Canadians are known for hockey, maple syrup and poutine, but what about their contributions to furthering medicine? Turns out, Canada is responsible for handfuls of medical breakthroughs from Pablum to insulin and child-resistant medicine bottles.
“There are many examples of Canadian physicians who have really been successful in changing the way medicine is being practiced around the world,” Dr. Granger Avery, president of the Canadian Medical Association, said.
“I feel very confident in saying that Canadians have contributed significantly, not just to health here in Canada, but health in the world. We get caught up on the international scene but forget about the incredible contributions Canadians have made,” Lissa Foster, executive director of the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame, told Global News.
Avery and Foster took a walk down memory lane with Global News to look at key medical breakthroughs covered in Canadian fingerprints.
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HAART therapy treatment as HIV prevention
Scientists led by Dr. Julio Montaner out of the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS have spent decades studying the disease. There, B.C. has become a global success story in combatting HIV/AIDS and it’s because of HAART, or highly active antiretroviral therapy.
It’s a cocktail of three drugs – taken daily – first implemented in 1996 to stop HIV from progressing into AIDS and to extend life expectancy and reduce HIV-related deaths.