My mom’s face lit up a few weeks back, when I asked if she’d ever tried Sweet N’ Nice ice cream, since they’re both from San Fernando, Trinidad. It turns out that as a kid in the 1950s, she’d dash outside every time she heard founder Charles Neale pull up on his icebox trailer bicycle, sing-songing his sales pitch. “Sweet n’ Nice! Tell ya mudda Neale heah!” she called out to me, invoking her childhood version of the ice cream truck song.
Ice cream is a particularly nostalgic food—cold, rich and apt to stir reminiscences of indulgent grandparents and standout summers. And these are particularly nostalgic times, albeit a little bittersweet. A recent trip for a swirl of soft serve took me back two years to a weekend in Vermont, speeding across a lake in a friend’s well-worn motorboat with the urgent task of trying her favourite “creemee.” That’s what it’s called in that dairy state, where only deliciously high butterfat will do. Who knows when I might taste one again–or get a chance to see my friend of two decades.
Two Trinidad-born women making ice cream this summer both know they’ve got eaters’ hearts in their hands. The first is a professional: Rosemarie Wilson, Neale’s daughter and vice president of production at the Canadian version of Sweet N’ Nice, which launched three years ago and has just become available nationwide. The other is a hobbyist, Toronto’s photo laureate Michèle Pearson Clarke, who ramped up her past-time to spread much-needed sweetness during the pandemic. Both take their treat-making seriously.
Wilson knows she has big shoes to fill. Her father supported a family of 12 children with a beloved product, and it wasn’t just ice cream that made a permanent impression on his fans. My mom remembers Neale handing out scoops to every kid crowded around his bike, even those who didn’t have a nickel. “He loved children. He would never deny a child who wanted some ice cream,” says Wilson.


Tropical flavours like rum and raisin are dear to immigrants’ hearts, and Wilson hopes to meet their expectations. “I want to get as close as possible to what I know back home, when you take that original coconut, crack the nut, hand grate it, squeeze the milk out, right?” says Wilson, of that iconic flavour. “I want to get the real cream from the coconut, because I know anybody from the Caribbean, this is what they’re looking for. They will critique it.” It’s easy enough to get the global flavourings she needs, she says, but finding the perfect ingredients takes tasting and time.
Clarke, on the other hand, steers away from coconut (and mango) in deference to her ice cream mentor, an uncle in Antigua who pulled out his “old school churn-like machine” when they visited. “It is a very powerful early memory for me, of my uncle being like a wizard,” says Clarke, who goes for more esoteric mixes, like orange-cardamom, or salted watermelon. “I wouldn’t make coconut, because that to me is the most classic flavour.”
The photographer started making ice cream as a hobby about five years ago, then ramped it up last fall, after befriending a chef who called on her to make dessert for dinner parties. By the beginning of the pandemic, she was in full swing, and began gifting pints to friends and neighbours. “To give out joy and comfort and indulgence during quarantine life is a nice thing to do, you know?”she says.
Much of Clarke’s work involves understanding grief, particularly her 2015 video installation, Parade of Champions, which was inspired by the death of her mother. It’s an emotion she thinks we’re all overwhelmed with right now. “I think that the urge to create and bring something into the world is very much a way to cope with grief,” she says, about the frenzy of sourdough baking, tie-dyeing and garden planting that spread alongside COVID-19

How to make homemade strawberry ice cream
Clarke dubbed her line Sugar Dandy. Always concerned with the visual, she asked graphic designer Lauren Hortie to come up with a logo. Wanting to couple its social media unveiling with a good cause, she put up her ice cream as the prize in a raffle benefiting a pandemic fund organized by the Toronto Prisoners Rights Project. The $2,360 she raised will go toward PPE for people who are currently incarcerated (and at extremely high risk of contracting COVID-19), as well as stipends for those who have received early release.
Here, she shares a recipe for her Maple Butter Tart Ice Cream, as well as some tips for newbies. If that’s intimidating (or too much work), Sweet N’ Nice is available at supermarkets across Canada. Mango fans need not worry that Wilson’s creation will disappoint–she tasted a lot of purees to find the right one. “I wanted to make sure that it gives the taste of literally biting into the fresh mango off the tree,” she says. My mom did a taste-test and approves, and says Wilson got guava right, too.
I, for one, plan on eating a lot of extra ice cream this summer. It’s a year that none of us will forget, and at least some of the memories should be sweet ones.
