Tag Archives: MCS

Healthy Housing for Ann – Help Needed

Posted on April 14, 2024 | 2 comments

 

My friend Ann needs to relocate soon, and really needs an accessible place where exposures to pollutants are minimized as much as possible.

The Plays that Says Here
Painting by Ann Cognito

 

She has written about her needs here:

Hello, I am a friend of Linda’s, who needs to find safe and accommodative housing. My name is Ann Cognito (pen name – my legal surname is Bucknor).

I am an older woman with disabilities and serious long term health issues including severe chronic pain (multiple causes) and severe environmental/chemical intolerances (probably MCS; I’m on a very long list waiting for assessment at the Women’s College Hospital Environmental Health Clinic). I am also agoraphobic, autistic, and have CPTSD.

Before my health deteriorated so much, I used to have a career, and owned my home.  I am very well educated, and an environmental activist. While I was still able to function more, I walked from Calgary to Ottawa with my support/service dog to raise awareness about the climate crisis. 

I am now looking for safe housing, again.

Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Air Quality, Community, Disability, Environmental Health, Health, Human Rights, Medically Required Housing, Real Estate

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Are You Feeling Lucky?

Posted on May 5, 2023 | 1 comment

Some of us are fairly independent, (no-one is fully independent  in an interdependent society).

Some of us may need helping hands to exist, sometimes in little ways, sometimes in seemingly big ways, which can seem even larger if policies have been created that make solutions much harder to access or create.

Some people’s basic medical needs which make it possible for them to exist are expensive, and these survival needs may seem elitist to others who can’t afford them, because the system is set up to make healthier (and for some, medically necessary) options more expensive and unavailable to everyone, even though everyone would benefit from access to them.

Society has also been conditioned to add on a quiet “they must be doing something wrong if they can’t manage independently”, and “I can’t afford those things that I would like to have too”, or  “I had to work my ass off for those things, why should someone get them for free”.

Are you feeling lucky today that your basic needs are being met?

Here’s a list of questions to consider:

Continue reading →

1 Comment

Posted in Accessibility, Air Quality, Disability, Environmental Health, Fragrance, Health, Housing, Human Rights, Medically Required Housing, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities

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Help Susy Find and Afford Safe, Accessible Housing to Prevent MAiD

Posted on February 14, 2023 | 2 comments

Long time MCS/ES community member Susy Mallin needs our support now.

She has managed to survive years of brutal conditions due to the severity of her MCS/ES, but all this has taken a big toll on her, and she is out of energy to keep struggling just to exist.

She needs medically safe, low toxicity housing on the Sunshine Coast area of BC where her family lives, housing that is affordable on a senior’s fixed income, a home where she isn’t exposed to chemicals, fragrances, smoke, pesticides, and other pollutants all the time. For these reasons, she can’t live in any multi-unit buildings.

You might see the issue with this need.

Housing is unaffordable for so many now, especially for people with medical needs for “healthy” housing, made with inert, low VOC materials.

People with MCS/ES don’t have a social safety net, our ability to live really does depend on community support, on you.

Please donate generously so that Susy can spend her remaining years in some relative peace.

Please be on the lookout for housing that could be suitable for her.

In a world that has otherwise made it abundantly clear that she, and others with more severe MCS/ES, aren’t really welcome, and who don’t care how much preventable suffering is imposed and endured, let’s show Susy that humans care enough to make it possible for her to exist, to be able to live out her natural life in dignity, and hopefully even be able to return to sharing her art with us.

♥
Read more, and donate here:

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https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-save-susys-life

♥

Banner of 5 images of jewellery that Susy was previously able to create, including hearts, pendants, and initials, all hand-made of silver

Silver jewellery made by Susy when making jewellery was still possible.

Please share widely.
Thank you for anything you can contribute.

An UPDATE on Susy’s situation (March 11th, 2023)
Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Disability, Environment, Environmental Health, Generosity, Housing, Human Rights, Indoor Air Quality, MAID, Medically Required Housing, Real Estate

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MCS and Housing Update

Posted on January 26, 2023 | 6 comments

The MCS and Housing  page has an entirely new updated resource section, divided into a few different categories.

Hope you find it helpful.

MCS and Housing

…

May safe, accessible, medically required housing be available for all who need it.

an illustration of different types of colourful housing on a green wavy landscape

6 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Disability, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, Housing, Human Rights, Medically Required Housing, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities

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Van Living with MCS/ES

Posted on June 15, 2021 | 10 comments
Marie’s an artist with severe mold sensitivity and MCS/ES, and has created an amazing slide show and photo  exhibits to raise awareness about the plight of people with environmental sensitivities and environmental illnesses, despite living in a dilapitated van, having to travel to the US for our winters because it’s too cold in a van here in Canada.

