Juno News - Activist doctor misleads Albertans on Smith’s gender policies

00:00:00.000 Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is still coming under fire for her recent transgender policies.

00:00:05.580 Most recently, an Alberta doctor says the policies contributed to his trans nephew's suicide. How

00:00:11.440 did this happen? The nephew, in this case, was an adult in his late 30s. The Premier said that she

00:00:16.620 will ban sex reassignment surgery as well as hormone therapy for most minors in the province.

00:00:22.060 But she did promise to increase trans care for adults so they don't have to travel to Quebec.

00:00:27.240 The doctor, in this case, has long been critical of the United Conservative Party government and is

00:00:32.580 now requesting a meeting with the Premier. Maybe Danielle Smith and the Conservatives 0.83

00:00:37.740 aren't the ones politicizing the trans issue after all. I'm Rachel Emanuel and this is the Alberta Roundup.

00:00:43.360 Taking a look at our first story here. An Alberta doctor who has long been critical of the United

00:00:58.540 Conservative Party government is requesting a meeting with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith,

00:01:03.700 saying that her recent transgender policies pushed his trans nephew over the edge. David Keegan's

00:01:09.640 nephew was 37 years old when he committed suicide. Keegan is a family physician and a doctor of family

00:01:16.480 medicine at the Cummings School of Medicine at the University of Calgary. Take a listen to what he

00:01:21.540 had to say to City News following his nephew's suicide.

00:01:24.080 This shouldn't have happened. It was chosen. This is not the kind of way our province should be. You

00:01:32.620 know, I think people get really up in arms about compassion and stuff, but compassion is real.

00:01:38.260 Every single person in Alberta deserves to live. Every single person in Alberta deserves to be here.

00:01:44.440 Every single person deserves their medical conversations to be with their physicians and

00:01:49.880 to be private and to be without the intrusion of politics. While the Premier announced that sex

00:01:54.960 reassignment surgeries would be banned for minors and that hormone therapy would be banned for those 15

00:01:59.620 and under, she actually announced that there would be more aftercare for trans adults, so they no longer

00:02:05.000 have to travel out of province for care. The activist doctor has lamented the state of healthcare in the

00:02:09.700 province for a few years now. In September 2022, Keegan filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights

00:02:15.300 Commission over the federal government's decision to lift mask requirements on airplanes. The

00:02:20.620 following June, he created a crowdfunding campaign to file a court injunction against Alberta Health

00:02:25.740 Services' plan to lift its facility mask mandate. A few months later in December, Keegan wrote a column

00:02:31.880 for the Calgary Herald titled, Why I Chose Alberta and What Went Wrong. At the time, he wrote, quote,

00:02:38.020 I've been here almost 16 years. Something has gone wrong with Alberta in this time. The wisdom that

00:02:43.800 seemed to anchor Alberta's decision making has been thrown out, replaced by refusals to address the

00:02:48.480 opioid crisis, advance truth and reconciliation, and ensure we have strong health and education systems

00:02:54.120 for all. And for what? To save a bit of money in the very short term and enable some companies to

00:03:00.060 extract as much as they can while downloading costs to families in the future. A month later, a January

00:03:05.820 article from the Red Deer Advocate covered how Keegan wears a ribbon he made from duct tape to, quote,

00:03:11.440 represent how Alberta's healthcare system is barely being held together. Smith didn't comment on whether

00:03:17.600 she would meet with Keegan, but directed City News to the Mental Health Helpline. We also found that a

00:03:22.660 David Keegan of Calgary donated to the Alberta NDP in 2021, giving him $350. The activist doctor in

00:03:30.140 question in this case did not respond to a request from True North confirming whether the donation was his.

00:03:35.320 Moving into our next story here, following a measles outbreak across Canada, Alberta Premier

00:03:40.440 Danielle Smith is encouraging parents to get their child the MMR vaccine, which protects against

00:03:46.340 measles, mumps, and rubella. The Premier said that uptake for the MMR vaccine has dropped by about

00:03:51.500 seven points to 72 percent, and she called that drop concerning. Take a listen.

00:03:56.220 And so we want to make sure that people understand that this is available and that we hope that they look

00:04:03.400 at the risk because the risk of consequences for measles can be very, very high. So I'm glad to

00:04:10.360 see that the rates are still high and we haven't seen a problem, but it is an active discussion with

00:04:14.960 our health minister about how we can make sure we get the word out so people know how to be able to

00:04:18.780 get the vaccination for their kids. Earlier this week, 17 cases of the measles were confirmed across

00:04:23.540 Quebec, Ontario, Saskatchewan, and British Columbia. Moving into our controversy of the week,

00:04:28.320 Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said that recall legislation currently being used in an attempt

00:04:33.560 to unseat Calgary Mayor Jody Gondik is a little unfair to voters because the bar is so high.

00:04:39.640 Here's what else she had to say. We have made the bar 40 percent of total population. So if you think

00:04:46.820 about that, in a city like Calgary, that means that for a successful campaign to proceed, it would

00:04:53.100 mean 500,000 signatures. And I believe the mayor got 177,000 signatures in the general election.

00:05:01.180 The premier said it seems a little unfair that the recall legislation includes everyone,

00:05:05.360 including those under the age of 18, as well as those who are not eligible to vote because they

00:05:09.900 are not citizens. Smith said the legislation is currently under review, but that there won't be

00:05:14.820 any changes while there is a live recall campaign ongoing. Petitioner Landon Johnston agrees the

00:05:20.380 criterion is ridiculous. In an interview with me on this show a few weeks ago, you guys might have

00:05:24.860 seen it. He said that it is statistically impossible to get enough signatures. Take a listen.

