Let’s Make Canada Healthier
12 ways you can help  

Diana Swift

Hey, we know you care about wellness—you’re at your doctor’s reading a copy of Canadian Health, right? But if you knew you could do something right now for the greater health of your fellow Canadians, you’d want to, yes? Read on for a dozen suggestions for making a difference.

1.  Be a blood donor.

Canadian Blood Services says our hospitals need 2,000 units of blood per day. One 450 mL unit can save up to three lives. But in 2002, only 3.5% of eligible Canadians were giving blood. You can start donating at age 17 and give every 56 days. To become a donor, call your local Blood Services office or telephone the agency toll-free at 1 888 2 DONATE (1 888 236 6283). Visit its website at www.blood.ca.

2.  Sign an organ/tissue donor card.

According to the Organ Donation & Transplant Association of Canada, more than 4, 000 Canadians are languishing on wait-lists for life-saving organs and tissues. Your gift could give a desperate person a new start. Download a wallet-sized donor card at www.organdonations.ca or call the association at 1 866 949 0003.

3.  Volunteer.

Deliver hot meals to the housebound elderly or make regular visits to patients in long-term care. Participate in a longitudinal medical study. This type of investigation follows people for several years to assess the health impact of factors such as lifestyle, diet, body mass index, waist-to-hip ratio, smoking, alcohol consumption, exercise, pregnancies and family medical history. The results help authorities make broad recommendations to improve the health of Canadians. If you have a treatable condition, you may be eligible for a clinical trial to test a drug or procedure. Ask your physician or local hospital if researchers are seeking recruits.

4.  If you smoke, try to quit.

Meanwhile, don’t expose anyone else—especially pregant women and children—to second-hand smoke. Since it burns at a lower temperature, an idling cigarette delivers more carcinogenic and cardiac toxins to bystanders than an inhaled one does to a smoker.

5.  Choose natural garden pesticides and insecticides.

Chemical preparations used in agriculture have been linked to childhood cancers.

6.  Drive less.

Use carpools when possible and don’t let your car idle, summer or winter. Exhaust particles sicken the air your fellow citizens breathe.

7.  Light your fireplace only on special occasions.

Woodsmoke is a pollutant that emits respiratory irritants and cancer-causing agents into the air.

8.  On smog-alert days, leave the barbecue unlit.

And don’t use gas-powered motors such as chainsaws, leaf blowers or lawn mowers. You don’t want their emissions adding to air pollution because when it soars, so do hospital admissions and emergency-room visits for breathing and heart problems.

9.  Safely dispose of hazardous household materials.

Take old car batteries, paints, antifreeze, solvents and aerosol cans taken to designated sites. These products can contaminate water, soil, air and the food chain. Contact your municipal offices for details on depots or special pickups.

10.  Return expired or unused prescriptions.

Ask your pharmacy whether it offers safe drug disposal or see if your municipality has a disposal program. If flushed, antibiotics, hormones and other medications could potentially contaminate the water supply.

11.  Pick up all pet droppings.

Infectious bacteria in animal feces—E. coli, giardia and salmonella, for example—can end up in Canada’s waterways, making them unsafe for humans and wildlife. Children playing on the ground can easily pick up roundworms from pet droppings.

12.  Curb neighbour-stressing noise pollution.

Use a manual lawn mower; don’t blast your home TV and sound system or car stereo, windows agape. Don’t yak at the top of your lungs on your cellphone in public places. Never let Rover bark for hours on end—or you could find yourself paid back in kind, as one Winnipeg dog owner was when fed-up neighbours surrounded her house at 3 a.m., barking at her windows and howling at the moon!