Demand for Naloxone training workshops grows as drug crisis intensifies

Melanie Leslie-Bernard was driving home two weeks ago and decided to pull over after seeing three people who appeared disoriented on a West-End street.

One was draped over the curb on Sargent Avenue near Dominion Street and appeared to be overdosing.

Leslie-Bernard and several other bystanders called 911, but no one knew how to help while they anxiously waited for emergency crews.

“In those first couple minutes when responding to an urgent situation, if you don’t know what to do and you don’t have that 911 operator helping you, it’s very scary and it’s very stressful,” said the 39-year-old social worker, who uses they/them pronouns.

Stretching the limits of our flexibility

Most people think you’re either born bendy or you’re not. Some kids fold up like lawn chairs. The rest of us reach for our shins and call it a win.

Yes, like everything physical, there are genetic advantages, but your mobility is more in your control than you realize.

A recent Huberman Lab podcast episode on stretching laid it out. Flexibility isn’t only about your muscles. It’s about your nervous system.

Picture your body as an overprotective bouncer. When you hit the edge of a stretch, it’s not always your muscle saying, “this is as far as I go.” Sometimes it’s your nervous system saying, “I don’t trust you out here, pal.”

Sports gambling marketing during World Cup raises concerns about negative influence on susceptible audiences

It’s just a game. And in the case of the World Cup over the last few weeks, it’s a beautiful game — dozens of them, in fact.

Yet interspersed amongst the exciting broadcast play on the pitch, advertising for sports gambling has raised concerns fun and games may come at too high a cost for some.

A recent New York Times feature pointed to a bonanza for the gaming industry globally, with one analyst stating the flow of bets amounts to as many as 10 Super Bowls.

Billions are likely to be made by online gambling platforms from what has been called the biggest gambling event in history. The other side of that coin is billions of dollars will be lost by sports fans willing to wager on a game’s outcome.

Play for all: story time inspires students to fight for accessible playgrounds

Concerned about injustice on their school jungle gym, St. Vital students spent months researching upgrades to make playgrounds more accessible for children in Manitoba.

Darwin School is dismissed for the summer, but one of its teachers plans to resume an advocacy project after the break.

“It’s not fair,” 12-year-old Selena Wei said about the fact one of her classmates — along with other children who use wheelchairs — can’t fully experience the pea-gravel playground at 175 Darwin St. and others like it.

“A playground is a really big part of a child’s life. It’s where they experience most of their outside time and where they’re the most social,” Selena said.

The scoop on cricket

Need the scoop on cricket, but you’re not sure who to ask? Free Press mascot Scoop has you covered. Let’s break down the rules, plays and wickets of the second largest sport in the world.

Winnipeg high school football coach subject of hazing investigation

Manitoba’s independent teacher commissioner is investigating the head coach of the Grant Park Pirates football program amid allegations of team hazing.

The AAAA varsity team is at the centre of a probe into allegations student-athletes who played for Doug Kovacs during the 2025-26 school year drew blood while carrying out a locker room ritual.

Multiple sources confirmed Kovacs was put on leave from Grant Park High School in the spring in response to a complaint about his coaching style.

“There’s a lot of different red flags here,” said one parent of a football player who was recently contacted about the case by the office of commissioner Noni Classen.

Brotherly bond boosts local Amazing Race competitors

Sacha has a feeling and Sébastien has a plan — together they’ll work it out.

Roughing it (less): Handy items for novice campers to make the great outdoors tolerable

I hate camping.

I loathe the very idea of leaving the comfort and safety of home to sleep in a random field, where not only will I be exposed to the elements, but will also be at the mercy of all manner of creatures, from ursine to canine to insectan.

I do not want to hike up a hill just to share one outdoor tap with 12 others, standing alongside them as I brush my teeth.

I do not want to queue for 15 minutes, then part with a $2 coin to wedge myself into a shower stall just to stand under a piddly stream of lukewarm water while trying my best to swiftly soap up and sponge off lest I irk the rapidly growing line of campers outside.

