Health & Medicine: 1)Advocates push for advance MAID requests two years after Parliament recommendation; 2)Companies can make generic Ozempic as of next week, but don’t expect to get it soon; 3)Doctor’s orders? ‘Belly laugh at least two to five days a week’; 4)Virtual reality opens doors for older people to build closer connections in real life

1)Advocates push for advance MAID requests two years after Parliament recommendation

Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press

By Sarah Ritchie, December 28, 2025

Sandra Demontigny knew something wasn’t right when she couldn’t remember buying herself a new pair of boots. They were a splurge — a little out of character for the mother of three — and she had been excited about bringing them home.

“I saw them near the door and I asked my kids, ‘Who bought these boots? I’ve never seen them,'” she said.

“The kids were saying, ‘No, (they’re) yours. You bought them and you really like them.”

Sliding her feet inside, she realized she couldn’t remember buying them. “I started crying,” she said.

The incident led to a diagnosis: early onset Alzheimer’s disease, the same kind Demontigny watched her father struggle with for years.

That was in 2018. Today, Demontigny is 46 years old and lives in an assisted-living facility in Lévis, Que.

She lives independently, but her short-term memory is failing and she finds it difficult to manage time. She has a tendency to repeat herself in conversation.

“I don’t know it, I just see it in the faces of the people who I’m talking to,” she said.

Early this year, she signed an advance request that sets out the conditions under which she would like to end her life. She isn’t sharing the details, but said it includes her ability to remember her children.

“It was a long process, a lot of reflection, a lot of crying, a lot of fear,” Demontigny said.

Now that it’s done, she said she feels at peace with the decision. It is not a choice she would have if she lived anywhere but Quebec.

Canada’s medical assistance in dying laws do not allow for advance requests, which are written requests to die with medical assistance under specific conditions, made before the patient loses the capacity to provide consent.

A 2023 report from a joint parliamentary committee on medical assistance in dying, also known as MAID, recommended changing the Criminal Code to allow advance requests in the event a person is diagnosed with a serious and incurable condition that leads to incapacity.

The committee wrote that “an advance request must be voluntary, non-coercive, well-considered and made by a person with the requisite capacity.” But the change has not been made.

Provincial legislation in Quebec allows for advance requests for MAID by ensuring that clinicians will not be criminally charged for providing the service.

Dying With Dignity Canada said it’s time for the federal government to act.

“Without federal legislation, we’re left with each province individually having to come up with and implement their own law,” said Helen Long, the organization’s CEO.

This fall, Health Canada released the results of a report it commissioned about advance requests, finding broad support among Canadians for the practice as well as concerns about the safeguards that should be put in place.

In Quebec more than 1,700 people have made an advance request so far.

Cardus, a Christian think tank, opposes any expansion to the assisted-dying regime and has advocated for stronger safeguards.

“Very few jurisdictions internationally have an advance MAID request in their legislation, and so we don’t have much data to see how it’s working in those countries,” said Rebecca Vachon, the group’s health program director.

“The data that we do have show how complex and difficult these ethical situations can be to navigate.”

Vachon said the requirement to provide consent is a key safeguard in Canadian law.

Cardus would like to see an independent monitoring and enforcement body created in Canada. Vachon said the group is alarmed that the latest data from Health Canada shows MAID accounted for about one in every 20 deaths in 2024.

Long said the numbers simply reflect people’s individual choices. She pointed out the data also shows more than 65 per cent of people who had a medically assisted death had been diagnosed with cancer.

“So, truly, they were dying of cancer. MAID was the process by which they chose to end their life,” she said.

The Liberal government has given no indication of whether it intends to change the existing laws.

A spokesperson for Justice Minister Sean Fraser did not answer specific questions, instead sending a short statement that noted MAID is a “complex and deeply personal issue.”

“We will continue to work with provinces and territories and medical professionals on the implementation of Canada’s MAID system,” said the statement from Lola Dandybaeva.

Demontigny said she has a clear idea of what’s coming as her illness advances, and she doesn’t want to live the way her father did in his final years. Young people with her diagnosis can live for decades.

“Because we are young, our bodies feel in really good shape. It’s just the brain that is bad,” she said.

2) Companies can make generic Ozempic as of next week, but don’t expect to get it soon

Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press
By Nicole Ireland, January 2, 2026

Drug companies in Canada are allowed to make lower priced generic versions of the blockbuster drug Ozempic as of next week, but experts say patients shouldn’t expect it to be available for at least a few months.

As of Dec. 29, Health Canada had received nine submissions seeking approval to make semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy, the brand-name diabetes and weight-loss drugs manufactured by Novo Nordisk. 

