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The Current Transcript for July 28, 2022

Host: Anthony Germain

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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SOUNDCLIP

So I put myself in the place of where the gay activists were who were suffering terribly from this mysterious disease. And I said, What would I do if I were in their shoes? And I came to the conclusion that I would do exactly what they were doing.

ANTHONY GERMAIN: He calls it one of his greatest lessons of when Dr. Anthony Fauci was a leading AIDS researcher in the 1980s. He faced intense criticism from activists. But instead of tuning them out, he tuned in. In a half hour, Dr. Fauci reflects on what he learnt during that crisis. And then.

SOUNDCLIP

I felt frozen. I couldn't move. And I couldn't think. And I would just freeze because why? Why would he be doing that to me? It just didn't make sense.

AG: Journalist Anna Maria Tremonti couldn't understand why a man she loved was hitting her. And as the abuse at home intensified, it became harder to keep it all a secret. In an hour, we'll continue her CBC podcast. Welcome to Paradise, sharing her story of intimate partner violence. But first, how to make your message stick. I mean, really stick, glue and all. I'm Anthony Germain in St John's filling in for Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

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Climate protesters resort to stronger tactics to get the world’s attention

Guests: Emma Brown, Roberta Lexier

AG: Well, this summer has rolled in record temperatures, raging wildfires, massive storms, all factors in the climate emergency. And with these intense climate related events, activists are changing how they try to hold policymakers accountable.

SOUNDCLIP

Ladies and gentlemen, we are sorry for the disruption. Leonardo da Vinci said, I was with all the scientists, all the queen of communication. And now, more than ever, in this day and age, communication of the truth. I know the experience of humanity during these times of catastrophic climate change is needed now more than ever.

AG: What you were hearing, there were activists who were gluing themselves to Da Vinci's Last Supper. In recent weeks, other similar demonstrations have taken place, as well as interruptions during the Tour de France and other large sporting events. The British Grand Prix. Gluing hands to gas pumps, plus barricaded streets and rail lines. Well, these disruptions are an escalation from the marches and gatherings we've come to see over the past few years. Emma Brown is with Just Stop Oil, a coalition of climate activist groups that's been using some of these alternative tactics. And she is in Glasgow. Hello.

EMMA BROWN: Hello, Anthony. Thank you for having me on your programme.

AG: Emma, your friends, some of your fellow protesters, they glued their hands recently to a 19th century painting by Horatio McCulloch called My Heart's in the Highlands. I was unfamiliar with this. I Googled it. It looks like a beautiful painting. Why was this something that your group felt was necessary to do?

EMMA BROWN: I mean, we chose to kind of connect with that painting in particular, because at the moment there are kind of parallels that we can draw, that you've got oil and gas companies and logging companies that are ruthlessly pursuing their own moneymaking interests at the expense of the people who live and work on these lands. And I work in an IP myself. I went to art school, and I think we really all need to be kind of taking a look, a humble look inside ourselves and looking at the kind of work that we're doing. And if we're working to, for example, preserve these objects, we need to be realistic about the fact that the future we're conserving them for at the moment doesn't currently exist. And the the children that are coming around this gallery, if we're doing nothing to stop the looming, terrifying future that they're currently predicted, that that needs to change. So going into alternative cultural and sporting events, as well as being nothing new in the history of civil resistance, is also really trying to mobilise people from different sectors of society to say, this is all of our business, this is going to affect our lives, our homes, our livelihoods. And we all need to be to be defending ourselves against some of these negligent decisions by our governments.

AG: I certainly hear the conviction in your voice, but you mentioned you're an art school graduate yourself. Why art? Because, you know, some of these things are rather delicate. Why? Why art? To make your point.

EMMA BROWN: I think is powerful. It's a powerful kind of symbol of what we hold as valuable in in our societies. And unfortunately so I know, for example, with just the oil, we've been blockading oil terminals and I know Save Art Growth have been doing similar tactics over in Canada. And we actually don't get as much media attention when we when we when we're actually physically blockading those infrastructures. We've been getting a lot more of our message out into the public. It's been picked up a lot more by the media when we do these acts that are seen as more controversial and some of those included, for example, blocking roads or blockading the the a formula one in the UK. And, you know, these are these are dangerous actions. And for me,as an art school graduate, I felt like all sectors of society need to be taking more of a stand. You know, and and I've been seeing a lot of exhibitions about climate change, and I just feel that is just not good enough. We need to be, all of us, using any power and influence. We have to directly critique these policies that are drawing us to extinction. You know, I think it's easy for us to to look at the environmental catastrophe and spend a lot of time kind of sort of shoe gazing and worrying about it or thinking what that means philosophically, when actually there's a lot of practical things that we can do to resist this. And that's why I felt like it was definitely worth targeting those institutions.

AG: After you, you and your group did what you did, you said in a news release that art is about telling the truth. But right now, when we need the most, art institutions are failing us. How how are those institutions, museums, how are they linked to, you know, the fight against oil companies?

EMMA BROWN: Well, historically, they've been accepting huge donations from oil and gas companies. But even now, I think this isn't the time. We've seen it a lot politically, but this is not the time to be sitting on the fence. Our institutions need to be coming out and supporting our demand. So in the UK we're demanding that the UK Government stop licencing to, for, you know, fossil fuel projects that they are planning in the pipeline up to 2025. So I think our institutions need to be taking practical steps. They could close, they could close and say we're not going to open until the UK government halts investing in new fossil fuel projects. Why can't they do that? I think we all need to be taking a kind of humble look at ourselves and say, why not? Why are we being so obedient to this system? Why are we carrying on with business as usual?

AG: I think, you know, country, the UK, Norway, Canada, a number of countries are saying, listen, we're trying to get to 2050, but your group says that's just too far down the future, right?

EMMA BROWN: I mean, we can look out the window. Does it look like we've got 30 more years?

