Latest news with #Koka
Ottawa Citizen
02-06-2025
- Health
- Ottawa Citizen
‘It's a relief they are closing': Controversial safe supply clinic to close in Chinatown
The Northwood Recovery clinic in Chinatown, which has stirred controversy among Chinatown residents, will be closing on June 9. Article content Article content The clinic was meant to be a 'safer supply' clinic, using a harm reduction approach to reduce the risk of overdose through prescription opioids. Instead, public drug use, violence and overdose deaths have only increased in the neighbourhood, concerning residents and businesses. Article content Article content 'It's a relief that they are closing,' Somerset ward Coun. Ariel Troster said. 'It was not working.' Article content Article content Troster said one of the main issues was that its primary physician, Dr. Suman Koka, was based in Sudbury, and dispenses prescriptions virtually. Article content Koka runs a network of addiction clinics across Ontario, including in Hamilton and North York. He has locations in Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie under the name Recovery North. Article content 'We saw an immediate uptick in crime, drug dealing, public drug use, disposal of Dilaudid bottles and needles all over the area after the Northwood clinic opened,' Troster said. 'Chinatown had the second-highest rate of overdoses in the city.' Article content The Ottawa Citizen was unable to reach Koka for comment, despite repeated attempts. Article content The loss of the Somerset West Community Health Centre's supervised consumption services added to the 'chaos', Troster said. This happened after the Ford government banned consumption sites within 200 metres of schools or daycares, which resulted in the closure of 10 sites across Ontario. Article content Article content 'Taking harm reduction services away is not helpful because people need to be alive if they're going to seek treatment,' she said. Article content Article content Ryan Turley, a board member of the Dalhousie Community Association, said they were pleased to hear of the clinic closing, after facing a long string of issues with Northwood that caused 'distress' in the community. Article content This included the use of Dilaudid, a type of opioid used to treat severe pain, which Turley said is often traded or sold for stronger drugs within the vicinity of the clinic. He said another issue they perceived was the lack of support given to Northwood patients after opioids were prescribed. Article content 'This also links back to the closure of the safe consumption and treatment site at Somerset West,' he said. 'There's nowhere for those people to do those drugs, where they can consume safely.
Irish Daily Mirror
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Daily Mirror
Bingeable RTE cooking show delivers over-the-top and oddly satisfying recipes
Chef Daniel Lambert knows what it's like to feel hangry. But being famished to the point of being grumpy - known by the playful portmanteau "hangry" - has resulted in some of his best recipes, which millions of people now watch him whip up online. "I deep fried a piece of cheese covered in Doritos one night and I got a million views," says the TikTok star and host of new RTÉ Player series Look Who's Hangry. "It's just kind of changed my life." Lambert - a classically trained chef by trade - turned to TikTok during the COVID-19 lockdowns, shortly after leaving his job. What started as a passion project quickly caught on with the app's millions of users - Lambert now boasts more than 300,000 followers on TikTok alone, something he attributes to his "emotional" cooking approach. "I like making people emotional - often they're waiting for me to say it at the end of the video!", he says. Look Who's Hangry hit our screens at the beginning of the month. The show sees two creators pitted against each other to create unconventional yet appealing dishes, with Lambert lending his culinary expertise to both contenders along the way. Highlights so far include deep-fried pistachio and sundried tomato ice cream, as well a jerk prawn sushi roll. Aside from these (often unholy) combinations, Lambert sees the show as an opportunity to broaden his gastronomic horizons. "The highlight of making it would probably be learning different cultures and different cuisines, and seeing how people react to different things," he says. "The response has been insane," he says, since the show debuted on the RTÉ Player. "My inbox was full of people saying 'What's this?' - because we released it so quickly, everyone keeps rewatching the episodes. It's great." Hanger is a real emotion - not eating enough can lead to low blood sugar, which in turn releases stress hormones. The brain can often crave salty or fatty foods in this state - luckily, Lambert has plenty of recipes ready to meet these needs. "What I do is get Koka noodles and make them into a wrap," he says. "Then I fry them in a pan with butter and make cheesy enchilada wraps, they're unbelievable - great for a hangover!" The link between hangovers and hanger is strong, and the mind can often crave the same kind of unhealthy meals. "You lose a lot of salt when you're out drinking," Lambert says. "You're then replenishing that salt the next day - that's why we crave those kind of foods!" Daniel's shared two of his favourite hangry recipes down below - perfect after a night out, a night in or when any hunger pangs kick in! Look Who's Hangry is currently available for streaming on RTÉ Player.
Japan Times
14-05-2025
- General
- Japan Times
34-year memorial held for victims of Shiga train collision
A 34-year memorial ceremony for a train collision killing 42 people in Shiga Prefecture was held near the site of the accident in the city of Koka on Wednesday. In front of a monument near the site, 21 participants, including bereaved family members and the heads of Shigaraki Kohgen Railway (SKR) and West Japan Railway, or JR West, observed a moment of silence and laid flowers. "We will do our best to advance our work to achieve train safety," SKR President Seijiro Masaki said in a memorial address. "We will engrave the tragedy of the accident and the preciousness of life in our hearts and continue to pass on the facts, remorse and lessons of the accident to future generations," JR West President Kazuaki Hasegawa pledged. "I would like to keep demanding that the nation and railroad operators take further safety measures," said Seiji Shimomura, 66, who co-headed a now-disbanded group for train safety set up mainly by bereaved family members in the 1991 accident. Shimomura lost his 2-year-old son in a July 2001 crowd crush on a pedestrian overpass in Akashi, Hyogo Prefecture. On May 14, 1991, an SKR train and a JR West train collided head-on in Shigaraki, now Koka, killing 42 people and injuring more than 600.
