Colin Furness MISt PhD MPH

@furnesscolin.bsky.social

Epidemiologist and Associate Professor of Information (teaching stream), University of Toronto. Current research: deconstructing professional expertise.

Feeling a bit vexed today, reading of a large outbreak of viral pink eye at St. Joseph's in Hamilton. By vexed, I really mean livid. Why? To begin with, the reporting was not well done, taking a "these things happen" tone in a case of serious negligence. 1/4 www.thestar.com/news/gta/out...

Some patients impacted by Stoney Creek pink eye outbreak were notified seven weeks after infection

St. Joe’s apologizes for the delay as the number of cases rises to 92; the outbreak has been declared over.

thestar.com

I should have pointed out this particular product when I talked about HEPA filters. Small local Toronto business. Entirely quiet devices. Like crazy quiet. Uses standard furnace filters. I have three of them in my house, in the larger common rooms. (Plus a small Levoit unit in every bedroom).

Dick Zoutman@dickzoutman.bsky.social · 3mo ago

For sure! I like the ones from NorthBox. Super quiet! 32dB! aidankepo.wixsite.com/northboxsyst...

Public health risks during the World Cup haven't received much media attention. But there is a capacity building opportunity here - some basic things to keep in mind to elevate safety. So how can one assess and mitigate risk? A thread ... 1/15

My Toronto Star Op-Ed last week pointed the finger at physician thinking & physician culture to explain why they just won't let go of certain beliefs even when drowning in evidence to the contrary. Today the Globe and Mail provided a tragically shining example, quoting Dr. Srinivan Murthy ... 1/10

Thanks for locating a non-paywall version of my Op-Ed! Just between us, I'm livid at having had many of my words changed over my repeated objections. It does read well, but key changes muted my voice. That's never been done to me before, but better that it get published this way than not at all.

Bean & Sprout's Mom@beansproutsmom.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Opinion | Why are we repeating the same mistakes with hantavirus that we made with COVID-19? By epidemiologist Dr @furnesscolin.bsky.social Non-paywalled version: archive.ph/2026.05.27-0...

A second hanta-rant in as many days. I'm concerned. That we can't apply what we have learned in dealing with this stricken ship. First objection: ignoring rodents, when rodents are the usual disease vector. Person-person transmission has been assumed AND that rodents aren't involved. Naive. 1/8

Sigh. After a few years of post-COVID peace & quiet, I did two hantavirus interviews today. So here I am. First, to be clear, human-human transmission of hantavirus has been reported several times, but NOT actually proven - in every case those people also had some other exposure in common. 1/7