Recipe: Maple Butter Tart Ice CreamSugar Dandy founder Michèle Pearson Clarke recommends starting with a coconut milk or condensed milk base to get a few successful batches under your belt, before moving on to attempt the custard base. That requires cooking the egg yolks, which can be a bit intimidating at the beginning. She also highly recommends using a candy thermometer for Step 4 when you get there, to reach exactly 170 F.

Ingredients2 cups heavy cream
1 cup milk
1 cup maple syrup
1/8 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 egg yolks
3 pecan butter tarts (homemade or store-bought)
Directions1. To concentrate the maple flavour, bring the maple syrup to a simmer over medium heat in a small saucepan, and let it reduce down to approximately 3/4 cup, or use as is for a milder maple flavour.
2. Add heavy cream, milk, cream, and salt to the saucepan; mix just to combine and dissolve salt, about 2 minutes and remove pot from heat.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk egg yolks until pale yellow; stirring constantly, slowly whisk one cup of the hot maple cream mixture into the egg yolks, then repeat with adding and whisking one more cup of hot maple cream mixture to the yolks.
4. Return the yolk/cream mixture back to the saucepan and gently cook over medium-low heat, stirring or whisking constantly, until custard thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon, and reaches 170-175 degrees on an instant-read thermometer.
5. Strain custard through a fine-mesh sieve into a clean bowl, stir in vanilla and chill mixture in a larger bowl with an ice bath, and then at least 6 hours or overnight in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Chop up butter tarts and freeze at least 6 hours or overnight on parchment paper.
6. Churn and freeze the custard in an ice cream machine according to manufacturers’ instructions, adding in the chopped-up butter tarts in the last few minutes of churning.
7. Transfer churned ice cream to an airtight container, and freeze until firm, about 3 hours.
8. Serve with an additional splash of maple syrup, and a pinch of Maldon sea salt.
Source: Chatelaine magazine, August 13, 2020

Samira Nasr has been named editor-in-chief of Harper’s Bazaar U.S., according to a Wednesday announcement, making Nasr the first black editor-in-chief at a Hearst-owned publication.
Nasr, a former Vanity Fair fashion director, will begin her Harper's Bazaar tenure on
July 6.
"As the proud daughter of a Lebanese father and Trinidadian mother, my worldview is expansive and is anchored in the belief that representation matters," Nasr said in an introductory video released by Hearst on Instagram. "My lens by nature is colorful, and so it is important to me to begin a new chapter in Bazaar's history by shining a light on all individuals who I believe are the inspiring voices of our time."
Hearst Magazine Chief Content Officer Kate Lewis said Nasr will create "something magical" at Harper's Bazaar, which launched in 1867 out of New York City.
Source: The Hill, June 10, 2020

NIKESHA HAYNES-GILMORE, a TT-born molecular pathologist and research assistant professor at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York, recently received a career development award for cancer research.
Haynes-Gilmore, who grew up in Chaguanas, saw herself becoming a vet as a teen, but said the trajectory of her professional path changed in college after her grandmother died of cancer. The past student of Holy Faith Convent in Couva migrated to the US after completing her A-levels in 2002.
For the past 30 years, the Cancer Control Program has done cancer-related research across the US. The programme investigates prevention and management of the side effects associated with cancer and cancer treatment.
Haynes-Gilmore is among seven faculty members internationally recognised for their outstanding work in cancer research and treatment.
This grant was set up to fund the necessary infrastructure for research-based clinical trials. Haynes-Gilmore was granted the award to help with a pilot randomised clinical trial to investigate the effect of an anti-inflammatory nutritional supplement in reducing inflammation and frailty in older survivors of colon cancer. It has an emphasis on recruiting older black survivors of colon cancer.
Pathologists are medical professionals who study bodies and body tissues.
Describing her career so far, Haynes-Gilmore said, "I normally will say I am a molecular pathologist by training, with a focus on cancer molecular mechanisms. I have now fused that background with clinical and public health research."
Haynes-Gilmore said she hopes to help bring attention to inequities in healthcare.
"It is known that racial inequities negatively impact health. Blacks are disproportionately affected by cancer as well as cancer and frailty, meaning cancer and the elderly."
Frailty, she explained, "categorises an individual’s physiological reserves and is an important factor for oncologists in determining the risk of chemotherapy toxicity. Inflammation has been shown to be a major contributor to frailty.
