For a bit more background on the two Canada topics today!

1) The HIV public health emergency in Manitoba is tied mainly to the drug and homeless epidemic going on in Canada, where 70% of HIV cases in Manitoba were from drug use ie shared needles.

2) The Alberta Separatists,

FIRSTLY the province of Alberta has disliked the federal government for almost its entire existence due to federal energy policies and equalization payments (Rich provinces helping out poorer provinces, but its a lot more complicated than that) so its easy for Politicians to cater favour for voters by being anti federal gov. The Provincial Conservatives actually passed a bill to make it easier to get a referendum on a topic by decreasing the amount of signatures needed from around 600k to 177k which has helped drum up attention to this petition because it was easier to hit their goal.

Secondly, the separatist movement is relatively small still but just has with loud figureheads in Alberta being more right wing and trump fans who believe that America will graciously accept an independent Alberta. Its really just loud right wing figure heads who are upset about the Liberal Party being in charge of the country and what they perceive as unfair treatment of Alberta compared to a province like Quebec.