CBC
28-04-2025
- Health
- CBC
Doctor operating safer supply clinics billed OHIP $2.5M last year
A doctor running a network of addiction clinics across Ontario, including an Ottawa location that offers safer opioid supply, is billing public insurance about $2.5 million per year. Dr. Suman Koka is the sole officer and director of Northwood Recovery, which has locations in North York, Hamilton and Manitoulin Island. It operates under the name Recovery North in Sudbury, Timmins and Sault Ste. Marie. Northwood Recovery opened its first Ottawa location in Hintonburg last year, but quietly moved it to Chinatown this March. Neighbours in both Hintonburg and Chinatown have criticized Koka for prescribing opioid medications to fentanyl users. They say his patients are trading the prescription drugs on the street to get harder substances, attracting dealers and crime to the area. City councillors representing both neighbourhoods have urged Northwood Recovery to change its operations or shut down. In an interview last month, Koka confirmed that the Ottawa clinic offers safer supply, a harm reduction approach intended to help users replace street drugs like fentanyl with safer prescription narcotics. Among other treatments, Koka prescribes hydromorphone, which is also known by the trade name Dilaudid. He confirmed that he primarily meets with patients at the Ottawa clinic remotely through telemedicine. CBC submitted a freedom of information request to the Ontario Ministry of Health seeking records of Koka's total billing to the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP). It reveals that he billed just over $2.3 million in 2023 and nearly $2.5 million in 2024. Those totals do not represent Koka's profit or take-home pay, since at least some of the money would be used to cover overhead costs at his clinics, which could include rent, supplies and administrative staff. But the totals are far in excess of typical billing. The average gross clinical payment for Ontario physicians was $388,557 in 2022-23, according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information. Payments for the top quintile — the top 20 per cent of physicians by billing — were $568,432 on average. CBC also submitted a request for Koka's billing for telemedicine specifically. He billed $524,302 for virtual care services in 2024, including video and telephone consultations. The figures were current as of January 22 of this year. The documents include a note that physicians still have a three-month period to submit additional claims for processing. Koka had previously appeared on a Toronto Star database of highly paid doctors published in 2019. According to the Sudbury Star, which cited the Toronto Star's reporting, Koka billed $1.5 million in 2018-19, putting him in the top one per cent of doctors ranked by OHIP billing. Koka did not respond to a request this week with detailed questions about his 2023 and 2024 billing. He did not explain how he is able to personally see enough patients to bill millions of dollars per year, or whether he is delegating some of the care. But in a March interview, CBC asked him whether he was still one of Ontario's highest paid doctors. "I'm not sure about that, but I'll tell you I'm probably one of the hardest working doctors in Ontario," he said at the time. Previously cautioned for telemedicine practices Doug Angus, a professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa's Telford School of Management, said Koka would have to see a very high volume of patients to generate that kind of money. Angus, who specializes in health economics, said Koka's reliance on virtual care could allow him to cycle through patients quickly. "That's changed the game completely," he said. "There's a lot of general practitioners who would love to have that kind of situation, but there's no way they can generate that kind of gross income with face-to-face visits." He said that the ministry has tried to rein in high billers, but it's difficult to monitor. He said they haven't yet addressed the question of how many patients a doctor can effectively see. Koka's membership page on the College of Physicians and Surgeons website shows he has 15 practice locations, as well as hospital privileges at the Health Sciences North regional hospital in Sudbury. His medical professional corporation has 13 different addresses. The college cautioned him in 2019, after a patient complained that Koka didn't meet with him at all. Instead, a physician assistant at his office prescribed methadone after a virtual appointment. The college found no sign that the physician assistant had proper training — and noted that delegating care is only appropriate in the context of an existing doctor-patient relationship, which did not exist in that case. Somerset Coun. Ariel Troster met with Koka last month, along with area MPP Catherine McKenney. In a post to her website, Troster said she insisted on wraparound supports for patients and better security protocols during the meeting. She said the clinic has hired a security guard and a nurse and committed to removing people from the program if they divert their medications. In his March interview with CBC, Koka said Northwood Recovery takes drug diversion very seriously. He said patients found to be trading or selling their medications are discharged from the program. According to Koka, even suspicion can lead the clinic to put patients under a stricter regime where they must take doses on site. He said telemedicine has increased the number of people he is able to see, allowing more people to access addiction treatment. "Whether it's through video conference or whether through in person, the interaction is the same," he said.
Time of India
23-04-2025
- Time of India
Man gets life term for killing brother over meat distribution
1 2 Rourkela: A 60-year-old man was sentenced to rigorous life imprisonment by a local court on Tuesday for killing his younger brother during a dispute over meat distribution at a village function in 2019. Additional district and sessions judge Mukty Ranjan Satapathy pronounced the verdict after examining 20 witnesses. The convict, Koka Ekka, was also fined Rs 20,000. If he fails to pay, he would serve an additional year in prison. According to the prosecution, the incident took place on April 27, 2019, at Dumerta Barkani village under Bondamunda police limits. The brothers, Koka and Soma (Fagu) Ekka, were attending an ear-piercing ceremony at Rimish Kujur's house when they got into an argument over goat meat distribution around 6 pm. Though villagers initially intervened, the dispute escalated when the brothers returned home. Soma reportedly struck Koka with an axe handle, prompting Koka to snatch the weapon and fatally attack his brother's neck. Soma was rushed to a nearby hospital where he was declared dead. Following a complaint by village sarpanch Rabi Narayan Majhi, Bondamunda police arrested Koka and charged him with murder. The convict has been in judicial custody since his arrest in 2019.