"However, the majority of research linking inflammation to frailty has not been done in the context of cancer treatment. With my co-authors, I have published that in patients with breast cancer, inflammation prior to cancer treatment and the change of inflammatory markers with chemotherapy is a predictor of post-treatment frailty. We also demonstrated a longitudinal relationship between immune cell profiles and frailty."
She said research has shown that in people of African ancestry, there is increased inflammation compared to other racial groups.
Asked what causes this, she said preliminary studies found that "socioeconomic status and perceived discrimination were contributors to the increased inflammation."
The specific cause of the disparity in inflammation,, she added, "is still being actively researched. Research is suggestive that social determinants are as important or can be even more important than health behaviours as it relates to health."
Haynes-Gilmore is excited about getting her study off the ground and said the ultimate goal is to develop interventions that address health inequities, thus aiding black people in achieving their fundamental right of health – an inequity that has been evident in the covid19 pandemic.
"Issues related to health inequities are being highlighted again due to covid19. There are reports that people of colour are disproportionately dying from this disease. Many of the reasons for the increased mortality stem from inequities.
"I hope that in the future there is more research in health equity and that governments make policy changes to improve health equity for people of colour around the world."
For her doctorate in pathology, Haynes-Gilmore studied molecular pathways, some of the smallest pathways in the human body for transmitting information, utilised by cancer to escape recognition by the immune system. The rate of detecting cancerous cells is slowed, as the usual identifying symptoms are limited.
Asked to share her research interests and aspirations, she said she is passionate about improving outcomes for older adults with cancer and reducing health inequities faced by people of African ancestry.
"This passion stems from my lived experience. I lost my grandmother to cancer; she experienced no treatment benefit despite severe chemotherapy toxicities, reduced quality of life, and physical and functional impairments.
"Furthermore, as a female researcher and mother of African descent, I have experienced first-hand the negative effects of inequities on my family’s emotional well-being."
This fuelled her aspiration to become an independently-funded translational scientist (scientists who use research to improve human well-being) who designs and implements interventions to improve outcomes for older adults with cancer.
"I dream of a future where people like my grandmother can age successfully without concern about the influence of race on their health and well-being."
Explaining how her research is applicable to TT, Haynes-Gilmore said, "There was a wonderful epidemiology study recently published about cancer facts and statistics in TT. In this study, it was found that the incidence and mortality rates of most cancers were higher in Trinbagonians of African descent as compared to other racial backgrounds."
However, she stressed, "At this time, I am not aware of the rates of frailty or elevated inflammation by racial/ethnic groups in TT."
She said if her current work proves effective, she sees no reason why the findings may not be beneficial to the population of TT.
A summa cum laude graduate of the historically black Lincoln University, Haynes-Gilmore is a first-generation college student in her family. She did her PhD in pathology at the University of Rochester.
Asked what professional challenges she had to overcome, Haynes-Gilmore said, "In my fourth year of completing the PhD, my adviser accepted a job offer at a different university. At that time, I had to restart my thesis project.
"But in hindsight, I am reminded of a saying my friends shared with me: We plan and God decides. I think if I didn’t have to restart my thesis with a different adviser, I wouldn’t be doing the research that I am doing today and I love what I am doing."
As an international student in the US, she said there are also challenges – some opportunities available only to US citizens.
"It was challenging for me to find a research internship. I was unable to secure a research internship until my junior year of college.
"So instead of directly applying to go to grad school at the end of college, I decided to take a year off. In this time, I was able to work as a research technician and in doing so, gain some skills to help me be competitive in applying for graduate school...I think that this year off was extremely beneficial personally and professionally and helped pave the way for what I am doing today."
Having accomplished all she has as a woman of colour from the Caribbean, Haynes-Gilmore said she feels a deep sense of pride and hopes to serve as a source of encouragement for young women from the Caribbean to chase their dreams regardless of their current life situations.
"Our current situation should not be the canvas for what our future should look like."
She emphasised the importance of collaboration, highlighting teamwork as a way of building individuals by supporting each other.
"The field that I work in is collaborative. We believe we are stronger and go further if we do it together. You would notice when I told you about my research I used 'we' pretty often.