AG: Fair question. Some cities, the answer would be definite no, others I think people are hoping it could be true. I wonder, obviously what you're doing works, Emma, because here you and I are on a national radio programme in Canada talking about what your group is doing. Any fear of a backlash? Because I looked at one video, I saw some people gluing their hands to a bought a cellie. And I don't mean the frame, I mean the actual painting. And I wonder if that, you know, the middle class and moderates sort of look at this and go, what are these people doing? Any concern about that?

EMMA BROWN: And we really don't have time to appeal to everybody here. You know, we know that we have a limited amount of time to stop the worst catastrophic effects and that that painting, they were glowing to the glass there. But in the in the context of what we're facing, like I was attracted to do this kind of work because it seemed to me to be acting like we're in an emergency. And what we're trying to do as just a cool, unsafe outgrowth is we're drawing lines about what we will not accept as citizens. And we we're defending those lines from corporate interests, the negligent governments, to say, no, you can't do this. And we kind of need everyone to help us defend them. So I know I've disabled both. The 82% of British Columbians agree. But this is the problem that agreeing isn't enough anymore. You know, we can't be clutching our polls, worrying about the glasses, the painting. We need to be physically putting our bodies in the way of the machine. Otherwise, unfortunately, we are ignored. And we've seen that. You know, I think people need to be tapping in as well as to that. You know, I know there's a huge amount of eco exciting eco depression out there. But I would say to your listeners, we need to be tapping into that eco anger. Why on earth have we got to this point in 2022 when we've known about this for 50 years? Why hasn't the B.C. provincial government banned the logging of old both yet? Why are the UK government still licencing new fossil fuel projects? Why are we having to tell them what to do and go to prison for it? You know, I think we need to shift the Overton Window and change the way that we're thinking about this and stop start questioning what we would do to protect our land, livelihoods and the people that we love.

AG: Right now is the is the goal here to attract more people? And I would suggest probably people who are younger than than yours truly, people of a different generation, to actually join in in these kinds of disruptive protest tactics. Or is it to really change the minds of people, or is it both?

EMMA BROWN: It's both. Definitely. It's both. I mean. It's not like the reason that I got involved. I'm 31 myself and I worked in the university library and one of the students gave me a flyer to come to this this talk, and it said, We're on it. And that's how the younger generation are feeling. And I would say to to you and to your listeners that are older than myself or the 20, I think we shouldn't be leaving it to teenagers and 20 year olds to solve this problem. We really all need to be getting behind that, that line that we are defending to say that as citizens, we are not going to allow you to do these, frankly, obscene policies. You know, so partly it is mobilising it's getting the message out there because unfortunately, compared to the oil and gas companies, we don't have that kind of money and that kind of advertising reach. This is one of the things that we are doing to to mobilise. It's also putting pressure on governments and we're trying to work toward this critical mass because at the moment I see this as an environmental problem, but more a political and social one. And we as people have power over our politics and our social structures. And that's where we need to be changing this mindset of obedience and really getting involved. So I would encourage everyone to come to the in-person discussion this Friday at Trout Lake Park in Vancouver or go to the Zoom calls with save old both and just listen to the people, because we're portrayed as oddballs, but we're just ordinary people and we've seen however many years of nothing working and we're determined to defend ourselves, defend you to defend future generations.

AG: Okay. I know that you're you have a day in court ahead. And for this gluing incident, do you plan on still doing these kinds of actions?

EMMA BROWN: I can't stop. Really? I mean, the the thing that that that changes is when I look at the trajectory that we're predicted or the track that we're currently on, whatever the British state does to me is not as bad as that. And I feel like I've got a kind of moral responsibility. And in a way, I mean, if you've seen the draconian protest laws that the UK Government are implementing, but first they laugh at you, then they're like, well, first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they crack down on you. It shows that what we're doing is working and then we win. So. So I'll keep going as long.

AG: Okay. Emma, appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very much.

EMMA BROWN: Thank you very much for having me.

AG: Bye bye now. That's Emma Brown. She is with Just Stop Oil, a coalition of climate activist groups and she was in Glasgow. Now, these disruptive tactics certainly get attention. They make headlines. But for more on whether they're actually effective and getting activists messages across, I'm joined now by Roberta Lexier. She's a professor at Mount Royal University in Calgary. Her teaching and research focus on social movements, activism and social change. Professor Lexier, good morning.

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Good morning. Thanks for having me.

AG: What goes through your mind when you hear about activists gluing their hands to paintings to convey a message?

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Well, I mean, I think it's a it's an interesting tactic. That's it draws on some interesting historical tactics that have been used before. And I think it's a really fascinating new strategy that that activists to turn to.

AG: Any sense as to why we're seeing this kind of tactic now?

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Well, I think it's pretty obvious why escalations have started. I think, you know, as your previous guest mentioned, if we look out the window, we can tell that the climate catastrophe is upon us and that, you know, nothing has really been done for, you know, the last few decades. And and so it's not surprising as we're seeing the consequences of a warming planet really hit us, that, you know, people are escalating their tactics to try and resolve this situation.

AG: Yeah, I think as Emma alluded to from a strategic or tactical point of view in newsrooms, it seems. Speaking as a person, the media every second day, somebody chaining themselves to a fence or something like that. So they have to find a new way. But gluing to artworks. Isn't there a risk there that you actually turn off public opinion rather than attract people to your cause?

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Yeah, of course. I mean, there's always the concern that the tactics that you choose as a social activist organisation might turn off potential supporters. But I mean, I think the reality is, is not every public protest or demonstration is intended to attract public, public attention or I mean public opinion and support. Sometimes demonstrations are not aimed at that particular strategy and are instead there to raise awareness, gain attention. And the kind of drawing in the public isn't necessarily the goal there. There's other ways and hopefully these organisers are doing the the work that has to happen behind the scenes, which is, you know, talking to people and and discussing with them the issues that are going on and the reasons why they're taking these actions. But in reality, not every public demonstration or social movement tactic is there to try and gain support or or build the movement in some sort of way.

