Rotary Club of Edmonton Strathcona is proud to participate with the Edmonton Comedy Festival to raise funds that contribute to our End Polio Now campaign!
The Edmonton Comedy Festival have generously donated 20 tickets to the club which we can sell at face value, $25, and all proceeds go the "End Polio Now" campaign.
Date: Saturday October 17 at 8:00 pm (2000)
Place: Varscona Hotel, 8208 106 Street NW
Tickets are $25 each with a limit of 2 tickets per person. All sales are final -- NO REFUNDS!
Payment is in CA$ online by Visa, Visa Debit or Master Card ONLY.
Buy tickets HERE or from the "Upcoming Events" on the home page.
As a side note, members of the Rotary Club Edmonton Strathcona are again, for the tenth year, providing drivers for the performers. A very worthwhile and satisfying community service project.
ATTENTION ALL MEMBERS AND GUESTS OF THE ROTARY CLUB OF EDMONTON STRATHCONA
Over the past week, the implications for group meetings as a result of the Corona Virus have changed. Some of the notifications we have recieved from national and international health advisory organizations are suggesting curtailment of group meetings.
Although our Rotary meetings have usually less than 50 people our concern is that our population is an at risk group because of age and predisposition to international travel.
As a result, our Board has decided to cancel our weekly meetings until further notice and reassess based upon further developments. We will provide updates to all of you as we continue to monitor developments. Please let us know if anyone needs assistance during this trying time....as always we support each other!
This past Tuesday our speakers were Dr. Sean McMurtry and Beth Barberree from the Canadian Centre for Men and Families. The Canadian Centre for Men and Families is a national charity based in Ontario.
They first spoke to us last year when they told the story of their hopes and dreams for a local presence to our Rotary club. Sean and Beth both thanked us for our donation and said that with our help and that of many others, they have been able to organize and set up several programs in Edmonton to meet the needs of men and their families when families break down. Over the past year they have become much more organized and are now able to offer several programs based on what they have heard from the men they help. These men have told them that they need to feel heard, with no judgement, to be offered facilitated solutions that give them a better path forward, and all to be done with empathy and respect.
The programs that they currently offer are ones that were not available from other groups in our community. They now have a website (CCMF.ca) and a Facebook and Instagram presence to help let people know what they offer. Their programs include a thirteen week family abuse Recovery Program, a Men’s Peer Support Group, and a Legal Resources Program. These programs are designed to prevent feelings of isolation and stigma and to help prevent the acute mental health crises that can result.
They would especially like to thank rotarians Graham Gilchrist, Donna Hutton, Jim Pedde and Gord Sheppard (of Expert Training Solutions) for their help and advice. Over the past year, their programs have been able to give men a place to go where people listen and understand. They are now hearing that social services are recommending their programs to people in need. They now have a full-time program director and are building their trained volunteer base so that they can expand their services. Their top three goals for the next year are to increase their outreach, diversify their fundraising and implement organizational strategies to improve and stay on track with their goals. They aim to be professional and offer a high quality of service to their clients.
As Sean and Beth both said, when you help men and their families when families break down, you help the entire community.
Thanks to the generosity of Club members, President, Jim Peddie, along with Rose Marie Basaraba, delivered an SUV filled with bags and baskets of baby clothes, blankets and accessories to Basically Babies on September 30th.
This local charitable organization provides layettes to newborn babies whose families are in financial need. On behalf of Basically Babies, Chelsea, their representative, expressed her gratitude to Club members who donated the items during the month of September. Our substantial donation was transferred into a trailer outside the facility. Due to COVID restrictions, tours of the facility are cancelled.
This was yet another proud example of RCES serving the community. (Thank you to Audrey Martyn for storage and organization of donated items prior to delivery).
Pradeep is working on a unique ventilator to be provided to governments in the quest to support Covid -19 patients. He advises that the prototype will be made public on May 6 and has shared the specifications with us. As well I have attached the presentation regarding the ventilator for all of us to see. As a former ICU nurse and Instructor, I truly see the value of an artificial intelligence component which would monitor and manage a patient's ventilatory status without human intervention... Way to go Pradeep... We are all amazed at what you do!!!!