"That is because it is all a team effort. We work together and we support each other in all of our endeavours. Honestly, I think if this model could be adopted broadly, we would see greater things being achieved as a society. In this model, as I step forward, or someone else on my team steps forward, we pull along the others. It might mean that instead of you yourself going forward ten steps you only went forward one step, but if you count all the steps that went forward, it’s probably now 20 or more steps forward. So collectively we made more progress."
A wife and mother of two, a son and a daughter, she said she keeps motivated by the impact her work has on families.
"In the field of cancer, you always hear stories from patients and/or their families. Stories about how much their life changed as a result of their diagnosis. How many issues they still face even after their cancer is cured.
"Helping these patients have a better quality of life is my motivation. In the context of health equity, knowing that inequity results in a host of negative health outcomes is also a driving motivation. My colleagues and I frequently chat about what we can do to reduce health inequities and with this clinical trial I hope that this can help in some way."
Her message for people seeking to follow their professional dreams is, "When you are afraid to chase your dreams, sit and ask yourself what are you afraid of and be honest with yourself about the answer."
She said people are often afraid of failing, but added, through failure there are many lessons.
"So go ahead, chase your dream. If you succeed right away, amazing. If you don’t – like most of us – give yourself a short time to grieve your failure, then evaluate the lessons learned from that attempt and try again. We are all stronger than we think."
Haynes-Gilmore wished to encourage readers with a message she would have given to her 16-year-old self: "You got this. Keep your chin up, keep pushing. God has a plan for you." Source: Newsday, June 2, 2020

Dr. Alexandra Amon is an astrophysicist from the sister islands of Trinidad and Tobago. In June of last year, she won the Michael Penston Prize for the best doctoral thesis in astronomy or astrophysics completed in the United Kingdom during 2018 with her thesis titled, “Cosmology with the Kilo-Degree Lensing Survey.”  
The Michael Penston prize, a very prestigious award, is presented annually by the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS) in the United Kingdom.  
Dr. Amon was also the 2019 runner up for the Jocelyn Bell Burnell Medal and Prize, which is awarded annually by the Institute of Physics in the UK for exceptional early-career contributions to physics by a very early career female physicist. 

In an email interview with us, Dr. Amon humbly explained her role as an astrophysicist,  
“I’m an astrophysicist, or more specifically, an observational cosmologist. Those are fancy-sounding words that just mean I spend my days doing scientific research to answer questions about our universe.”   
Dr. Amon grew up in Maraval, Trinidad and Tobago, and attended St. Joseph’s Convent, Port of Spain. She then attended the University of Edinburgh in Scotland on an island scholarship to complete a master’s in physics. Dr. Amon also completed her PhD at the same university and is currently a research fellow at Stanford University in the United States.  
From a young age, Dr. Amon dreamed of becoming an astronaut. She noted that a major turning point in her life was when she attended the International Summer School of Young Physicists at the Perimeter Institute in Canada.  
She described the experience as being “totally life-changing,” and that it gave her exposure to a career in astrophysics. Also, she realised that one way to become an astronaut was to pursue a doctoral degree. So to keep her options open, she decided to pursue a PhD.  
Despite many challenges along the journey studying abroad, Dr. Amon remained grounded in her Trinidadian roots.   
“Trinidad is a small place, but I think that the way we grow up there makes us ready for challenges anywhere,” she expressed.
She also noted that working in large international teams could be challenging at times, but growing up in diverse Caribbean communities with different cultures cultivates tolerance and acceptance of people with various backgrounds.  
“Trinidad and the Caribbean are such melting pots of culture, that we grow up very accepting of people’s differences, and even valuing them! That’s a skill not to be under-estimated!”  
Another challenge she faces while studying abroad is the lack of authentic Caribbean food.  Although, Dr. Amon thinks a general stereotype attached to being from the Caribbean is that we are “laid back,” she expressed that her upbringing taught her how to work hard as well as play hard.  
In her free time, she enjoys doing outreach programs to spread her love of space. She also enjoys yoga, gardening, surfing, and any sport involving the sun. 
An interesting detail she shared with us is that in the standard model of the universe, everything we know only makes up for 4% of its total mass. The normal observable matter, like the stars and planets, are just tiny fragments of the entire universe!  
The other 96% of space, known as dark matter and dark energy, is still a mystery. As a cosmologist, Dr. Amon gets to work on solving this mystery. Currently, she works with an international team analysing vast amounts of data retrieved from a telescope located on a mountain peak in Chile.  