AG: And I guess, you know, history has shown us certain movements that have used tactics that have a certain shock value to make their points. When we look to the past and the impact of disruptive kinds of protests, what examples come to your mind since this is your area of expertise?

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Yeah, one of the most important things I think to keep in mind is that change only happens when we force that to happen. You know, it doesn't happen just because we we ask nicely or because, you know, that things just just change for the sake of change. Disruption is really what what creates change. And I think we can look at a whole bunch of historical examples in Canada and around the world to see how escalations and tactics and disruptions can actually force the state or in this case, oil companies or others to make change. And I think, you know, some examples we might look at are on to Ottawa Trek in the 1930s during the Depression, which ultimately ended up in the murder of activists in Regina and the stop of the whole thing of that march. But actually in many ways forced the Government to realise that, you know, unemployed individuals during the Great Depression were actually suffering quite, quite dramatically and something had to be done. And I think it makes it clear by the time the Second World War starts that they're going to have to to develop some sort of social safety network to support people to prevent that from happening. I think we can also see it in the civil rights movement in the United States. You know, tactics like the Montgomery bus boycott, which we know quite well, the one Rosa Rosa Parks sparked in 1955, you know that the bus boycott wasn't intended to to gain support from from individuals. It wasn't it wasn't intended to to kind of mobilise the masses. It was intended to disrupt the system enough so that it would force change to happen. And and that's, in fact, what what happens, you know, when everybody stops taking the bus. Something has that has to change. And and, you know, we could come up with many examples to show that.

AG: I think Clark Watts sound in the early nineties. A lot of us remember the war in the woods. I think hundreds of people arrested more recently that the old growth logging protest at Fairy Creek with the hundreds of arrests. I was thinking of the suffragette movement with women in Britain breaking windows and women not knowing their place to try to get the vote. That sometimes these things are upsetting for the status quo at the time.

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Well, they have to be. I mean, that's the only way you make change, really, is if you let things just develop. They're going to stick with the status quo because that's what benefits the system and those who represent the system. And so that sort of work has to happen. I mean, the suffragette tactics were used again as well in Canada in the 1970s during the abortion caravan, which is a fascinating example of these young women who, you know, get into question period in parliament and chained themselves to the seats in the in parliament. And end up shutting down question period for the first time in Canadian history. And so, you know, these tactics are quite common and they've been used in the past not often in terms of art galleries and art in this sense. But, you know, I think this is a way this is an effective way for people to to make change.

AG: But what about those more traditional methods in peaceful marches, rallies protesting via the ballot box? Are those just not effective anymore?

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: I think that, you know, my studies of social movements and social change show that this stuff happens when everybody is working in concert together to try and effect change. So that means people working within the electoral system, people working without outside of the electoral system. And so, you know, those more traditional methods are still happening. They're still going on. You know, people are still taking oil and gas companies to court. People are still implementing petitions and letter writing campaigns. You know, candidates are running for election on climate platforms. Those tactics are still happening. But at the same time and on top of those, are these more sort of aggressive and assertive tactics. And I think, you know, what we've seen is real slow action. I mean, there's been nothing done for decades. And so I think it's pretty obvious that the sort of traditional asking nicely hasn't worked particularly well. And and we really are faced with the the urgency of this crisis. And so the tactics, of course, are going to escalate, I think, as we go forward. And I don't think those other tactics have been particularly effective as we've seen so far.

AG: So it put you on the spot. You're. What's your gut feeling of someone gluing their hands to a masterpiece to make a point?

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: I mean, I think it's important to acknowledge that they're not gluing their hands directly to the masterpiece. It's the frames in the glass. And so that's, I think, important. But, you know, I think that the point that they're trying to make is a really interesting one, which is that, you know, what's the point of all of these great masterpieces or these great pieces of art and literature and humanity and our, you know, human culture, if we're going to let it be destroyed by really greed and profit. And so, you know, it's not a tactic necessarily I would do, but I think it's a really fascinating one, one to approach. And I think, you know, civil disobedience, which is basically breaking the law to protest the law, is a really powerful and motivating form of social activism. And and so it may make people uncomfortable, but that's actually the point. And I think it can be a really good thing.

AG: Okay, Professor Lexier, thank you very much. Appreciate your time.

PROF. ROBERTA LEXIER: Any time. Happy to be here. Thanks.

AG: Roberta Lexier is a professor who researches social movements and activism at Mount Royal University in Calgary. The CBC News is next. And then.

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You got to listen to the involved communities. No matter what the disease is, no matter what is going on, you have to involve the community. To me, that's the greatest lesson.

AG: Coming up, what Dr. Anthony Fauci learnt from the HIV AIDS epidemic and how it still guides his approach to public health today. I'm Anthony Germain in for Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

People at risk of monkeypox need help, not stigma: Dr. Anthony Fauci

Guest: Anthony Fauci

AG: I'm Anthony Germain and you're listening to The Current.

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AG: Still to come, when the private becomes public. In episode three of her CBC podcast, journalist Anna Maria Tremonti shares how she struggled to keep the abuse she suffered at home a secret and what happened when the police were called. But first, lessons from the forgotten epidemic.

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AG: He has spent more than 40 years studying the most pernicious infectious diseases in the world. Dr. Anthony Fauci is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the United States. And since 2020, he has been one of the most public voices of the COVID 19 pandemic. In the 1980s, though, Dr. Fauci was on the forefront of research into another new infectious disease, the one we now know as HIV aids. This weekend, Dr. Fauci is a key speaker at the 24th International AIDS Conference in Montreal. It's a massive conference. AIDS 2022 will convene 15,000 scientists, policymakers and grassroots activists in person as well as virtually. Matt Galloway spoke with him earlier this week.

SOUNDCLIP

MATT GALLOWAY: Dr. Anthony Fauci, good morning.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Good morning. Good to be with you.

