There are good public health folks and not so good ones. The not so good ones announce the source of an outbreak by eating a taco. Or don’t announce the outbreak at all.

The good ones, like Toronto Public Health’s Jim Chan and Mount Sinai Hospital’s Don Low, are innovative, welcome transparency, get the science right and are accessible.
Today marks a change for public health in Ontario as Jim announced his retirement and Don tragically passed away from a brain tumor.

I didn’t know Don, but as a risk analysis-studying graduate student a decade ago I followed his daily updates and media interactions during the largest infectious disease event to hit Canada in my lifetime: 2003’s SARS outbreak. Don’s openness and frank discussion of risk and what was being done to manage it was a model for others to follow.

Jim, another fantastic public health communicator and creative mind, was one of the drivers of the DineSafe program, Toronto’s restaurant inspection disclosure system as well as being the dude who was quoted in pretty much every food safety related story in the city. From uninspected meat to rat infestations in Chinatown, Jim exemplified what the risk communication literature says: tell folks what you know, what you don’t, what you’re doing and update often.