00:05:30.380 It's impossible. It's just statistically impossible. Even if you had unlimited resources, unlimited helpers,

00:05:38.440 the pool of signatures is like 630,000 potential Calgarians that can sign this, but that doesn't

00:05:47.700 take into account, like there's like 30, 40, 50,000 Calgarians who do not speak English. So like you have

00:05:57.760 to find people that can communicate with those people. Moving into what we're watching in the weeks

00:06:02.880 to come. Last week, we discussed how Ottawa kiboshed the Alberta government's request to track safe supply

00:06:09.540 drugs through chemical tracer. Alberta mental health and addictions minister had requested the federal

00:06:14.540 government add a chemical tracer to safe supply drugs so that the government could see where they're

00:06:19.560 ending up on the streets. Ottawa said that wouldn't be possible. This week, the RCMP revealed that

00:06:24.760 thousands of opioid pills obtained by prescription through so-called safe supply harm reduction programs

00:06:30.120 were seized by police in Prince George, BC after they were found to have been diverted to organized

00:06:35.260 crime groups reselling them across Canada. Corporal Jennifer Cooper of the RCMP's Prince George

00:06:40.280 Detachment said, quote, organized crime groups are actively involved in the redistribution of safe

00:06:44.880 supply and prescription drugs. Many of the pills that were seized had been prescribed to specific

00:06:48.940 individuals, but were found all collected together, no longer belonging to those individuals. It might

00:06:54.520 mean how we regulate our safe supply might need a sober second glance. The corporal also said the issue

00:06:59.680 has emerged in recent months, adding, quote, what we have seen in Prince George is people taking

00:07:04.200 prescribed medication, some of which is dedicated as safe supply prescription drugs, and selling them to

00:07:09.260 organized crime groups in exchange for more potent illicit drugs. The organized crime groups are then

00:07:14.540 taking the prescription drugs and selling them interprovincially across Canada. Alberta Premier

00:07:18.840 Daniel Smith responded to the recent news on X, reminding the province that she had asked Ottawa to

00:07:23.860 place those chemical tracers in the drugs so that so-called safe supply drugs could be more easily traced

00:07:29.240 by the province. She added, quote, we can't have high potency opioids distributed as safe supply flooding over

00:07:36.360 the border and into Alberta communities. This needs to stop now. No level of government should be helping

00:07:41.080 criminals peddle deadly drugs on our streets. And moving into our weekly comment roundup and taking

00:07:45.660 a look at some of the comments left under last week's Saturday's episode. Our first one is from user

00:07:50.240 Napoleon Hosweg, writing, quote, might be an unpopular opinion, but I love how much more cynical and

00:07:55.900 condescending you have become, Rachel. Our government is full of people who don't compromise and believe they

00:08:00.720 should control the fate of everyone. They refuse to find a middle ground, no matter how one may try.

00:08:05.700 We saw this with Smith. Since the day she got in, she has been trying to work constructively with the

00:08:10.220 feds and to no avail. The time for pleasantries has passed. Too many of our people's lives are on the

00:08:15.200 line. I chuckled at this comment and it's definitely very true. I remember when I graduated university and I

00:08:20.060 was just starting out work in mainstream media. I wasn't nearly as conservative then as I am now,

00:08:24.880 but I remember thinking that Justin Trudeau was sort of a misguided ideologue. And I've come a long

00:08:30.360 way since then. I actually do believe he is trying to actively destroy our country with the policies

00:08:35.100 that he's putting in place, whether it's because he wants a job for the UN afterwards, or maybe he

00:08:39.760 wants to be Klaus Schwab's butler, or maybe he just thinks by destroying our country, he and the liberals

00:08:45.040 can stay in power longer. I'm not sure, but I certainly no longer believe that he is just misguided

00:08:49.780 as I once did. Taking a look at the next comment here, Andrew Brown says, quote,

00:08:54.400 Canmore charges its homeless rent to sleep outside. I feel like you would fit right in. Alberta throws its

00:09:00.020 homeless under the bus and it's only gotten worse since UCP came in. It's very telling that my

00:09:05.600 concern for the rising homelessness and addiction is being perceived by you as not supporting

00:09:10.180 homelessness. I actually don't support homelessness because I believe we can offer these people a

00:09:14.260 better life. They don't need to stay addicted to drugs. There are treatment options available.

00:09:18.340 I believe we should continue to build on those treatment options and encourage these people to get

00:09:22.820 into a treatment facility so that they can have a good life. Living on the streets is not a good life.

00:09:27.240 These people are able to get treatment to hold down a job and to have their own apartment or their own

00:09:31.380 house and to have a beautiful future where they have relationships with people. For some reason,

00:09:35.740 you think the best we can offer these people is a nice cold spot on the ground and I think that says

00:09:39.600 more about you than it does about me. Okay everyone, that's all I have time for today. As always,

00:09:43.740 please like this video and subscribe to True North if you haven't already. You can also head over to

00:09:48.400 donate.tnc.news if you want to support our work. Thanks so much for tuning in. I'll see you guys on

00:09:53.200 Wednesday. God bless.

Juno News - March 09, 2024

Activist doctor misleads Albertans on Smith’s gender policies

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