MATT GALLOWAY: Great to have you here. I want to ask about the conference in a moment, but let me start with what's top of mind for so many people, and that is this pandemic. You had COVID earlier this summer. How are you feeling?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: I feel really very good. I find myself very fortunate that I was vaccinated and doubly boosted. And when I developed COVID, I very quickly went on Paxlovid. And you know, given my age, I would have been on a higher risk for a severe outcome. And I think this is just a very cogent argument for the importance of getting vaccinated. And it and when you do and if you do get infected to have the availability quickly, early in the course to get a good antiviral that has an extremely good track record. I have been fortunate that I have no residual. Now that's good because some people do get a residual amount of fatigue or difficulty concentrating. I am just very fortunate that when I did recover, I recovered to the point of I never interrupted my responsibilities. I continued them online throughout the entire course and I really feel quite good now. I feel about as close to normal as I felt, so I don't really feel anything that's a residual of that. Again, I think I'm very fortunate because some people do go on to have residual symptomatology.

MATT GALLOWAY: Well, it it feels now like everybody knows somebody who has COVID. So where are we at in this pandemic? I mean, I know people have talked about this as a as a marathon. You're a runner. Are we now at the point where you can see the finish line or are you rounding the corner and suddenly it's Heartbreak Hill in front of you?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, you know, it really depends on what you look at as to the the the anticipation that we are going to just get completely rid of this, which we're not. And I think what we have to accept is that we're not going to eradicate this virus. We've only eradicated one virus in all of public health history, and that is smallpox. And the characteristics of smallpox are that it is a virus that doesn't change much at all. I mean, literally over decades, if not centuries. Number two, the immunity that you get from smallpox, either through infection or vaccination, is measured in decades, if not lifetime. And there has been historically a universal acceptance of vaccines. The same holds true for viruses that we've eliminated. And that's the reason why I don't think we are going to eliminate from any given country or region COVID for the simple reason that when you eliminated measles and polio, again, those were viruses that don't change much. I mean, I got measles as a child and the measles I got then is the same really as the measles that we have now circulating in some parts of the world. The other issue is that the vaccines and prior infection with measles or polio again confers. A protection against reinfection that is measured in at least decades and maybe lifetime. And we have a universally accepted vaccine programme. The difficulty we are now facing and have faced with SARS-CoV-2 is that we have a virus that continues to evolve and continues to get new variants. Some of the variants are strikingly different than the prior. Some are just minor modifications of it and the immunity associated with vaccines and prior infection. Although it does protect you reasonably well against severe outcomes leading to hospitalisations and death, it doesn't protect you as well over a period of time from infection. In other words, the protection wanes, whereas protection against measles and polio and smallpox back in the day didn't wane. All that means is, you know, a long way of saying we're going to have to learn to live with this virus, but hopefully to live with it at a very low level that doesn't disrupt the social order. Learning to live with a virus where you having several hundreds of thousands of new cases and thousands of deaths is not a level that you would find acceptable to live with. You want to get it to the lowest possible level not eliminate, not eradicate, but the lowest possible level. The lower it gets in, the less virus circulating, the less likelihood there will be mutations leading to another variant. So there are things that we can do in society by following public health measures, vaccination boosting at the point when your booster is due. Using testing to protect you and your family from inadvertently spreading it when you are infected. To use anti-viral drugs to prevent you if you're at a high risk to progress to severe disease. So that's what we're going to be looking forward to. We're not going to be looking forward to a complete eradication or elimination of this virus.

MATT GALLOWAY: You're part of this discussion this weekend on lessons learnt from the HIV AIDS response over the past 40 years and what we learnt that perhaps should inform a response to something like COVID. What did we learn from the HIV AIDS crisis that we should have employed during this pandemic?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, I mean, first of all, there were things that were common in HIV, the issue of the disparities in health during HIV. Like even currently to this day in the United States, you know, we have 13% of our population is African-American. And yet amongst the new cases, 44% are amongst African-American, mostly men who have sex with men, mostly young men who have sex with men. That is disparity in health accessibility and accessibility to testing, to counselling, the stigma associated with that. We're finding the same thing with COVID. If you look at the morbidity and mortality amongst our minority populations, it's significantly greater amongst the minority populations with COVID than it is with the general population. Some of the things that we did learn from from HIV applied to COVID was the exquisite amount of elegant science that has been put into the development of drugs. And even though we didn't have a successful vaccine yet for HIV, the structure based vaccine design that was perfected in many respects in attempting to develop a safe and effective vaccine for HIV was really the foundation for the success, the overwhelming success that we've had in the development of vaccines for COVID, in the sense of getting the proper immunogen design to use new platform technologies such as MMR, Renay. So there's been a back and forth in which what we've learnt through HIV has helped us in how we address COVID and some of the things we've learnt with COVID. I'm going to go now back in a retrospective way, particularly with regard to vaccine platforms like MRNA and help us with HIV. So it's a two way street. It goes both ways.

