Episode 22 with Naheed Dosani

habibti please

This week, Nashwa sits down with Dr. Naheed Dosani, a palliative care physician and health justice activist who cares for homeless and vulnerably housed individuals. They speak about how Covid-19 is socially impacting different groups throughout Canada. Some topics they cover include vaccine hesitancy among some communities and how to combat it, and how Covid-19 has differentially impacted people throughout Canada based on social location. The two also discuss long-term care in Canada and current gaps in the framework. Dr. Dosani reminds us that it is indeed a privilege to #stayathome. They also discuss vaccine roll out. Despite precarious and dangerous working conditions for Canada’s migrant workers, they have no guaranteed access to the vaccine; we hope listeners become signatories of and share the Vaccines For All campaign to ensure full access to the vaccine regardless of immigration status. This episode features a number of resources that complement the conversation—please check them out below.

Mutual Aid & Community Support:

This week, the City of Toronto has filed legal action against Khaleel Seivwright, the Toronto tiny shelter builder. It is vital people push back by writing to their city councillors and showing solidarity with Khaleel as the City attempts to charge him for implementing a temporary measure to keep people alive this winter. You can see a statement from Khaleel here. If you live in Toronto please call, email, or tweet your elected officials to drop the charges against Khaleel for his tiny shelters, stop gap measures to keep unhoused people alive this winter. Every year, unhoused people die in the city and nothing changes, things seem to get worse. Khaleel not only helped give people tiny homes, he demonstrated the ways the community steps up and cares for each other in times of rising austerity and organized abandonment by elected officials. We hope more Toronto citizens call for charges to be dropped and are in solidarity with those who are fighting for housing in the city.

Additionally, here are further resources for communities within Toronto facing the results of increased austerity:

* RenovictionsTO is a volunteer-run organization that gives tenants the tools they need to organize and fight back against their landlords who are partaking in a renoviction.

* Keep Your Rent is another vital organization that offers Toronto residents a litany of resources to combat rent evictions.

* Evictions Ontario is yet another great resource for evictions—it also specifically offers a tracker to see where evictions are taking place across the province.

* Disability Justice Network of Ontario is a collective that aims to build a just and accessible Ontario through the dissemination of knowledge regarding issues that people with disabilities face—they promote change through legislative action; also, they support community members through a community caremongering program.

Additional Resources:

Readings and resources that complement this episode:

* Webinar: Panel on impact of changes to Medical Assistance in Dying on Black & Indigenous Communities an event supported by The Disability Justice Network of Ontario (DJNO), Inclusion Canada, Disabled Women's Network of Canada (DAWN Canada), Independent Living Canada, and the British Columbia Aboriginal Network on Disability Society (BCANDS).

* Marginalized communities concerned about changes to assisted-dying laws by Adrian Ghobrial

* We Are Not the Virus a podcast by Encampment Support Network

* Second wave for some, tsunami for others. Medical experts on why the Ontario government’s one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work by Dr. Suzanne Shoush, Semir Bulle, and Dr. Naheed Dosani

* Ontario's homeless 5 times more likely to die of COVID-19, study finds by Kate McGillivray

* Metro Morning with Ismaila Alfa - Feb. 24, 2021: Tell him I love him: Jennifer Jewell says the tiny shelter that Khaleel Seivwright gave her was better than a shelter

* Tiny Shelter Builder Khaleel Seivwright Asks Toronto to Drop Legal Action Against Him by Becky Robertson

* Working in long-term care by day, sleeping in a shelter by night: The economic realities of life as a PSW by Elizabeth Payne

* Ontario teenager's death sign of pandemic 'human rights catastrophe,' newcomer advocates say by Jeremiah Rodriguez

* Behind Closed Doors: Exposing Migrant Care Worker Exploitation During COVID-19 by The Migrant Rights Network

* 'People are being shown no mercy': Online evictions raise alarm in Ontario by Holly McKenzie-Sutter

* Toronto Must Defend People Experiencing Homelessness by Canadian Civil Liberties Association

* COVID-19 hit federal prisons twice as hard in 2nd wave of pandemic, report says by Kathleen Harris

* Doctors for Justice in LTC

* Doctors for Defunding the Police

Guest Information:

Guest of the week: Naheed Dosani

Dr. Naheed Dosani is a palliative care physician and health justice activist, he is presently on faculty at the University of Toronto and McMaster University.

Find Naheed online!

Instagram

TikTok

Twitter

Production Credits:

Hosted by Nashwa Lina Khan

Show Music by Johnny Zapras and postXamerica

Art for Habibti Please by postXamerica

Production by Nashwa Lina Khan and Johnny Zapras

Production Assistance by Raymond Khanano and Ali McKnight

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