The Deonandia Podcast

To celebrate the installation of the new rector of the University of St Paul in Ottawa, Canada, a panel was assembled to discuss the ethical implications of the rise of Artificial Intelligence. My presentation as part of this panel was titled, “ChatGPT: Finding the Right Ethical Framework.” This podcast episode is the audio from that […]

This podcast episode was an assignment for one of my undergraduate students in another class (Satya Sarma). Satya chose to interview me for it! The topic is one close to my heart: public health information (and misinformation) in the age of COVID. It’s also available on YouTube as a video:

Recent US congressional hearings focused on eyewitness testimony from two navy pilots who claimed to have encountered UFOs, and a highly ranked military intelligence officer who claimed to know of crashed UFO retrieval programs. In the wake of this event, Mike Donofrio and Dr Raywat Deonandan talk about the waning stigma of the UFO topic […]

Jan 28, 2022 — Today’s episode is the audio from a presentation I gave to Occupational Health Clinics For Ontario Workers Inc, or OHCOW, all about Rapid Antigen Tests, or RATs. You can download the slides from this link. And you can watch the presentation on YouTube.

May 28, 2021 — It’s a question I get a lot these days: should I give my child the COVID-19 vaccine? Well, it’s ultimately a personal decision that you should take up with your child’s pediatrician. In this brief episode, I outline a framework for how to think about risk vs reward. You can read […]

Today’s episode is the audio from an interview with Sweden’s Dr Anders Tegnell from March 3, 2021. The interview was organized and lead by Dr Ziad El-Khatib of the Facebook Epidemiology group, and is posted in full on YouTube:

Dec 12, 2020 — In this special podcast episode, I’ve solicited pressing questions from the general public about the new COVID-19 vaccines. After receiving about 26 questions, I reached out to a true expert to help answer them: Dr Erling Rud, a virologist and vaccinologist with decades of experience researching vaccines for viruses like Ebola and […]

Dec 11, 2020 — I was asked by a journalist to submit a two minute video on a topic related to COVID-19. I spoke too long and recorded a five minute one instead, so I re-recorded a shorter version. What to do with the original video? Well, I’m including it here as a podcast. The […]

Nov 13, 2020 — The vaccine data are compelling and there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. But the tunnel is long and dark. So how do we manage until the vaccine gives us herd immunity? Right now all across Canada there is a call for a comprehensive strategy. I wrote about some […]

Sep 23, 2020 — Right now in Canada, new daily cases of COVID-19 are increasing seemingly exponentially. But we are not seeing a similar increase in either hospitalizations or deaths. Dr Deonandan presents five (and maybe a sixth) possible explanations. View the YouTube video of this podcast here.

Sep 22, 2020 — Another brief podcast episode linked to an earlier blog post. In this one, I attempt to explain what we mean by a “second wave” of COVID-19, and how it is 100% driven by human behaviour. The original blog post is here, and the youtube video link is here:

Sep 13, 2020 — I’ve been ignoring this podcast of late and focusing more on writing COVID-related blog posts. So I’ve decided to triple-down on the messaging and am recording both video and audio companion casts for the most read blog posts. Today, I talk about the overall plan for opening public schools safely in […]

April 29, 2019 — I was privileged to present to the PhD students of the Population Health program at the University of Ottawa. The topic was generally how to make a knowledge mobilization plan, but more specifically about how to turn one’s research into an opinion-editorial article. A PDF of my slides are available here.

Mar 5, 2019 — This is the audio of a lecture I gave to an undergraduate class at the University of Ottawa, all about how to conduct a systematic literature review. You can access a PDF of my slides here.

March 5, 2019 — This is the audio of a lecture I gave to undergraduate global health students at Carleton University in Ottawa. You can access the PDF of my slides here.

Jan 26, 2019 — This is the audio of the keynote address that I gave to attendees of the University of Ottawa Healthcare Symposium. To access a PDF of my slides click here.

May 28, 2018 — This is the audio of a lecture I gave to a graduate class in Community Outreach and Media Relations in the Sciences. It was recorded using my bluetooth microphone, so the audio quality is not as great as it could be.  A PDF of the class slides (with most photos removed) can […]

Sep 30, 2017 — This is the audio of the keynote lecture I gave at the Action Global Health Network conference at the University of Ottawa.  A PDF of my slides can be accessed here.

Sep 27, 2017 – I was invited to speak about global health ethics at the 6th annual CHEO Global Health Half Day. I recorded the audio of my presentation for your listening (dis)pleasure. To access a PDF of my presentation slides, click here.

June 29, 2017 — This is the third of three presentations I gave to the attendees of a summer institute on social justice, hosted by the Indian Institute of Technology in Ahmedabad, India. Slides can be downloaded here.

June 28, 2017 — This is the audio of a presentation I gave to attendees of a special summer workshop on social justice, hosted by the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar in Ahmedabad, India. The slides from the presentation are available here.

June 27, 2017 — This is the audio of a presentation I gave to doctoral and post-doctoral students attending a special summer workshop on social justice, hosted at the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar in Ahmedabad, India.  The air-conditioning in the room was rather loud, so I do apologize for the audio quality of the recording. […]

This episode of the Deonandia podcast was produced by three students from my undergraduate international health class in October of 2015.  Michelle Brazeau, Jessica Colbourne and Fallon Melville analyze a study titled, “Group support psychotherapy for depression treatment in people with HIV/AIDS in northern Uganda: a single-centre randomised controlled trial.”

Once more, I turn this podcast over to my undergraduate students in my 4th year international health class.  This episode was recorded in 2015 by Anika Suri and Patrick Van Loon, and they chose to examine “Hazardous alcohol drinking and premature mortality in Russia: a population based case-control study.”

April 25, 2017 — This is the audio of a presentation on Reproductive Tourism that I gave at a conference titled, Healthy Canada Conference 2017: Access to Affordable Medicines.  Copies of the PowerPoint presentations from the event are downloadable here.