Something important to take away from Dr. Amon would be her inspiring words of advice to aspiring astrophysicists from the Caribbean. She says to “work hard at the things you love,” and that “there is no replacement for hard work, and hard work is so much easier if there’s passion.”  
She also stressed that during the journey, it is crucial to stay true to one’s roots.   
“Along the way, stay true to yourself and your roots. It’s tempting to let that go to ‘fit in,’ but being from the Caribbean is unique, and minority opinions in these fields are valuable.” 
Source: Stem Caribbean, May 2020


 

As general secretary and co-founder of the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (Card) in the mid-1960s, Jocelyn Barrow, who has died aged 90, helped to pave the way for the 1965 Race Relations Act, which for the first time made racial discrimination illegal in Britain. Later she became the first black female governor of the BBC and an important black presence on a number of public bodies, including the Broadcasting Standards Council and the Parole Board.
Jocelyn’s involvement in the creation of Card was sparked by an inspirational meeting she had in London in 1964 with the American civil rights activist Martin Luther King, who was passing through the UK on his way to Norway to receive the Nobel peace prize. “King was warm and charming, and wanted to give us an idea of what we should be doing,” she said. “It helped to crystallise our ideas and we went on to form Card.” While there were other influential groups that had already been applying pressure for race relations legislation in Britain – and attempts to pass private members’ bills had been going on for a number of years before 1965 – the creation of Card undoubtedly helped to galvanise Harold Wilson’s Labour government into support for an officially sanctioned bill which it then steered through parliament.
​Three years later, during the successful nationwide campaign that led to a new, updated 1968 Race Relations Act, Jocelyn accepted my invitation (as Card’s northern regional secretary) to lead a march against racism in Newcastle upon Tyne. The hostility towards it was phenomenal, the local press signalled the potential danger of busloads of National Front demonstrators arriving from Leeds, and the Northumbrian police tried to get the march banned altogether. Its leaders received threats to their personal safety, and Jocelyn was warned not to travel to Tyneside at all.
Travel she did, however, and the march went ahead peacefully. Without a megaphone (her voice was commandingly loud), Jocelyn addressed a gathering of several hundred demonstrators, speaking of her upbringing and how it had shaped her fight against racial discrimination.
Born in Port of Spain, Trinidad, Jocelyn was the daughter of Olive (nee Pierre) and her Barbadian husband, Charles Barrow, an engineer. After attending St Joseph’s Convent school in Port of Spain she trained as a teacher at the city’s governmental teacher training college, and arrived in the UK in 1959 to pursue an English degree at London University, followed by postgraduate studies at the Institute of Education. She remained in the UK for the rest of her life, and throughout the 1960s and 70s taught English at schools in Hackney, one of the most deprived areas of east London, later becoming a lecturer at Furzedown teacher training college in Tooting, south London.
As an educationist who fervently believed in multiculturalism, she could not stomach the yawning gap between well-resourced schools for mainly middle-class white children and poorly resourced schools for mainly working-class black children. Her experiences in the classroom prompted her to set up a local project called Each One Teach One, designed to help black children and their families support each other educationally.
However, although her teaching had its own significance, it was her more general work on race relations that garnered wider attention. She was general secretary and then vice chair of Card from 1964 to 1969, and immediately after the passage of the 1968 Race Relations Act, which made discrimination in housing and employment illegal, she was appointed a member of the Community Relations Commission, set up to co-ordinate national measures to encourage the “growth of harmonious relations” between different races. She served on that body until, after the 1976 Race Relations Act, it was amalgamated with the Race Relations Board to form the Commission for Racial Equality.
Later, as a member of the Parole Board (1983–87), and particularly as the first black female governor of the BBC (1981 to 1988), she initiated programmes that encouraged young black and Asian people to fulfil their potential. She was also chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission on Training Barristers and was a patron, since its foundation in 1981, of the Black Cultural Archives.
Much of Jocelyn’s public work was not directly connected to race, however. From 1989 to 1995 she was deputy chair of the Broadcasting Standards Council, forerunner of Ofcom, and from 1993 to 1999 she was a non-executive director of the Whittington Hospital NHS Trust in London, where she pleaded for better employment conditions and promotion opportunities for non-trained auxiliary nurses and carers.
