the household or in a health-care setting. Health Canada toughened its travel advisory, recommending that Canadians not fly to affected regions, particularly around southern China. Ottawa was also considering a request from the World Health Organization to screen all passengers flying out of the country for SARS. International efforts to identify what is believed to be a viral agent behind the outbreak continue, with Hong Kong researchers suggesting the bug belongs to the coronavirus family, known for causing the common cold.

THERE'S A RESIDENTIAL neighborhood in Windsor's west end that's a pleasant collection of middle-class bungalows and 1 1/2-storey A-frames built soon after the Second World War. There, a short walk from the Ambassador Bridge linking the southwestern Ontario city to Detroit, some three dozen 40-year-old ash trees line California Avenue -- but they won't for much longer. City forester Bill Roesel surveys the devastation caused by a voracious Asian beetle that is choking his ash trees to death. The emerald ash borer, discovered just this year in Michigan and, two months later, in Windsor, is munching mercilessly through Windsor's 6,000 ashes, and may already have spread east and west. An immediate concern: whether it will reach Point Pelee National Park, a spectacular sanctuary for migrating birds poking into Lake Erie just 50 km to the southeast. A federally imposed quarantine forbids the shipment of ash firewood, wood or trees from Windsor and four surrounding municipalities where the borer has so far been located. Authorities charged with stopping the invasion are considering felling every ash in a five-kilometer strip around the quarantine zone in a bid to contain the damage. If the defence strategies don't work, the experts warn it could get as bad as the dutch elm disease that decimated those stately trees across North America. With no natural predators, and thriving on trees with no effective resistance, the emerald ash borer has been free to spread. If it isn't stopped, the biggest impact will likely be felt in urban landscapes in Eastern Canada, where the trees are widely used to line streets, and to a lesser extent on the Prairies, where ash is sometimes used as a windbreak.

Discusses a controversy over online Canadian pharmacies which are selling drugs to people in the U.S. Idea that drugs cost less in Canada than they do in the U.S.; Business of Internet pharmacies in Canada; Involvement of physicians with the industry.

Examines environmental conditions and problems in nature during the summer of 2002. West Nile virus, caused by mosquitoes; Spraying for mosquitoes in Winnipeg, Manitoba; Asian carp fish in the Mississippi River; Droughts in Canada; Warnings about air quality, humidity, and heat; Global warming caused by burning fossil fuels and effects on weather; North American consumption of energy reserves; Climate change; Rain and flooding in central Europe; Toxic cloud over southern Asia.

Focuses on the Children's Exercise and Nutrition Centre in Hamilton, Ontario, which is run by the Hamilton Health Sciences Corp. and McMaster University. Way that obese children may attend the center and experience summer camp; Teasing of overweight children by their peers; Eating habits which are encouraged at the camp, including smaller portions.

Focuses on the Keele Valley Landfill in Ontario, which is closing down because it has reached its capacity. Efforts of the city of Toronto to find a different location to transport garbage to; Plan to dump waste in Michigan; Outlook for a curbside recycling program for organic materials; Use of composting and garbage screening in order to reduce waste.