MATT GALLOWAY: When you look back at those early days, what were the big mistakes, do you think, that were made in terms of you were right at the front lines, but you also faced a lot of criticism early on from some of the activists, Larry Kramer and others, for what wasn't being done. And part of that's a government response, but part of it people depend on on health care as well. What were the big mistakes that you think were made when you look in the rear-view mirror to the early days of the pandemic?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: The early days of HIV, that mistakes were made. But I think one of the most important things that I feel good and proud about was to listen to the activist community, because we were in uncharted waters where we had a disease. We didn't even know what the aetiology was for a few years. We had no therapies, we had no vaccines, and we were trying to do research and clinical trials in the classic, somewhat antiquated way, not involving the community. The community, understandably, was upset and pulled back on the federal government and was very iconoclastic, very confrontato, a very theatrical that turned off a substantial segment of the scientific and regulatory community in the government. One of the things I learnt early on was I put aside the confrontation and I don't know why. I guess I've been brought up that way by my parents and my training to be very empathetic to people who are in difficult circumstances. So I put myself in the place of where the gay activists were who were suffering terribly from this mysterious disease. And I said, What would I do if I were in their shoes? And I came to the conclusion that I would do exactly what they were doing. I would be confronting the establishment and saying, You've got to get us involved in the planning and the implementation of the research and clinical trial agenda. And once I came to that realisation, that's when I opened up myself and my organisation to very important input from the activist community. It wasn't all smooth at first, but over the years I think it became one of the greatest examples of how when two groups that might appear to be opposed have the same endgame in mind is the ending of this terrible outbreak that when they work together, you can have a great, great advantage. And right now that's been proven the case. We're plus 40 years later and my involvement with the activist community goes back to the mid and late eighties when they really mobilised with act up. And with other organisations that those groups of activists are now my closest colleagues, my confidence and are helping us out with approaching and addressing the COVID outbreak. So it really is a very important story of you got to listen to the involved communities, no matter what the disease is, no matter what is going on. You have to involve the community. To me, that's the greatest lesson of HIV and its relationship with COVID and back and forth. But to me, it's one of the greatest lessons that I've learnt. Fortunately, very early on in the HIV AIDS pandemic.

MATT GALLOWAY: Do you think it's possible the UN would like to eradicate HIV by 2030? That's the goal that the U.N. has set. Is that is that possible?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, I wouldn't use the word eradication, because that would be an expectation that would not be able to be realised, because when you have people who are living with HIV, that's a different story. Then a virus that has a very short period of time in an individual's disease, like an acute respiratory infection. It goes away. You know, we're going to have hopefully millions of people who will live comfortably and good lives with HIV. And as till you get the control of this, either through pre-exposure prophylaxis, which we're perfecting and we're going to hear a lot about that at the meeting here in Montreal, or you're talking about a moderately if not highly effective. I'm not sure how soon it will take to get their vaccine, that we will turn it from a pandemic to a very low level that we can gradually make lower and lower. I think to tell the community that the goal is to eradicate HIV by 2030 would not be a realistic goal, but to turn it from a global pandemic to a very low level where deaths are rare and infections are infrequent, as opposed to as we've seen from the latest report from UNAIDS, where we still have 1.5 million people became newly infected in 2020, that is an unacceptably high level. 680,000 people died from AIDS related illnesses in 2020. That is an unacceptably high level. When we talk about where we want to be in 2030, we want those numbers to be dramatically lower than what they are now. That's the goal.

MATT GALLOWAY: Let me ask you just briefly, just about I mean, we have another infectious disease and monkeypox. The head of the FDA in the United States says the U.S. has probably missed the window to control it. And there are people who are in the communities that are being overwhelmingly affected who say that the stigma that we saw in the early days of the HIV AIDS crisis is being applied here, and that that's how this window was missed. Do you agree with that?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: No, I don't. And it wasn't the current FDA commissioner. It was a former FDA commissioner that said that. And I don't believe that the window has now been completely lost to get our arms around this early on. Obviously, when you have something as new as this, we could have done better. Everyone could have done better, and we know that. But right now, looking ahead, we have a difference, a fundamental difference now with monkeypox than we had with HIV in the early years. Now, I've had because of the fact that I've been here for so many years, I've had the opportunity to be at the very first days of both of those outbreaks in the summer of 1981, when we first recognised this new disease that we weren't even calling it AIDS at the time and the very first days of the COVID outbreak. And one of the things that's really important is the differences. Back then we had no ideology, we had no therapy, and we had no vaccine. Right now with monkeypox, we have something very, very different. We have an ideology. We have tests. We have vaccines and we have therapies. The challenge back with HIV was to rapidly try to develop interventions. The challenge now with monkeypox. Is to try and implement effectively and in an equitable way without inducing the spectre of sort of stigma. Because it is the reality, it is predominantly now amongst the men who have sex with men. That's just the reality. That's what's happening. So you've got to realise that. Address the community. Make sure physicians who are caring for that community are aware of it so that they don't miss it. And you've got to do that without stigmatising the community. So it becomes literally an implementation issue. And that's what we're struggling a little bit with right now, because we have these interventions and we've got to get them to the people who need it. Things like vaccines, both in post-exposure and pre-exposure prophylaxis. We've got to cut down on the logistic paperwork associated with getting a drug, for example, t pox to people with monkeypox. So it becomes as much or more of an implementation issue, then it becomes a discovery issue.

MATT GALLOWAY: I have to let you go. But you raised and this has come up a couple of times, this idea of listening and being willing to listen to people, that does not seem to be the case when it comes to COVID. You have become a lightning rod. You've been targeted. You've been threatened with death, you've had your motives questioned. And it goes beyond, beyond, beyond when people aren't listening to each other. What is the toll of that?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, that is one of the great obstacles and enemies of public health. The one thing I want to make clear to the listeners is that the confrontation back in the early days of HIV were by people who actually were correct. The government. In its usual traditional ways did not yet make the transition to the new way you had to look at dealing with the community. So when they were being confrontational with us, they were actually on the right path. They were correct. They were not threatening scientific principles. They were not threatening public health principles. What they were doing is that they were trying to get those applied in an equitable, efficient and effective way to the community. That is entirely different. I was confronted by them early on because I was a representative of the federal government and they wanted me to pay attention to them. And luckily for me and them, I did. They were correct. That's different now. What you're seeing now is a pushing aside and a denial of good public health principles based predominantly on political ideology, which is absolutely no place for that. When you're in the middle of a pandemic. So when you see me criticised, it is not criticised because I'm not listening to the right public health principles. It's criticising me because I am promoting the appropriate and correct public health principles. So it's a very different situation and they should not be compared say, well, there were criticisms back then in the in their criticisms now the criticisms now are a denial of science, an anti-science I mean, things that were the the outbreak is going to disappear. No, it's not going to disappear. Hydroxychloroquine is a great drug. No, it's not a great drug. So big difference that we are dealing with a much more formidable problem now. We're dealing with a denial of scientific facts. And that's something that until we overcome that, we're going to have a tough time getting around and ending the COVID 19 pandemic.