She also became founder and president of the Hackney Community housing association (1978 until her death); national vice president of the Townswomen’s Guild (1978–80); a member of the European commission’s economic and social committee (1990–98); a trustee of the National Museums and Galleries on Merseyside (now National Museums Liverpool), and a governor of the British Film Institute (1991–97). These and many more largely community-based organisations benefited enormously from her spirited commitment – and also from her refusal to suffer fools gladly.
Jocelyn, whose anger against injustice was carefully cloaked beneath an aura of dignified authority, liked to practise what she called “pincher politics”, which she once described to me as “a bottom-up/top-down approach, with the purpose of pinching the establishment into action and reform”. It was a method that was as psychological and cultural as it was political and educational – a little Machiavellian, perhaps, but always purposeful and often highly successful.
What drove Jocelyn – or “DJB” as she was affectionately known after being made a dame in 1992 – was the belief that she was entitled to be part of a society more equal than the one she had known either in her colonial birthplace or in the Britain of the 60s into which she later emerged.
In her last major intervention, in 2005, Jocelyn returned to education, the field that was closest to her heart, to head a nationwide consultation commissioned by the United Learning Trust into the role of underperforming would-be Academy schools. She found that the 20 schools that she studied were in various degrees discriminatory on the grounds of race, and concluded that a new and inclusive approach needed to be adopted. She retired in 2013.
In 1970 Jocelyn married Henderson Downer, a barrister and later a Jamaican appeal court judge who retired in 2004. For most of their long marriage they lived between the UK and Jamaica, enjoying their independence, separation, and togetherness in equal measure; Henderson coming to London for Christmas, Easter and a month in the summer while Jocelyn went to Jamaica from January to March. She is survived by Henderson and by two nieces, Christine and Leslie Anne, whom she raised at her home in Bloomsbury, central London.
• Jocelyn Anita Barrow, race relations campaigner and teacher, born 15 April 1929; died 9 April 2020
Source: The Guardian, May 27, 2020

Poet Roger Robinson has won the £10,000 RSL Ondaatje Prize for his “profoundly moving” A Portable Paradise (Peepal Tree Press), which includes a sequence of poems reflecting on the Grenfell Tower fire.
The annual prize rewards the best work of fiction, non-fiction or work of poetry that best evokes a sense of place. A Portable Paradise, which also won the T S Eliot Prize last year, was named the winner on 4th May across the RSL's media channels.
The poet said: “Winning the RSL Ondaatje Prize is great on many levels. Gaining wider recognition for the political issues that are raised in A Portable Paradise is one of the most important things for me, alongside more people reading about the struggles of black communities in Britain which hopefully creates some deeper resonating empathy.”
A writer and educator who has taught and performed worldwide, Robinson was chosen by Decibel as one of 50 writers who have influenced the black British writing canon.
He is also co-founder of both Spoke Lab and the international writing collective Malika’s Kitchen, alongside being the lead vocalist and lyricist for King Midas Sound.
His work was chosen from a shortlist featuring Robert Macfarlane's Underland (Hamish Hamilton), Elif Shafak's 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World (Viking), Jumoke Verissimo's debut A Small Silence (Cassava Republic), Surge by Jay Bernard (Chatto & Windus) and Tishani Doshi's Small Days and Nights (Bloomsbury Circus).
Judge Peter Frankopan branded the winner “a fabulous and ingenious work that seethes in its condemnation of injustices but sparkles in its tenderness and subtlety and revels in celebration at the things that make us all unique”.
Fellow judge Pascale Petit said: “Roger Robinson’s profoundly moving book manages to balance anger and love, rage and craft. Every poem surprises with its imagery, emotional intensity and lyric power, whether dealing with Grenfell, 'Windrush', or a son’s difficult birth, which is also a tribute to a Jamaican nurse. This is a healing book, enabling us to conjure our own portable paradises.” Source: TheBookseller.com, May 4, 2020
(Robinson was born in Hackney, London, to Trinidadian parents, and at the age of four went with them to live in Trinidad, returning to England when he was 19[6] in the 1980s. He initially lived with his grandmother in Ilford, Essex, before moving to Brixton, an area of south London that he found more congenial.[8] He describes himself as "a British resident with a Trini sensibility".  He was chosen by arts organisation Decibel as one of 50 writers who have influenced black-British writing over the past 50 years).

rinidad-born Dr Michael Pillai, 28, is one of the ‘heroes’ working on the frontline in a hospital in East Brooklyn, New York.Pillai, who is originally from Diego Martin, is an internal medicine resident and is in his second year of residency.Working through this COVID-19 pandemic happened to fall during his training so he did not have a choice but to work.
