Ninety seconds. That’s the amount of time an algorithm has to convince you to start your next binge-watching session. Lights, camera, inaction. Given its increasing monopoly over entertainment, Netflix seems to have perfected its tantalizing algorithm, seducing millions of people to endlessly consume the rabbit hole of tailor-made TV. “There’s n...

November 9th 2016 marked the ballot drop heard round the world. For Americans living abroad, homesick took on a whole new meaning as a President who fought for justice, dignity and unity was replaced by a fear-mongering, divisive, truth-denying plutocrat. But on the heels of Brexit and other displays of nationalistic protectionism across Europe,...

We’ve heard it for decades. Women’s empowerment and gender equity are key components in fighting poverty, realizing human rights, building stable societies, sustaining peace and promoting health. Arguably, both directly and indirectly, women’s empowerment is a contributing piece to all 17 sustainable development goals. And yet, this is an ...

You’ve arrived. Signs welcomed you and hundreds of others (for a while anyway). You have a temporary room. Temporary furniture. Temporary clothes. A temporary identity. Until your asylum decision is made. Then you move onto being semi-permanently temporary, sometimes living for decades as temporary citizens with stunted rights and privileges. ...

I happen to be Canadian by choice. My parents put in a conscious, thoughtful effort into deciding to move to Canada- a decision rooted in the values the country represented, including its role as a peace-maker, a protector of human rights, and a friend to the environment.  Fifteen years later, I can’t honestly say they would’ve made the sam...

Public health problems don’t exist in silos and neither do their solutions nor their outcomes. We have plenty of evidence to demonstrate the links between unhealthy environments, unhealthy people and unhealthy economies. These links are not one-way streets; they work in feedback loops, making it difficult to know where to intervene and how.  ...

It’s been a week since the 3rd Global Symposium on Health Systems Research, and I’m still puzzled by how it closed. It felt a bit anti-climactic that after a week of discussing why a systems approach– grounded in social justice, with enough attention paid to system complexities– is necessary to improve health outcomes in an effective and sus...