MATT GALLOWAY: Dr. Fauci, you're a busy man, and I really appreciate some of your time this morning. Thank you very much.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: My pleasure. Good to be with you.

MATT GALLOWAY: Take care. Bye bye.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Bye.

AG: Dr. Anthony Fauci is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the US. Pope Francis on the final days of his visit to Canada today he is in Quebec before his final stop in Iqaluit. While his visit has been a celebration to some, it has also been a painful reminder of the abuse survivors have faced at residential schools. The survivor crisis line is reporting a tenfold increase in calls for support. Many related to the pope's visit. Survivors like poet Dennis Saddleman know that pain well. He attended the Kamloops Residential School for 11 years. Here's one of Dennis's latest poems.

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Clenched and clenched. I shouldn't look back. I closed my eyes. I do not want flashbacks to embody in my past. I shouldn't look back. I cleanse the throat of the resident residential school time, plough deep wrinkles on my face. Anger made my tongue hot. Hate made me spit. Violence all over the place. Years upon years, my beginning could not find the next chapter. I sank into a pool of forgotten stories. I became of all to my dreams and my future. I was at the bottom of nothing. Days went by and they cannot find the history book. Without me, the world churned and turned and churned. I'm a nameless voice. My silence swallowed my tongue. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust. I'm a priest and wound I can heal. I must gather my rage. Got rid of my pain, Andrus said to his understanding. I must write the train of commitments. My next stop, a town full of possibilities. The bones of hope repaired. My future forgiveness. A stranger to my childhood forgiveness. A stranger to my innocence. I am clenched the throat of the residents of school.

AG: Now we'll have more of Dennis Settlement's work on tomorrow's programme and our special correspondent Falen Johnson will also be back with their final report on. A papal visit. And one more note. If you are a residential school survivor and need support, please reach out to the 24 hour Indian Residential School crisis line. 1 866 925 4419, 1 866 925 4419. Coming up after your regional update.

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This is not your fault. You don't need to go back there and you don't need to make this a better relationship. You can get away from this one and you're not going to be not worthy because of this.

AG: What Anna Maria Tremonti wishes she could have told her younger self, but instead she returns home to her abusive husband. We'll hear how their image of being a perfect couple was shattered. In episode three of Welcome to Paradise. I'm Anthony Germain. You're listening to The Current.

Episode three of Welcome to Paradise

AG: I'm Anthony Germain and you are listening to The Current. We've been presenting the CBC podcast, Welcome to Paradise. Renowned journalist and former host of the current Anna Maria Tremonti is breaking a 40 year long silence on her past experience with domestic violence. Here she is with Episode three. Elle is for love and a warning. The following deals with descriptions of violence.

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ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: So you'll probably remember this. So you bought this wallpaper and we were wallpaper in the bedroom and we were also drinking wine. I don't know if that had anything to do with it.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: It was one of those lazy weekends spent with friends. The guys, Pat and Vance went fishing. Sue and I started decorating.

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ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: We'd put one sheet of wallpaper up, we'd cut the next sheet and we'd get it in place. And as soon as we got that wind in place. The first thing just peeled off and rolled on to the floor. And so I said to you, Do you have a hammer? Yeah, I got a hammer. Do you have any nails? Yeah, I got nails. Get them. We nail that freaking wallpaper to the wall. By the time you guys came home, it looked pretty damn good, I think.

VANS: Well, we saw the nail heads, but then I thought, well, that's unusual, but the paints, the work, everyone's happy.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Was there a hole in their wall?

SUE: No.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Do you remember I told you about the hole in the wall?

SUE: Yeah, after the fact.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Because he'd made a hole. He was mad at me and he threw a glass at me. Oh. And it missed. And it hit the wall. It made a hole in the walls. And so I wallpapered the wall. So you wouldn't see the hole. And I wall papered over the hole.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Wallpaper is a pretty good metaphor for that year of my life. I was always covering something up a hole in the wall, a bruise on my arm. The fact that I was in a dangerous relationship. I'm Anna maria Tremonti. This is Welcome to Paradise.

[Music]

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Six months into my marriage, I am leading a double life, having fun with friends, and hiding the reality of life behind closed doors. No one knows about the abuse. Except a woman I've never met. A woman I've told my therapist, Farzana, about during one of our sessions.

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FARZANA: And what about the bitch downstairs?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I know you.

FARZANA: Wanna talk about her a little bit?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I was angry with her for doing a good thing because she...

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: It's a cold winter day. A Sunday. I don't remember how it starts. Pat attacks me on and off all afternoon. It's noisy. All the punching and yelling. This is the one time I fight back. Late in the day, I swipe at him as he lunges at me. And he accuses me of hurting him. He retreats up the stairs. It doesn't occur to me that anyone can hear us. But there's a knock on the door. And when I open it, distracted, two men are standing there, police officers. They are big, imposing guys. I am stunned to see them. They want to know if I'm okay. Yes. I tell them through a crack in the door. They ask if they can come in. I tell them no. They asked to speak to my husband. He's asleep, I say. I want to close the door. It's barely ajar as it is. I'm afraid their prying is just going to make things worse. How did they know? I'm thinking. Your downstairs neighbour called us. One of them tells me, like he's reading my mind and all I can think of is someone knows, someone knows. And now I'm not just scared. I'm pissed off. I think to myself, that bitch. That bitch downstairs.

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ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: It was my secret.