“I was needed at the hospital. In a matter of months the way we once knew life had changed. The cases increased rapidly and so did the complications,” Pillai said.
“I’ve worked in the ICU as well as on the admitting team during this period. While in the ICU the entire unit was COVID positive of varying ages. During admittance, more than 90 per cent of admissions to the hospital were due to respiratory problems from COVID-19. It was necessary to create new areas of the hospital to accommodate the amount of COVID-19 patients and residents from all specialties were helping with the work that was necessary,” he added.
Pillai, in sharing his experience with Guardian Media, said the work load increased “exponentially and more was expected of us as physicians.”
He said it has taken an emotional toll both on families and on health care workers including nurses and physicians.
“The death rate increased substantially as did the amount of codes being called for rapidly deteriorating patients. I have personally seen people that I work with who have suffered from this virus that lead them needing critical management. These include; doctors, nurses, clerks, respiratory therapists,” Pillai said.
“Though I would say the number of admissions for COVID-19 has been decreasing comparing last week to the prior week. This virus is affecting people of all ages especially with rapid deterioration in the obese population necessitating ventilator support,” he added.
Pillai said COVID-19 causes a decreased oxygen level amongst some patient called hypoxia, “This lack of oxygen causes respiratory distress necessitating oxygen delivery to these patients by external measures. When these patients do not respond to external measures of oxygen delivery then the decision is made for intubation and connection to a ventilator.”
“Some of these patient’s with COVID-19 develop Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) and at this point the chances of successful extubation from the ventilator decreases significantly. It is also important to note that these are with the critical patients,” he added.
Pillai noted that people are also recovering with supportive care such as treating the fevers, adequate hydration and self-isolation, “During this pandemic visitors have not been allowed due to the risk of spread of the virus. That being said, patients’ families have to be called daily with updates on patient care as they cannot see their family members so there are unfortunate cases where people are dying alone under these circumstances.”
This process, he further explained, has been difficult in many aspects “but it is important that we work with what we have and work together to operate as efficiently as possible.”
In giving advice to T&T, Pillai urged all to, “stay at home and refrain from gatherings.”
“Remember to leave your shoes outside your door and wipe your phones and your glasses. We are facing this pandemic together and it is important that we look out for each other and maintain social distance,” he said.
“I often wonder if I would have chosen to go into medicine had I anticipated something like this. In the grand scheme of things we all have our part to play, this just happens to be mine, and I humbly embrace it,” he added. Source: TT Guardian, May 3, 2020

 WITH almost half the US covid19 deaths in the state of New York, and almost 10,000 in the city, Marabella-born US-trained nurse Lisa-Maria John said she hopped on a plane to what is now referred to as “ground zero” because she was bound by duty.
Coming from a family of nurses, with three aunts and two cousins caring for the sick, the 32-year-old progressive-care nurse said she left the safety of Virginia, where the pandemic is not as widespread, took a 21-day contract, grabbed a one-hour flight, and the next day began caring for patients with the most severe cases of the virus. 
As of Saturday morning, New York State had 222,284 cases and 14,636 deaths, and New York City had 131,263 cases, with 8,893 deaths.​
“The outbreak is nowhere as bad as it is in New York,” John said. “It can’t be compared to anywhere else in the world right now except for maybe Italy.”​
No one knows the seriousness of the disease’s effect on the state as well as Ria Anderson, who works in another hospital in New York City.
Born and raised in Maloney, Anderson, 43, contracted covid19 on the job. She spent less than a week at home. Now she is back at work, caring for her patients, with the mindset that it will get better, and until that happens, she will do all she can.
Both women spoke with Sunday Newsday via WhatsApp calls and texts. ​
Anderson’s only regret is passing the virus to her four-year-old son Ethan.​ “Initially I was scared, not for myself but my son,” explained Anderson, a single mother. “Unfortunately he had mild symptoms and had to be isolated for 14 days. 
“I had a lot of guilt. But I knew we were both healthy and would overcome it. My family, on the other hand – that includes my cousins, aunts and brothers – were very concerned and scared that the outcome would not be favourable.
“Now that I feel good and back out to work they (gave) a sigh of relief.”​
Anderson developed symptoms on March 24, was tested two days later and on April 3 was confirmed positive. Her treatment was Tylenol and keeping herself hydrated.
