The Big Story – Details, episodes & analysis

Being a part of a clinical drug trial can pay very well—up to several thousand dollars. And a lot of people need that cash and are desperate to take part. 

But when someone's desperate for that money, they'll cut a lot of corners: lie to be accepted, fail to report adverse reactions or other complicating factors and skip the mandatory recovery time between trials. When that happens, it can throw everything off, including the data that Health Canada may be relying on in order to approve these drugs for all of us to use...

GUEST: Rob Cribb, director of the Investigative Journalism Bureau, investigative reporter at the Toronto Star

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For this weekend's look back, we're revisiting an episode from June 2023 about the level of noise we've become accustomed to in our daily lives, and the effect it's having on us. 

We hope you enjoy! 

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You know how sometimes you notice that it's eerily quiet? That's because we're so accustomed to the background noise of life in a city of any size, that sudden silence catches our attention. From cars and trucks to neighbours and kids, modern appliances to incessant TV, music or videos, we rarely have a silent waking moment.

New research is beginning to discover exactly what that's doing to us, and the results are fascinating. It's not just us, either. When the world's water traffic mostly stopped during the first month of Covid lockdowns, the absence of the usual noise actually changed the way some sea creatures communicate... so what does a noisy world do to us all?

GUEST: Bojan Furst, writing in The Walrus

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It's one of the most iconic photographic portraits in world history—and it hangs in one of the most famous buildings in the Canadian capital. At least it did, until it was stolen...

The story of The Roaring Lion theft involves international intrigue, world history, careful detective work and one of this country's most renowned artists. But most of all, it's a riveting heist tale that spans from Canada to Europe, and who doesn't love one of those?

GUEST: Brett Popplewell, author, reporter, associate professor; writing in The Walrus

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Typically, a broken water main does not plunge a city into weeks of critical water shortages and a state of emergency. But the pipe that broke on June 5 wasn't a typical water main. Now, almost two weeks later, the city is estimating another three to five weeks for full repairs, and until then Calgarians are under water restrictions.

How did the break happen, and could it have been prevented? Why will repairs take so long? What might happen if the city gets close to running out of water? And will the Calgary Stampede, due to start on July 5th, still go on as scheduled?

GUEST: Kerry Black, Assistant Professor and Canada Research Chair, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Calgary

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It's been a sign of spring for well over a century—baseball players heading down south to meet their teammates, toss around a few balls and play some meaningless games. In the grand scheme of things, not much about Spring Training matters, but it's still become a symbol of rebirth, and the end of winter, to millions of North Americans.

This year, more than ever, we need things to look forward to. We need things that promise better days to come. And the return of baseball, and the sun, and the real chance of a contending Blue Jays team, offers that.

GUEST: Stephen Brunt, Sportsnet

(Stay tuned at the end of today's episode for the sounds of spring.)

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It's tax season! If you took any form of government COVID-19 relief this year, you've probably got all sorts of questions about how that impacts your return. If you didn't, but you worked from home, you might be eligible for deductions you haven't even considered.

As tax season begins, the pros are being swamped with questions from anxious Canadians. We asked one of those pros to clarify the confusion she hears from clients, debunk the most common misconceptions about the CERB, and share her best tips for navigating the most complicated tax year in recent memory.

GUEST: Shannon Lee Simmons, The New School of Finance

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Since the 2008 financial crisis, the single-family rental industry has exploded in the United States, with massive companies buying up as many single-family homes as possible, and renting them out en masse. What that means is that millions of Americans now have megacorporations as their landlords—and that's going about as well as you'd expect.

And here's the kicker: One of the largest of these companies is doing hundreds of millions of dollars in business with a Canadian government pension fund. This means that hundreds of thousands of Canadians are seeing their retirement savings grow as Americans lose their homes during a pandemic...

GUEST: Richard Warnica, business feature writer, The Toronto Star

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Provinces are rolling out their vaccination plans for the general public, and they all seem pretty similar. After the initial push to vaccinate frontline health-care workers and residents of long-term care facilities, programs will proceed by age groups, starting with the 80+ cohort. It makes sense, as the elderly are most at risk from COVID-19.

But what if there was another factor that could guide our plans to where shots would do the most good? Ontario's COVID-19 Science Advisory Table has published a new report that offers evidence that simply using age is not the best way to save lives and stop the spread of the virus. But will health units take their advice, if it means prioritizing at-risk neighbourhoods over wealthy ones?

GUEST: Peter Jüni, member of Ontario's COVID-19 Science Advisory Table

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Even without a global pandemic, we're spending less and less time just doing nothing. The urge to check our phone every 20 minutes is the same urge that leads us to online shopping and bread making and ... anything else to distract us from our current predicament.

But what if we could learn to turn our boredom into a strength? If we could train ourselves to once again sit quietly in the moments we get to ourselves? It's no secret the past year has taken a toll on our mental health. But can we help ourselves by embracing the stillness forced upon us?

GUEST: Mark Hawkins, author of The Power of Boredom

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Temperatures are rising everywhere. Severe weather is becoming more common. And climate disasters are becoming an increasing part of our lives. So it can feel like we're hurtling off a cliff.

But in the past few years, we've also made incredible progress on reducing emissions, renewable energy and other efforts—so much so that the grimmest of possible futures is much less likely to occur. It can feel like a naive question to ask, but are we turning a corner in our fight to save the Earth?

GUEST: David Wallace-Wells, author of The Uninhabitable Earth

We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:

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