“Health Canada understands that there is considerable interest in lowering costs associated with this highly prescribed drug by introducing generic versions,” spokesperson Mark Johnson said in an email to The Canadian Press. 

Sandoz Canada, Apotex, Teva Canada, Taro Pharmaceuticals and Aspen Pharmacare Canada have all applied for Health Canada authorization, according to its list of generic submissions.

Sandoz Canada and Teva Canada told The Canadian Press they couldn’t provide any information on expected timelines for their products, while the others either could not be reached or did not respond to requests for comment. 

The remaining companies weren’t named because their submissions were received prior to April 1, 2024, when the policy requiring a sponsor name changed, Johnson said. 

Mina Tadrous, a pharmaceutical policy expert at the University of Toronto, said a generic semaglutide medication is unlikely to be approved until late spring or early summer. 
“Canadians should not be expecting a product in January,” he said. 

Based on generic pricing models in Canada, patients can expect the drug to be priced as low as 35 per cent of the brand-name Ozempic cost, which can be a few hundred dollars a month, Tadrous said, noting that there will likely be multiple generic semaglutide medications competing with each other. 

The “target timeline” for Health Canada’s scientific review of generic drug submissions is 180 days, Johnson said. 
That doesn’t include the extra time required if Health Canada needs more information from the drug company. 

Evaluating generic semaglutide drugs is more complex than many other medication approvals, he said. 
That’s because semaglutide was originally developed using biological processes, but the generic versions can be made using more simple chemical means. 
“Generic semaglutide products are complex synthetic products that are pharmaceutically equivalent to the brand name drug, but with possible differences that could impact safety and efficacy,” Johnson said. 
“The manufacturer must show that these differences do not affect the safety, efficacy, or quality of the drug compared to the brand name drug.”

Dr. Ehud Ur, an endocrinologist in Vancouver, said being able to prescribe generic semaglutide will be “very exciting,” noting that semaglutide would be an effective medication for many of his patients, but they aren’t on it because they can’t afford it. 

“The price could drop pretty sharply and become quite affordable for people with Type 2 diabetes and obesity,” he said. 

“I would say that the biggest barrier to (taking) Ozempic is not side effects or worries about its efficacy but its cost,” Ur said. 

“When you’re talking about two, three, four hundred dollars a month, (for) a lot of people, you know, that is just impossible.”

Ur said generics should “theoretically” be the same as the brand name, but occasionally patients don’t have as good a response to generic medications so may decide to stay with the original. 

Canada is the only country where Novo Nordisk allowed the patent for its semaglutide drugs to expire, paving the way for “regulatory exclusivity” to end on Jan. 4.

In an interview with The Canadian Press in late December, Novo Nordisk Canada president Vince Lamanna declined to give any details about the patent lapse, citing intellectual property confidentiality. 
Lamanna said more than a million patients in Canada are taking the brand-name medications.

“Irrespective of what happens in January or through 2026, we’re committed to supporting patients on semaglutide — and that includes both Ozempic and Wegovy — and to continuing to make it available,” he said, noting that the company will provide “financial and savings support” to some patients who don’t have insurance coverage and don’t want to switch to a generic version. 

Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk’s main competitor for diabetes and weight loss medication, still holds its patent in Canada and there’s no imminent patent expiry for its drugs: Mounjaro and Zepbound. 

The active ingredient in those drugs is tirzepatide, which like semaglutide acts on glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) hormone receptors, but also targets glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP) receptors.  
“Lilly remains confident in the differentiated benefits of tirzepatide, the first and only dual GIP/GLP-1 receptor agonist approved to treat adults with obesity and adults with type two diabetes,” the company said in an email statement to The Canadian Press. 

The statement did not address questions about whether or not Eli Lilly would provide cost savings to patients in order to compete with generic semaglutide.

3)Doctor’s orders? ‘Belly laugh at least two to five days a week’

Courtesy Barrie360.com and The Associated Press

By Albert Stumm, December 27, 2025

Melanin Bee curves her spine like a stretching cat as she lets out a maniacal, forced laugh.

The quick-fire pattern of manufactured giggles —“oh, hoo hoo hoo, eeh, ha ha ha”— soon ripples into genuine laughter, and she giddily kicks her feet.

She’s practicing what she calls Laughasté, a hilarious yoga routine she created that is a descendant of “laughter clubs” that emerged in India in the 1990s. It feels awkward at first, but you fake it till you make it, she said.

“It’s about allowing yourself to be OK with being awkward,” said Bee, a Los Angeles comedian and speaker. “Then you’re going to find some form of silliness within that is going to allow you to laugh involuntarily.”