The dream of the ’90s is alive in summertime

“Nineties Summer” is trending. People are longing for a slower summer, a less scheduled summer, the kind of summer they had when they were kids.

The Bird River offers prime kayaking conditions in late spring

A two-hour drive northeast of Winnipeg, the lower Bird River is a popular draw for whitewater enthusiasts.

The water moves fast and the hazards — rapids, rocks and technical drops — are challenging.

This is not a beginner-friendly run. Paddlers need to keep their wits about them as they roll through Class 1 to 4 rapids.

The Bird River, flowing through the traditional territory of the Sagkeeng First Nation, stretches from the Ontario border, through Nopiming Provincial Park, before reaching the Winnipeg River, east of Lac du Bonnet.

Le pari water-polo de Jayden Del Campo

Le water-polo est arrivé naturellement dans la vie de Jayden Del Campo. Issu d’une famille de sportifs, son père et son grand-père pratiquaient aussi ce sport, une passion qui s’est transmise dans la lignée familiale.

“Mon grand-père a joué dans l’équipe nationale de Cuba et mon père jouait aussi. J’avais comme quatre ans quand mes parents m’ont poussé dans l’eau pour que je commence à jouer.”

Bien que les débuts aient été difficiles — il n’aimait pas être dans l’eau et nager avec un ballon était un vrai défi il a fini par tomber en amour avec ce sport. C’est un chemin qu’il a suivi jusqu’au bout, en devenant entraîneur au Club Vortex, et en acceptant une bourse d’admission à l’Université McKendree aux États-Unis, où il a rejoint l’équipe de water-polo.

Pourtant, malgré une certaine popularité au sud de la frontière et en Europe, la communauté de water-polo reste très petite au Canada. “C’est une communauté qui est vraiment petite au Manitoba. Un de mes buts, c’est de faire grandir ce sport. Pas seulement au Manitoba, mais partout au pays.”

Divers Tiaglei, Rumpit jumping their way through 50 states in 50 days

Two months ago, Winnipeg high-diver Alex Tiaglei received a call that he could’ve easily confused for a belated April Fool’s joke.

On the other end was his American-born friend Braden Rumpit, whom Tiaglei had dove against at several competitions around the world.

Rumpit gave it to him straight: he planned to do a cliff dive in all 50 United States in 50 days, and he wanted Tiaglei to do it with him.

“I mean, at first I thought he was kind of crazy,” said Tiaglei. “But then I started thinking about it, and the pieces were definitely falling together pretty well.”

Australia plans to strengthen laws banning children from social media

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The Australian government plans to strengthen laws that ban children younger than 16 from social media platforms, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.

Observers said on Friday the government was responding to evidence that the ban on young children holding accounts on platforms including Facebook, Instagram and YouTube had failed since it came into force on Dec. 10 last year. Australia was the first country in the world to pass legislation keeping youth off social media, but others have since followed.

Albanese told Parliament on Thursday this government was considering options to strengthen the ban.

“We’re working on that as a priority because this is something that other generations didn’t have to deal with, which is why it’s complex,” Albanese told Parliament.

Growing number of Manitoba youths are addicted to vaping

A few minutes after the final classes of the day end at Grant Park High School on a recent afternoon, students stream out of the building, headed in myriad directions.

At the railing outside the front doors, several teens stop to vape.

Classmates and teachers walk past without a second glance. Behaviour that once might have raised eyebrows now barely registers.

For many Manitoba teens, vaping — using a battery-powered device to heat flavoured “juice,” most often containing highly addictive nicotine, into an inhalable vapour — is a habit deeply woven into their daily lives.

Grade 7 students learn about environment in Seine River cleanup

On a rainy Wednesday morning, Grade 7 students from École Lacerte traded their classroom desks for rubber boots as they headed out along the Seine River to help plant native shrubs, test water quality, and clean up the riverbank.

JJ Swidersky, one of about 40 students taking part in the work, says protecting the environment is important to him and his classmates.