We really don’t have accessible housing for people with severe MCS/ES. I have several good online friends living in vehicles now because there’s no accessible housing. Marie is one of them, and she needs a reliable new (to her) van really soon, so that she can continue to live and create the beautiful, challenging, and awareness-raising art she lives for.

Life in a specialized van is hard enough, but it’s not at all safe in the old one she’s been trying to maintain the last few years. The old van has come to the end of it’s life. She has been harassed by unscrupulous men a number of times when the van broke down, and she deserves better than this from our society.
Let’s make sure she receives what she needs. No contribution is too small. Likewise, no donation is too big if you have more than you need.
Can you please donate, share, and ask the people you know to donate and share too? The world needs Marie!

10 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Air Quality, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, Housing, Human Rights

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Hunger Strike for Access to Safe Health Care

Posted on May 12, 2021 | 21 comments

Ginette lives in Quebec and has been trying to access health care safely for years, without success. The fragrance exposures cause severe symptoms and her health is deteriorating as a result of not being able to have her basic needs met, because… fragrance.

She posted this video to her fb profile:

Here’s a  rough English transcript:

Continue reading →

21 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Action, Disability, Fragrance, Health Care, Human Rights, Policy, Public Health

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MCS Awareness Video by Maria Rizzo

Posted on May 12, 2021 | 5 comments

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This excellent video about MCS/ES was made in 2020 by Maria Rizzo, who was behind the Fragrance Free Revolution, but has not aged a second.  It is just as relevant today as it was then.

♥

The only thing that has changed, is that Maria is no longer with us. She lost her life in December 2020 after being subjected to too many exposures when spending time in hospitals with her father.

She wasn’t able to recover from those exposures, the broken heart of losing her father, and of the world that harms us instead of welcomes us.

The tribute her partner wrote when he informed the community of her passing can be found here.

I miss collaborating with Maria, I miss her creative energy, and her ability to do things in clear and concise ways.

She’d still be with us if hospitals and the rest of the world stopped inflicting unnecessary poisons on us all, and instead respected our human rights as well as their own vulnerability to 24/7 exposures to unnecessary hazardous substances.

Her death is a great loss to the global MCS/ES community.

…

 Rest in power Maria.

♥

Text: Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Choose People...Not Products. Be Fragrance Free Always No Fragrance or Fragranced Products

5 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, Fragrance, Health

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2021 – Welcome to MCS/ES Action and Accommodation Month

Posted on May 1, 2021 | 13 comments

Traditionally May is MCS and MCS/ES Awareness Month.

After decades of awareness raising, it’s time to move on to welcoming action and accommodation, don’t you think?

Are people with MCS/ES, often referred to as Human Canaries, actually welcome in this world?

If you are a person with MCS/ES, please share in the comments if and how you are being accommodated and welcomed (or not) in this world.

If you are a person who doesn’t have MCS/ES, please share in the comments how you are accommodating and welcoming people with MCS/ES into the world.

image description: a faded beach ball mother earth... there's a large faded canary bird (representing human canaries) wearing a full face respirator, on the middle of the globe text reads: Are people with MCS/ES welcome in this world? seriously 'sensitive' to pollution May 2021 MCS/ES Action and Accommodation Month multiple chemical sensitivities MCS/ES environmental sensitivities

13 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Action, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, Healthy Environment, Human Rights

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Earth Day Human Canary Starter Pack

Posted on April 22, 2021 | 6 comments

Human Canaries are what’s left after the signs from wildlife and nature weren’t respected, but we’re not long for this earth either, unless there are some significant changes in people’s daily habits – yes, things everyone can start to do RIGHT NOW!

Let’s start with some hashtags:

#HumanCanaries #EnvironmentalSensitivities #EarthDay #EarthDay2021 #MotherEarth #ChemicalSensitivity #MCS #EHS #IAQ #EnvironmentalHealth #air #water #disabilities #ScentFree #FragranceFree #BeFragranceFree #NonToxic #StopTheKill
Then move on to some science and other research (with apologies for the formatting, I really hate wordpress now):

Continue reading →

6 Comments

Posted in Action, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, Human Rights, Policy, Public Health

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What Now?

Posted on March 13, 2021 | 20 comments

 

A brief account of a seriously “sensitive” to pollution person living in a society where fragranced and toxic products are more important than lives, where disabled lives are disposeable, where it’s now easy to be euthanized (even for for externally imposed and inflicted) suffering, but not to receive support to remove the causes of suffering, causes and conditions that have been made systemic for many people with disabilities.

I’m not a poet and I know it and I wrote it anyway…

What Now? Continue reading →

20 Comments

Posted in Accessibility, Air Quality, Community, Disability, Environmental Sensitivities, Food, Fragrance, Health, Healthy Environment, Housing, Human Rights, MCS/ES, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities, Pesticides, Policy, Pollution, Support

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