Health IQ: CrowdStrike outage hits Canadian hospitals

CrowdStrike outage and hospitals

Several hospitals and health-care networks across Canada grappled with the fallout from the widespread CrowdStrike outages on July 19.

Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike said the problem occurred following a faulty update to computers running Microsoft Windows and the issue was being resolved.

The technology outage disrupted hospital systems across Canada, from Vancouver Island to Newfoundland and Labrador.

Some health networks turned to social media to update patients on the outage, while Global News reached out via email to hospitals nationwide to assess the impact.

British Columbia was hit, with at least two health networks impacted by the system: Vancouver Coastal Health and Island Health.

Dynacare, a Canadian medical laboratory service, was affected by the outage as well as services at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto.

Several other Ontario hospitals also experienced the fallout from the outage.

For a full list of hospitals and clinics impacted by the CrowdStrike outage, click here.

Rabies, dog regulations and Canada

Canada’s pushing back on stricter rules for bringing dogs into the U.S., claiming our low rabies risk warrants an exemption. But experts caution that rabies still lurks in animals such as bats and skunks — and even dogs.

Speaking to the media on July 17, Health Minister Mark Holland emphasized that Canada is a “rabies-free country” while discussing the need for the U.S. to exempt Canada from its stricter border rules on dogs.

However, Dr. Isaac Bogoch, an infectious diseases specialist, explained rabies cases still occur in Canada and the disease is extremely difficult to eradicate.

“Rabies is a viral infection. We get it from the bite or saliva of other mammals, and in humans, it is universally fatal,” Bogoch explained. “I think that is the key message for anyone. [If you get infected], you’re not going to survive.”

Rabies spreads in the body by travelling through the peripheral nerves from the site of the bite to the brain, where it causes severe inflammation and ultimately leads to neurological symptoms and death if untreated, Bogoch told Global News.

In Canada, since reporting began in 1924, there have been 26 cases of rabies in humans in six provinces and all cases were fatal, Health Canada data shows.

Read more about rabies and the new dog relations coming into effect at the U.S. border.

— THE TOPIC —

Tax-free counselling, psychotherapy in Canada

— WHAT EXPERTS ARE SAYING —

In a move aimed at making mental health-care more accessible, certain psychotherapy and counselling services in Canada are now exempt from sales taxes.

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) said in a news release on July 15 that certain psychotherapists and counselling therapists are no longer required to collect the goods and services tax (GST) or the harmonized sales tax (HST) on their services.

The tax exemption was proposed by the federal government in the fall economic statement in November and went into effect on June 20.

It applies to individuals who have a licence from a provincial body to provide psychotherapy or counselling therapy services.

“Once you confirm that your services are GST/HST exempt, you must stop charging the GST/HST on your services,” the CRA said.

“If all of your services are exempt, you may close your GST/HST account with the CRA, online or by mail,” the agency said.

These new rules apply anywhere in Canada, except for Quebec, which has its own tax requirement.