Below is the information Pradeep shared with me and now you... The reference to the pages relates to the attached presentation.
Basic design attached refer page 6/7. It is a simple operator proof design and yet the most sophisticated ventilator available in the market if it goes to the market at all. It uses aerospace components and none of the medical components used by others.
The 1st prototype video will be out on May 6th for the world to see. I hope I make it by this time.
A video of our first prototype will be out on or before May 6th. Additional features included.
Just some extra information why our Ventilator will be very unique compared to even the largest manufacturers of ventilators in the world.
It can be adapted to feed one and 20 + patients. Independently controlled for each patient.
Medical personnel does not need to be close to the patient once hooked up as it can be operated remotely once hooked up.
Screens are made large for quick visual and controls with remotely operated systems too.
Specialists can dial in to the ventilator from anywhere in the world and operate it if required while supported by general hospital medical personnel at location.
It can be hooked up in the hospital or in any field area set up to treat as it has its own oxygen and mixture device too. Assembled in module formats as required.
Can be hooked up on the patient’s bed so that unhooking the ventilator while moving the patient may be avoided.
Build in AI where you don’t need a highly trained nurse or respiratory specialist or a trained doctor as it will synchronize with the patient and make recommendations or continue to operate as required manually. Aerospace and Space Technology implemented. “Operator proof” is the plan by introducing AI features in the system. You enter data from around the world and see recommendations in real time for specific patients.
Aerospace, Space and some Oil & Gas equipment parts are mainly used in the entire system with oxygen cleaned and certified as we will not run out of standard ventilator parts used by others.
This Tuesday we heard on ZOOM from Jordan Schwann, a Portfolio Manager with Newport Wealth. Newport has been in business for twenty years and has about three billion dollars in assets under management. About thirty percent of their client base is in Alberta.
Jordan first talked about the effect of the COVID pandemic on our economy. COVID is a world-wide pandemic with significant numbers of infections and deaths which have had and will continue to have a significant effect on economies around the world. He said that there is no way we can go back to normal until we have a vaccine. Vaccine development is ongoing in many companies and countries around the world. There are presently nine companies with a vaccine in final approval Stage 3 trials. Hopefully, several of these will be available sometime next year.
The economic effects of this pandemic have been the sharpest and deepest global recession since the Great Depression. Real GDP growth was already slowing in 2019, but the pandemic effects of business shutdowns pushed it down even further. Central banks and governments have provided monetary stimulus and have cut interest rates to help to compensate. This has resulted in massive purchases of bonds, securities, ETFs and hi yield bonds. Globally governments have spent ten trillion US dollars. Our economy in North America lost about ten-years-worth of job gains in the first few months of the pandemic. Jordan said that only about fifty percent of those jobs have been regained so far. Fortunately, consumer spending has held up really well throughout, which shows that government transfer payments for low income individuals are working. Unfortunately, one area that is not doing well is small businesses, which are still down about twenty percent. Very large corporations are doing fine finding funds as they can issue bonds, but some large companies in hard hit sectors such as travel, energy and real estate are going bankrupt, if they did not have enough cash flow to cover their debt.
Financial markets sold off quickly at the beginning of the pandemic but rebounded as soon as the central banks stepped in. At the moment the market is showing some unusual trends. The S&P 500 is currently dominated by the values of just six stocks, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google and Microsoft. They currently make up twenty five percent of the entire value of the S&P 500. These companies are attracting a lot of interest right now, but investors should be sure that they are purchasing good companies at a good price as well. Some market corrections are most likely coming. Governments are using low interest rates to support markets, and this is bad news for the bond market. This means people are putting their money into the stock market. Average investors need to think about how to generate income in this environment as low interest rates are here to stay for a while. Some factors to consider are the speed of vaccine development and the correlated economic recovery, the current social and political unrest, inflation rates and levels of pre-existing debt. He said that a broad diversification of investments is the best approach to deal with all of these things.
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Rotary Club of Edmonton Strathcona is proud to participate with the Edmonton Comedy Festival to raise funds that contribute to our End Polio Now campaign!
RI link: 