FARZANA: Mm hmm.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: And suddenly it wasn't a secret anymore. And suddenly I understood she had been privy to all that had happened. She could hear it all. She. She only did what a thinking, caring person who doesn't know you would do. She was not going to go up there, of course, with a knock on the door herself. She had to call somebody. But if somebody tries to intervene and you're not ready to face what's going on with you, then you're just going to push them away.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: After I finally convinced the police to leave, I look in the bathroom mirror. And don't recognise myself. It's after midnight and I have to be up for work at 4:00 a.m. So I put my keys in my pocket. I lay my purse and my favourite burgundy boots next to me by the couch and try to sleep. If he comes downstairs again, I'll grab my stuff and run for the door. I show up on time for the early morning news shift at the FM station where I'm working. I can't look anything near normal. Unshowered. In yesterday's rumpled clothes. But no one says a thing. No one asks if I'm okay. Pat and I never talk about the fact that he beats me. But sometimes he'll make an oblique reference like it's our little secret. One time he points to an acne mark on my face. It's a little more red than normal because he's just slapped me. It looks like a lopsided capital L, he tells me. L for love. For the most part, though, he's careful to keep his hands off my face. He never gives me a black eye to cover with makeup. He never leaves a mark on me I can't hide under my clothing. And I noticed something about myself. When he attacks me, I don't move. I can't.

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FARZANA: So as we're remembering that, what do you notice in your body, right now?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: My shoulders are like I'm very. I'm getting, like, seised up. Getting tight. Mm hmm. I just always remember thinking, like, I couldn't. I felt frozen. I couldn't move. And I couldn't think. And I would just freeze. And I kept hunching over trying to, like, keep his blows away. But if I had, like, gotten out of his- just moved completely away from him and then swung around, maybe he would have stopped low, like, maybe...

FARZANA: But, but just to just to normalise this.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Uh huh.

FARZANA: Your reaction was a normal reaction. Freezing is a normal reaction. Because that's what our bodies do. When we are being attacked physically, we do fight, flight, freeze. Right.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Yeah.

FARZANA: The other piece is that someone you loved was doing this to you. What comes to mind or maybe what comes to your body, as I say that?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Complete confusion, right? Because why why would he be doing that to me? Like it just didn't make sense.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: He's not just abusing my body. He's in my head. He never says sorry. Instead, he tells me. I drove him to it. It's me. Something I've done. And what's totally crazy. He makes it sound reasonable. So when I think about leaving him, I second guess myself. I tell myself I need to try harder. I need to be a better wife.

[Music]

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I'm I'm really good these days. Whenever I visit Sue and Vance on the East Coast, we always hit the road together, hugging the coastal highway, taking in the rocks and waves and reminiscing.

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SUE: Were there any bruises or anything before you got married?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: No. It's like he waited. There was one incident that he got really mad at me. Do you remember that? We had that blue and white comet and he got in the car and he was mad at me about something, and he, like, he hit the dashboard and he cracked it. That was the only thing he did before. That was the only time I saw him get angry at me.

SUE: And then how soon after he got married did it actually start?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Weeks. Well. And it would be sudden, like he would go from like a volcano, right? Like a dormant volcano to an explosion. And I would I would get it. That's when I would get it of.

VANS: I had no idea.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I didn't want you to have an idea. Right. I was mortified. I didn't want you to think less of him, even. It wasn't even just about me. I didn't want you to think less of him.

[Music].

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RADIO HOST: See, I always see 100 music from the box with Elton John 729 My radio [uninteliigible] to Anna maria Tremonti has just joined us. Well, on the dismal side this morning, but it's supposed to pick up a wee bit for the weekend.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Yeah, we can't complain if we have rain Friday and we get sun. Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. Now can we?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: At the radio station, I'm reading the morning news and weather and filling in on an afternoon interview show. That's right. Pat's actually working in the same building on the TV's side, but he has different hours. So when I'm in the newsroom, what's happening at home doesn't exist. I'm doing well at work, really well and it feels great. I love the people. I love the whole radio station vibe. Still, when Pat gets another job back in Fredericton, I'm quick to follow him there. Middle of the week. Maybe they'll start on my last day of work in Halifax. I read the lead story without missing a beat.

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RADIO HOST: Crime is up and down at the same time.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: That's right, Randi. The overall crime rate in Halifax is down by eight and a half percent. However, the just released 1980 police report says there has been increases in violent crime, the most alarming indecent assault against women. They climbed 64% last year. Sexual offences are up 33%. The number of reported rapes, however, is down.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I rattle off the numbers, however, as if this kind of violence has nothing to do with me. Deep down, I hope a move will improve things. It just complicates them. Pat's mother moves in with us. I get up early on a morning in late July and join her to watch the royal wedding of Charles and Diana. We sit together for hours, entranced by the ritual, the extravagance.

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PRIEST: Diana. Frances, Wilt thy have this man to thy wedded husband?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: But as I watch, I can't stop the thoughts churning through my mind about the choices women make who they choose to marry. The expectations they have him.

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PRIEST: So long as you both shall live.

PRINCESS DIANA: I will.

PRIEST: I, Diana Frances.

PRINCESS DIANA: I, Diana Frances...

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Diana is 20. Hi, Diana. I've just turned 24. She seems impossibly young, and I feel tremendously old. Sitting there with my mother in law. I'm unemployed. My identity is wife. And unlike the princess on the small screen, I am neither glamorous nor special. The man I've chosen is volatile and threatening, though sometimes he's fun and caring. I never know for sure. His unpredictability distorts my sense of reality. One night after another, argument Pat leaves the house. I wake up wondering where he's gone. It gets late. I go to bed alone. In the small hours of the morning, I wake up. Someone is standing over me. A silhouette. A dark mass at the side of the bed. I want to get up. I want to scream. But I can't. I'm too scared to move. And then the silhouette is gone. A car starts in the driveway, our car and slowly drives off. All these years later, I still ask myself, What was he doing? What was he thinking? Was he planning something? This is the summer that I lace up my running shoes and head down the side of the highway. It's perpetually hot. I am beyond troubled. I'm not a terribly good runner, but I'm persistent. I puff and plod at first, chasing that moment where the monotony of the movement will free me. The roadkill on the shoulder is a bit of an obstacle course, and I find myself sidestepping porcupine bits. But even as I concentrate on that, my mind is racing. I'm obsessed with the news. The war in Lebanon is raging.