The laughter clubs were based on the common-sense notion that laughter relieves stress. But a good laugh is also good for your heart, immune system and many other health benefits, said Dr. Michael Miller, a cardiologist and medical professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

“Like we say, exercise at least three to five days a week,” Miller said. “Belly laugh at least two to five days a week.”

The study of laughter

Although luminaries from the ancient Greeks to Freud have opined on the roots and implications of laughter, the modern study of laughter — gelotology — began emerging in the 1960s.

Stanford University psychologist William F. Fry, one of gelotology’s founders, drew blood samples from himself while watching Laurel and Hardy. He discovered that laughter increased the number of immune-boosting blood cells.

In 1995, Dr. Madan Kataria, a physician in Mumbai, got wind of the emerging research as editor of a health magazine while researching an article on stress management. To combat his own stress, he started the first daily laughter club in a park. It ballooned from a handful of participants to more than 150 within a month, he said.

After the group quickly ran out of jokes, Kataria created exercises that activated the diaphragm, and he incorporated yogic breathing exercises, light stretches and deliberately silly sounds and movements.

“We were faking in the beginning and within seconds, everybody was in stitches,” Kataria said.

Why is laughter good for you?

Miller began studying laughter in the 1990s. Showing funny movies to study participants, he found that laughter produces endorphins in the brain that promote beneficial chemicals in the blood vessels. Nitric oxide, for example, causes blood vessels to dilate, which lowers blood pressure, inflammation and cholesterol.

The combination reduces the risk for a heart attack, he said, and the endorphins are natural pain killers.

“When you’ve had a really good laugh, you feel very relaxed and light,” said Miller, who is also chief of medicine at the Philadelphia Veterans Administration, where he is implementing a laughter therapy program. “It’s like you’ve taken pain medication.”

Forced laughter — or simulated mirth, in academia — may even be more beneficial than spontaneous laughter, said Jenny Rosendhal, a senior researcher of medical psychology at Jena University in Germany.

Rosendhal completed a meta-analysis of 45 laughter studies, among other research, and found that laughter-inducing therapies decreased glucose levels, the stress hormone cortisol and chronic pain. They also improved mobility and overall mood, especially in older populations.

Because humour is subjective, it is hard to measure. That’s why much of the more recent research has focused on laughter yoga and similar programs that provoke sustained bouts of laughter during 30- to 45-minute sessions, Rosendhal said.

Laughter yoga is particularly effective for people who might not feel like laughing, such as those struggling with depression or cancer patients, she said. With simulated laughter, the physiological mechanisms are the same, such as additional inhaling, exhaling and muscle activity that also improves mood.

“The well-being comes through the back door,” she said. “You start with an exercise, and then the spontaneous laughter comes later because it’s funny to see people laughing.”

How to laugh more

During a recent video call, Kataria said the trick is to learn to laugh for no reason. He and others in laughing yoga classes around the world have created hundreds of exercises that help.

The simplest: Get together with another person, look in each other’s eyes and repeat the sound “ha” for a full minute. Or try the “breathe in and laugh.” Bring your hands to your chest on a deep inhale, hold your breath for three seconds, and burst out laughing on the exhale while extending your hands forward.

In laughing yoga classes, people may pretend to greet each other like aliens, crawl around like their favorite animals, or tap their temple as if a light bulb went off, exclaiming, “Aha! ha ha ha!”

Kataria suggested bringing laughter into your daily life, even at things that might not seem funny. Demonstrating “credit card bill laughter,” he held out his hand as if looking at a statement, and burst into a roiling, infectious laughter. For inspiration, you could log into one of the three dozen free online American laughter clubs recognized by Laughter Yoga International.

“Really, it’s not about forcing yourself to laugh,” he said. “It’s like activating your laughter muscles, getting rid of your mental inhibitions and shyness. Then the real laughing is childlike laughing, unconditional laughing.”

4)Virtual reality opens doors for older people to build closer connections in real life

Courtesy Barrie360.com and The Associated Press

By Michael Liedtke, December 28, 2025

Like many retirement communities, The Terraces serves as a tranquil refuge for a nucleus of older people who no longer can travel to faraway places or engage in bold adventures.

But they can still be thrust back to their days of wanderlust and thrill-seeking whenever caretakers at the community in Los Gatos, California, schedule a date for residents — many of whom are in their 80s and 90s — to take turns donning virtual reality headsets.

Within a matter of minutes, the headsets can transport them to Europe, immerse them in the ocean depths or send them soaring on breathtaking hang-gliding expeditions while they sit by each other. The selection of VR programming was curated by Rendever, a company that has turned a sometimes isolating form of technology into a catalyst for better cognition and social connections in 800 retirement communities in the United States and Canada.

