Skully White operates a gourmet hot dog stand — Lullys Food Experience — in a Canadian Tire parking lot in Abbotsford, B.C. Tim Hiscock is a long-time customer. . . . “One day,” White told Glenda Luymes of Postmedia, “his wife called me up and said he had some medical issues and I wasn’t supposed to feed him without her permission.” . . . One thing led to another and now, on Dec. 14, if all goes according to schedule, White will be giving Hiscock one of his kidneys. . . . White and Hiscock have become friends through all of this, with Hiscock referring to them as the doctor and Frankenstein. “I’m the doctor and he’s Frankenstein,” Hiscock told Luynes. . . . That story is right here.
The QMJHL has seven Quebec-based team bubbled in Quebec City in the hopes of rattling off a number of games in a short period of time. It all was scheduled to open on Tuesday with the Drummondville Voltigeurs meeting the Quebec Remparts. But the QMJHL has been forced to adjust the schedule after there was an inconclusive test on a member of the Drummondville organization. . . . So now it’ll be the Shawinigan Cataractes meeting the Remparts in the bubble opener.
Jack Finarelli, aka The Sports Curmudgeon, weighed in on NCAA basketball and football in his Monday musings that can be found right here. Here’s part of what he wrote:
The NCAA has decreed that the college basketball season will commence on 25 November; that is nine days from now. Given the public health data and the trends extant today where there are almost 100,000 new cases of coronavirus infection tabulated each day, it would seem to be only a matter of time until college basketball games run into the same fate that college football games have encountered. The college football season is a mess; it is only a matter of time until the college basketball season faces the same reality.
Moreover, there is another thing that is very wrong with the NCAA’s messaging with regard to COVID-19:
- Public health officials have warned for months about the need for social distancing and mask wearing as actions that can slow the spread of the virus.
- Public health officials have determined that close contact involving cheering, singing and heavy breathing encourages the spread of the virus.
- NCAA football games violate virtually every one of those public health warnings and when you add “field-storming events,” tail-gating and post-game celebrations/commiserations you realize that the NCAA is enabling super-spreader events every week.
COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .
CBC News: Manitoba announces 10 more COVID-19 deaths and 392 new cases of COVID-19. That’s just below the province’s average from the previous 7-day of 407.
Global News: In Steinbach, Man., the local hospital is so overcrowded with COVID-19 cases, that nurses are having to triage patients in their cars.
CBC News: 181 new cases of coronavirus reported in Saskatchewan, same daily total as reported Sunday. Compares to province’s previous 7-day average of 157.
CBC News: Number of COVID-19 cases in Nunavut jumps with 6 more in the hamlet of Arviat and 2 in Rankin Inlet. Total is now 26 in 3 different communities, even though the 1st case in the sparsely populated territory was diagnosed just 10 days ago.
CBC News: Alberta is reporting 20 new COVID-19 deaths in the past 24 hours. This is by far the highest daily increase in deaths since the pandemic began. The province also reported 860 new COVID-19 cases and had a positivity rate of about 7 per cent.
Lethbridge Herald: Alberta reports 860 cases Monday — 10,031 active cases — 264 in hospital, 57 of those in ICU — 20 additional deaths reported for a total of 427 fatalities.
Tina Karst, CJOC/CKBD Lethbridge: There were 41 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Lethbridge over the weekend. With recent recoveries there are now 168 active cases in the city.
Troy Gillard, rdnewsNOW: RedDeer now has 116 active cases of COVID-19, up from 94 on Friday.
CBC News: B.C. is reporting 1,959 new cases of COVID-19 and 9 additional deaths over the weekend.
CBC News: New Brunswick reports 8 more COVID-19 cases, a significantly high daily number for the province, which is experiencing a recent surge. By comparison, there were 13 cases in the previous 7 days.
CBC News: 25 additional deaths in Quebec are being attributed to COVID-19 as the province reports 1,218 new cases. That’s virtually unchanged from the previous day’s total of 1,211. The province’s 7-day average is also fairly consistent, moving to 1,326 from 1,318.
CBC News: Ontario has 1,487 new cases of COVID-19. That’s the 11th straight day above 1,000, and pushes the 7-day average to 1,442 from 1,408. 508 new cases are in Toronto, 392 in Peel Region and 170 in York Region. The province is also reporting 10 more deaths.
The 2021 Beanpot Tournament, which is played annually at Boston’s TD Garden, has been cancelled. It was to have been played on the first two Mondays of February. . . . The men’s hockey tournament normally features teams from Boston College, Boston U, Harvard and Northeastern. . . .
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) cancelled it’s men’s and women’s hockey seasons on Monday. In the men’s game, there now are nine NCAA Div. 1 teams whose seasons have been cancelled.
There is some interesting news from Mayo Clinic that should have some impact on the process of attracting living kidney donors.
From Mayo Clinic’s news network:
“Mayo Clinic has a rich resource of kidney biopsy material in its Aging Kidney Anatomy Study, led by Andrew Rule, M.D., a Mayo Clinic nephrologist. A new study of living kidney donors at Mayo Clinic in Minnesota and Arizona from 1999 to 2018 has found some microstructural features that can indicate some long-term susceptibility for chronic kidney disease in otherwise healthy adults.
“The study, published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, reinforces that kidney donation is safe for living donors, and it provides new insights for counseling donors on how to take care of themselves and preserve kidney function, according to Naim Issa, M.D., Mayo Clinic transplant nephrologist.”
There’s a whole lot more right here.
——
If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:
Living Kidney Donor Program
St. Paul’s Hospital
6A Providence Building
1081 Burrard Street
Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6
Tel: 604-806-9027
Toll free: 1-877-922-9822
Fax: 604-806-9873
Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca
——
Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney
Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre
Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street
Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9
604-875-5182 or 1-855-875-5182
kidneydonornurse@vch.ca
——
Or, for more information, visit right here.
TAKING NOTE 