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JOURNALIST: This is Beirut.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I watch a CBC journalist named Anne Medina and her gritty reporting from the thick of it. I want to be her. I want to do what she does. My ambition takes a giant leap forward. But it makes no sense, because look at me. How do I possibly go from this life to that one? I'm angry on these runs. I am frustrated. I am done with him. I'm in love with him. I will leave. I'm stuck.

[Music]

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ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: He had driven to Ottawa with me and his mother, and we were staying in a bedroom in the basement. And we got into an argument. We're a thousand kilometres from home visiting one of Pat's relatives who at this point is up in the kitchen with Pat's mom. You know, he was hurting me, and he was he was grabbing me. He ripped my shirt right off of me, and he was punching me and I was crying out, and nobody came downstairs. Nobody.

FARZANA: Nobody helped.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: No, no.

FARZANA: And they would have heard you.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: They had to have heard. Yeah.

FARZANA: Yeah.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: He eventually joins them upstairs for what seems like an eternity. I can only vaguely make out what they're saying. Then I hear his footsteps on the stairs. He comes into our room just long enough to tell me he and his mother are going home to New Brunswick and they're leaving. Without me. I took a train from Ottawa back to Fredericton. I don't remember how I got to the station. I don't remember any of that. I just remember being on this overnight train and. I spent the time on the train thinking about how I had really screwed up, how I had clearly said something to upset him. I thought about how I needed to be a better person and I was going to go and tell him, We could talk it out. The train rolls along through the night. I don't sleep. I keep running things over in my head.

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FARZANA: So talk to the person you were back then for a second. What did she need to know, on the train? If you could have been a helpful, older, wiser person for her, what would you say to her if you could lean over and talk to her on the train?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Well, I would start by saying this is not your fault and you don't need to go back there. And you don't need to make this a better relationship. You can get away from this one and you can go find yourself a better relationship. You know you're not going to be not worthy because of this.

FARZANA: And would she have any rebuttals for you? The the girl on the train.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Oh, it might have been something as simple as. But I love him. I must try. You know. Yeah.

FARZANA: And what would what would older you say to her?

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: But that's not love. People who love you don't treat you like that. That's not love.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: By the time the train pulls into Fredericton, I've got my apology and my heartfelt pledge of devotion already for him.

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ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: And it was early morning and I came into the house and the coffee was on and I got a coffee and I sat on the couch and there were two couches that faced each other. And he sat across from me on the other couch. And he looked at me and he said, Either you leave or I leave. If you don't. I will kill you. It's just a matter of time.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: The rest of that day is a blur. I don't know what to do. I call a shelter. The woman on the phone says I should make him leave. I don't even know how I'd begin to do that. I stay one more night, but I'm panicking.

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SUE: So a knock came to the door Saturday morning, and I must have been home alone. When I opened the door, you were standing there with a look that I'd never seen on you before. And I knew something bad happened.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: I drive off early in the morning. I'm hysterical behind the wheel. I chew on a dishrag the whole way for hours to try to stop crying.

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SUE: And your face was white. Your eyes were red. Oh, I don't even know how to describe. It was just the most mournful look. I said, come in. We sat at the table. I asked you what in the hell was going on? And then you just let it go. You let everything and told me all the stuff that had been bottled up for all that time of the past nine months. I remember you telling me situations that we'd all be together and you guys would go home, and he beat the crap out of you after we had all been together at dinner parties or just out with the whole gang and... Which I remember thinking, wow, you know, everything seemed so cool. Everything seemed, you know, so regular. And nobody had any idea. Nobody would have thought it in a million years.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: What did you... Did I stay with you?

SUE: You did. You stayed that night. I mean, you slept on the couch that night.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: After a few days, I start thinking, Come on, he's not going to kill you. He doesn't mean that. Go home and talk to him. You know you love him. I tell myself I will be careful not to upset him. I tell myself we will be happy. And besides, we have plans back in Fredericton. I have a job interview lined up with CBC Radio. Pat's not home when I get in, but his mom is. She barely speaks to me. She retreats to another part of the house. It's dusk. The woods that surround the house grow dark. I wait in the kitchen. Pat doesn't say a word when he comes in the door. But there's something in the way he moves. He's livid. And before I have a chance to say anything, he just attacks. I remember what happens as a part of me is watching from across the room and part of me is stuck in my body. I'm falling against the kitchen cabinets. I'm on the floor. He's wearing his heavy motorcycle boots and he's putting all of his strength. Into kicking me. His boot slams into my thigh over and over and over again. A few days later, I have a ring of bruises around my neck. His fingerprints. He must have been choking me with his bare hands. I can see so much of the assault so clearly in my mind. But I have never been able to see that. And suddenly all these years later I realise. I must have blacked out. I don't know what you're thinking as you listen to this. But as I recount this incident, I just feel sick. Even to me, this is so surreal. It is so far removed from the woman I am today, and yet I can still see myself in that kitchen that night. I can feel myself there. And my stomach starts to knot. My heart races. I feel so bad. Still.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: You've been listening to Episode three of the CBC podcast, Welcome to Paradise, hosted by Anna maria Tremonti. And we'll continue tomorrow with episode four, The Long Tail. Well, that's our programme for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for q. In his stand up comedy, Chris Sandifor describes his vibe as Okey dokey. So it makes sense that in the vampire comedy, what we do in the shadows, he plays the most mild mannered and inept vampire ever. The Canadian actor and comic joins Talia Schlanger to talk about season four of the hit show and what it was like to work with Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone in the Netflix series God's Favourite Idiot. Great title. I'm Anthony Germain. You're listening to The Current See Tomorrow.

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