CPHA Centennial Conference, Toronto

Troubles began even before I set off on the train for Toronto. Rebecca phoned in great distress to say that one of her cats - her surrogate children - was acutely distressed so she had to take him to the emergency veterinarian clinic. The cat turned out to have widespread abdominal cancer and has now gone to the great catnip patch in the sky. His mortal remains repose beneath a flagstone beside the actual catnip patch in Rebecca's garden. We will have to tread softly as we pass by on the way to the patio table where we eat out so often in clement weather. When troubles come they come not singly but in whole battalions. Richard developed severe chest pain, was taken to the Ottawa Heart Institute where last night he had angioplasty and a stent placed in a coronary artery. I'll get the details when I return home. Meantime Wendy has been ably cared for by Jonathan and by at least one of our friendly and helpful neighbours. She has sounded very frail and old when I speak to her on the phone.

Meantime the meeting is going very well for the large numbers of public health specialists who are gathered in Toronto, ranging from some 250 eager young students to elderly has-beens like me. Many of the youngsters, students and others, seem to know who I am and want to shake my hand, take my picture, have me sign their books or even several of the books I've written or edited. I have so far spent most of my time networking with old friends and new friends, but have attended a couple of the plenary and smaller sessions where the standard of discourse has impressed me, especially when it's been the young comers doing the discoursing. There's hope for the future of public health in Canada with these bright, knowledgeable, altruistic and dedicated youngsters coming up through the ranks. A year or more ago I was one of a number of prominent Canadian public health specialists who submitted to a televised interview, and this is playing on large screens as part of the exhibits in the exhibit hall. As I've gone to and fro I've seen my time-ravaged face and my bright blue Ken Done sweater (from a bargain bin in the departure lounge at Sydney's Kingsford Smith International Airport more than 20 years ago) several times. The interviews have been well edited so our comments on each of the themes we were asked to discuss all appear together. It's not the best interview I've ever given but it's not the worst either. It's available at the CPHA Centennial website and I'll locate and add the URL to this post. Continuing this post the day after I started, I can report now that I performed to my own and as far as I could tell, everybody else's satisfaction on a topic with which I didn't feel at all comfortable. And this evenings Gala Banquet went very well too, with opportunities both to renew old friendships and make at least one new one, with a very impressive young woman who shows every sign of becoming a major figure in our field. What's more, she comes from New Zealand. Admittedly I am biassed in favour of New Zealanders for obvious reasons, and also because there are so many extraordinarily talented Kiwis in every field of human activity with which I'm acquainted, from dictionary-making to nuclear and abstract physics. So it's high time for yet another outstanding Kiwi to make her mark upon the world. Meeting her and seeing in her the next generation of public health leaders rising to prominence made this conference more worth while for me than otherwise it might have been. It's very reassuring to know there are very able newcomers entering our field -- this one is exceptionally well qualified -- who will carry on the good fight to protect, improve and enhance the prospects for all life on earth including the most predatory and destructive of all species, Homo so-called Sapiens. (In passing, let's reflect on how inappropriate that qualifier is, but that will have to be a topic for another post some time).

This is Public Health; A Canadian History, is available at http://www.cpha100.ca and I think the interview I contributed is part of this. I also played a rather prominent role in editing the work and wrote an Epilogue. But the credit for assembling and editing the work as a whole belongs to Sylvia Fanjoy and Sue Sullivan. They have done a magnificent job, and their combined effort is well worth reading in detail.