Saskatchewan was panned Thursday over its high infant mortality rate by the author of a new article in the journal Paediatrics & Child Health, wrote the Leader-Post (Regina, Sask.) Jan. 22.
In his article, “The health of Canada’s children: Part 1”, released Thursday, York University Professor Dennis Raphael, of York’s School of Health Policy & Management, in the Faculty of Health, cites a 2008 Statistics Canada report pegging Saskatchewan’s infant mortality rate at 8.3 deaths per 1,000 live births, the highest of any province.
“Saskatchewan has this dubious distinction. The single best indicator to represent the health of the population is infant mortality,” Raphael said in an interview Thursday.
Factors affecting infant mortality include the growing gap between rich and poor and the child poverty rate, he said. The article also pegs Canada’s child poverty rate well below average.
Canada has 15 per cent of its children living in households with less than 50 per cent of the Canadian median income. Denmark, Finland, Sweden and Norway all come in at five per cent or less. “We are not doing well in terms of taking care of everyone,” Raphael said.
Paul Quarrington’s father taught at York
Paul Quarrington, 56, a beloved Canadian writer, musician and screenwriter, passed away early yesterday at his home in Toronto after a heroic battle with lung cancer, wrote The Globe and Mail Jan. 22.
Quarrington was the middle of three sons born to professional parents, who also had one daughter. His father [Professor Emeritus Bruce Quarrington, who died in 2001] was a professor of psychology in York University’s Faculty of Health [from 1969 to 1989].
Music prof will help adjudicate north Durham festival
The 53rd annual Sunderland Lions Music Festival is returning on Valentine’s Day, Sunday, Feb. 14, continuing until Thursday, March 4, wrote the Uxbridge Times-Journal Jan. 2. This year’s adjudicators include Professor Bill Thomas (instrumental), currently associate chair of the Department of Music in York University’s Faculty of Fine Arts.