By April 9 she was back to work, having been cleared to return.
PPE protection​ a must
With over eight years as an ICU-trained nurse, Anderson said she has had the burden of watching patients suffering the worst effects of the virus, and, with visits banned, patients dying without their loved ones around them. ​
John, whose contract ends on April 21, said she has worked 12-hour shifts for 13 days without a break.
Her first day off was on April 15. She spent most of it sleeping, and the rest replenishing her groceries and “taking in some fresh air and sunlight.”
She too fights the virus in the ICU, which is outside her specialty as a progressive care nurse.
But, she said, “This is not the first disease that nurses have faced. If you are afraid of a disease, then do not become a nurse. You are trained – use the training.
“I do not work if I do not have the personal protective equipment (PPE); it is in my contract. If I get sick, then I will have to tell my patients to go around and make room for me. So it is important that health care workers are protected.”​
While John has all the PPE she needs, Anderson said there were times when it was in short supply, but the job had to be done.
She recalled at one time reusing the same mask for an entire week.​
“I understand there’s limited supplies, but the changing of guidelines to accommodate insufficient materials is not the answer, and, most importantly, I believe is not safe.
“The suggestion at one time of using a bandanna instead of an N95 mask is beyond me.” ​
That suggestion is on the website of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) as one of several “strategies or options to optimize supplies of facemasks in healthcare settings” for professionals, as a last resort when no facemasks are available.
​Mental strength dealing with covid19​
​Anderson said: “All the patients that I have been caring for have covid19. Unfortunately, a few of them passed away.
“This has been the most heartbreaking experience. No one is allowed to have visitors, due to hospitals being on lockdown, because of the exposure that guests can bring to the hospital. They are all alone, and I am one of the few people they see.”
Meanwhile, “As nurses, we are constantly going into the rooms of patients who are positive, exposing ourselves to the virus.”
But rather than being worried for herself, she said: “I still haven’t fully processed everything that has been going on in the world, but I am thankful to be there for those in time of dire need.​
“Since being tested, I’m so grateful for my life and being able to overcome this virus. I have never been so grateful for my health. Every night I fall asleep I thank God I’m healthy. Every morning I wake up I thank God for another day. I thank God for putting me in a position to help others.
“I wonder what type of scars this will leave on us. What type of bond that it will create?
“As much as I want to run, this is my role. This is what God put me here to do. In spite of the fear that this coronavirus brings, I do not hesitate to get up, get ready and help fight, by taking care of all patients.”​
John wakes up at 4 am every day to catch a chartered bus to work. ​
“Physically, the level of exhaustion I have – I don’t know how I keep going, even as a healthy person I don’t know what is driving me...
“(But) there are no words to describe how difficult it is to lose three to five patients in a day. I tell myself: ‘There are sick people out there. Get up and get to work.’”
She added, “You know, I hate being called a hero. This is just part of the job.”​
​Not everyone around them has been able to accept the risks they have chosen to face.
“My parents were upset when I told them I was going to New York,” John said.
Asked what she did to calm them down, she answered “You ever tried calming a Trini parent?”
Her family are more reconciled to her choice now, and daily phone calls after she returns to her apartment around 8 pm usually soothe their worries.​
Anderson said she was offered but is yet to access the counselling provided by her hospital.
Both women are studying for master’s degrees in nursing. Anderson hopes to graduate next year as a family nurse practitioner, and John is scheduled to graduate in December in nursing education.​
​​NY nurses’ advice to TT​
​Speaking from the epicentre of the covid19 pandemic, the two nurses offered this advice.
Anderson said, “My advice is to stay home, practise proper hygiene and safe distance to stop coronavirus. Simple.”​
John was not as succinct: “I know we as a people abhor being told what to do. We walk to the beat of our (own) drums.
“However, this isn’t the time for that.
“Some may ask, ‘Well, who is you? You just a nurse!’
“Well, I am the nurse who has seen the most patient deaths in her nine-year career. I am the nurse who watched people in their 30s fight for their lives. I am the nurse who listens to the cries of someone begging to not let them die. I am the nurse holding the iPad so a patient’s children can say their goodbyes over FaceTime.​
“I don’t want my experiences for your family.
“This is not the time to be selfish and ignore social-distancing measures because you ‘can’t fight the boredom of being home.’ The only way to curb the spread of covid19 is to social-distance and stay home!” Source: Newsday, April 22, 2020