A group of The Terraces residents who participated in a VR session earlier this year found themselves paddling their arms alongside their chairs as they swam with a pod of dolphins while watching one of Rendever’s 3D programs. “We got to go underwater and didn’t even have to hold our breath!” exclaimed 81-year-old Ginny Baird following the virtual submersion.

During a session featuring a virtual ride in a hot-air balloon, one resident gasped, “Oh my God!” Another shuddered, “It’s hard to watch!”

The Rendever technology can also be used to virtually take older adults back to the places where they grew up as children. For some, it will be the first time they’ve seen their hometowns in decades.

A virtual trip to her childhood neighborhood in New York City’s Queens borough helped sell Sue Livingstone, 84, on the merits of the VR technology even though she still is able to get out more often than many residents of The Terraces, which is located in Silicon Valley about 55 miles south of San Francisco.

“It isn’t just about being able to see it again, it’s about all the memories that it brings back,” Livingstone said. “There are a few people living here who never really leave their comfort zones. But if you could entice them to come down to try out a headset, they might find that they really enjoy it.”

Adrian Marshall, The Terraces’ community life director, said that once word about a VR experience spreads from one resident to another, more of the uninitiated typically become curious enough to try it out — even if it means missing out on playing Mexican Train, a dominoes-like board game that’s popular in the community.

“It turns into a conversation starter for them. It really does connect people,” Marshall said of Rendever’s VR programming. “It helps create a human bridge that makes them realize they share certain similarities and interests. It turns the artificial world into reality.”

Rendever, a privately owned company based in Somerville, Massachusetts, hopes to build upon its senior living platform with a recent grant from the National Institutes of Health that will provide nearly $4.5 million to study ways to reduce social isolation among seniors living at home and their caregivers.

Some studies have found VR programming presented in a limited viewing format can help older people maintain and improve cognitive functions, burnish memories and foster social connections with their families and fellow residents of care facilities. Experts say the technology may be useful as an addition to and not a replacement for other activities.

“There is always a risk of too much screen time,” Katherine “Kate” Dupuis, a neuropsychologist and professor who studies aging issues at Sheridan College in Canada, said. “But if you use it cautiously, with meaning and purpose, it can be very helpful. It can be an opportunity for the elderly to engage with someone and share a sense of wonder.”

VR headsets may be an easier way for older people to interact with technology instead of fumbling around with a smartphone or another device that requires navigating buttons or other mechanisms, said Pallabi Bhowmick, a researcher at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who is examining the use of VR with older adults.

“The stereotypes that older adults aren’t willing to try new technology needs to change because they are willing and want to adapt to technologies that are meaningful to them,” Bhowmick said. “Besides helping them to relieve stress, be entertained and connect with other people, there is an intergenerational aspect that might help them build their relationships with younger people who find out they use VR and say, ‘Grandpa is cool!’”

Rendever CEO Kyle Rand’s interest in helping his own grandmother deal with the emotional and mental challenges of aging pushed him down a path that led him to cofound the company in 2016 after studying neuroengineering at Duke University.

“What really fascinates me about humans is just how much our brain depends on social connection and how much we learn from others,” Rand said. “A group of elderly residents who don’t really know each other that well can come together, spend 30 minutes in a VR experience together and then find themselves sitting down to have lunch together while continuing a conversation about the experience.”

It’s a large enough market that another VR specialist, Dallas-based Mynd Immersive, competes against Rendever with services tailored for senior living communities.

Besides helping create social connections, the VR programming from both Rendever and Mynd has been employed as a possible tool for potentially slowing down the deleterious effects of dementia. That’s how another Silicon Valley retirement village, the Forum, sometimes uses the technology.

Bob Rogallo, a Forum resident with dementia that has rendered him speechless, seemed to be enjoying taking a virtual hike through Glacier National Park in Montana as he nodded and smiled while celebrating his 83rd birthday with his wife of 61 years.

Sallie Rogallo, who doesn’t have dementia, said the experience brought back fond memories of the couple’s visits to the same park during the more than 30 years they spent cruising around the U.S. in their recreational vehicle.

“It made me wish I was 30 years younger so I could do it again,” she said of the virtual visit to Glacier. “This lets you get out of the same environment and either go to a new place or visit places where you have been.”

In another session at the Forum, 93-year-old Almut Schultz laughed with delight while viewing a virtual classical music performance at the Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado and later seemed to want to play with a puppy frolicking around in her VR headset.

“That was quite a session we had there,” Schultz said with a big grin after she took off her headset and returned to reality.