“Planting the trees, planting the shrubs,” Swidersky said when asked about his favourite part of the effort. “Just trying to keep the river clean, trying to keep it as clean as we possibly can.”

The planting Swidersky is referring to is part of the Niakwa Trail Rain Garden, which is located next to the St. Anne’s Superstore.

Websites suggest conspiracies fed accused Montreal gunman’s ‘buffet extremism’

Online activity suggests accused Montreal shooter Seth Hatfield watched videos about weapons, the outdoors and a tangle of conspiracy theories and grievances.

However, experts warn against drawing conclusions about the gunman. They also urge people to stop sharing online images of Monday's shooting outside a Montreal hotel.

Police said two officers were shot — Mohamed Lamine Benredouane, 34, was killed along with a bystander, Michel Mizrahi, 68, and the shooter died in the crossfire.

The coroner identified the dead suspect as 25-year-old Seth Hatfield from Lethbridge, Alta.

Many hands feed many mouths at Siloam Mission

It takes many willing hands to prepare the quantities of food required to serve community members accessing Siloam Mission’s meal services.

One of these hands belong to Kishwar Mirza, a recently retired nurse who has been volunteering every Tuesday morning for the 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. breakfast shift in Siloam’s kitchen.

Led by Siloam Mission’s kitchen staff, Mirza and the volunteer crew — who number between 12 to 16 — prep 700 pieces of toast, 576 eggs, 150 pounds of fruit, 120 litres of soup and 80 pounds of meat daily for the approximately 600 people who turn up for breakfast, lunch and dinner at the Princess Street drop-in.

Breakfast is served from 9 to 10 a.m., plated up assembly-line style as community members queue to receive their food through the service window.

Not just a blip in the news cycle

It wasn’t, as is said, “a good look.”

When the U.K. tabloid newspaper the Daily Mail published a report on its website last week that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had issued a travel advisory for visitors to Manitoba, warning of a hepatitis A outbreak, there were likely audible groans in several Winnipeg offices.

The dailymail.com website gets over 35 million unique monthly visitors in the U.S. alone, making it one of the most popular news sites in the world.

So, when America’s leading public health agency issued a notice telling people to be mindful of their interpersonal interactions in Manitoba and to be vaccinated against hepatitis A before visiting, officials with tourism agencies and government ministries knew they had a job to do.

AI safety advocates say bill a good ‘first step’ on regulation, but more needed

The federal government’s proposed online safety legislation is a good start on regulating artificial intelligence chatbots — but more work will be needed to protect Canadians from their potential harms, a pair of advocates say.

Bill C-34, introduced earlier this month in the House of Commons, would regulate the companies behind AI chatbots by imposing on them a duty to act “responsibly.”

It includes measures to lower the risk of chatbots communicating harmful content and would put in place crisis intervention protocols for cases involving self-harm, suicide or violence.

Wyatt Tessari L’Allié, founder of Artificial Intelligence Governance and Safety Canada, said the bill’s effectiveness depends on how the details are worked out.

Close encounters of the amphibian kind

Frogs, snakes and horses, oh my!

Liam Peterson, an 11-year-old outdoor enthusiast, encountered all of those during summer camp last year at Circle Square Ranch.

“There were always frogs hopping around our cabin, and I let one in because I wanted it to have company because it was bored — it was just sitting there,” recalled Liam.

“And then my friend freaked out because it was on top of (his foot) in the morning. Everyone in the cabin woke up and he woke up with a red bump on his head after hitting his head on his bunk.”

Pill, bills, budgetary aches

We’re a nation of drug users. Well, not those drugs.

Rather, many Canadians have their health supported by pharmaceutical medications prescribed by a physician.

In our universal health-care system, medication can come with a big additional cost.

The federal government introduced a national pharmacare program in 2024. Manitoba was among the first to sign on, partly leading to its Enhanced Pharmacare Program, which now offers birth control, diabetes and a few other medications at no cost to Manitobans.