Santiago Arias Orozco
Santiago Arias Orozco covers health and public policy stories for CBC Manitoba, focusing on how systems, laws and environments shape the health of people at the margins. His reporting centres on outbreaks, access to care and the way public agencies respond when health and safety break down. He brings experience from earlier work in Toronto newsrooms, including CBC Toronto and the Toronto Star, which informs a detailed, case-driven style of coverage.
Public health outbreaks and vaccination
A core strand in his work is public health surveillance and vaccination, especially when preventable diseases disproportionately affect people with little stability or support. He has covered a hepatitis A outbreak concentrated among people experiencing homelessness, documenting how outreach groups vaccinate their own staff to reduce transmission while continuing front-line work with vulnerable Winnipeggers. He has reported on measles in Manitoba, highlighting that nearly 90 per cent of the province’s reported cases involved unvaccinated patients and breaking down what that figure means for community risk and health system planning. His public health stories typically pair outcome data - case counts, vaccination rates, exposure warnings - with the policies and operational decisions behind them, such as staffing, clinic capacity and communication with at‑risk groups.
Across these pieces he treats outbreaks less as isolated events and more as tests of the province’s ability to reach people who do not move easily through formal health channels.
Access to care, patient safety and legal accountability
Another defining focus is what happens when care fails, and how patients and families seek accountability. He has reported on a dying woman who sued doctors after they failed to diagnose her cancer despite an early CT scan, laying out the allegations against a respirologist and diagnostic radiologist and the claimed errors in interpreting imaging.
In that coverage he traces the path through the health system - referrals, tests, consultations - and shows where each step is alleged to have broken down, giving equal weight to medical detail and legal process. He also covers infrastructure that underpins access to care, including Manitoba’s online organ donor registry, where he reported current registration numbers and explained how the system is meant to work at the point of care when potential donors are identified.
His health access stories frequently connect individual cases to broader questions about wait times, diagnostic quality, consent and the reliability of systems meant to protect patients, rather than treating lawsuits and registries as stand‑alone items.
Environment, extreme weather and health risk
Arias Orozco regularly reports where environmental conditions and extreme weather turn into health risks, with particular attention to people who live or work outdoors. He has covered air quality warnings across much of Manitoba prompted by wildfire smoke, relaying Environment Canada’s advice on closing windows and doors, limiting time outside and the residual risks that remain even with reduced exposure.
He reports on extreme heat events in Winnipeg, describing outreach groups that collect and distribute water to people living on the streets and explaining how heat and humidity compound existing health issues for those without shelter. His work on storm-driven power outages, including coverage of trees downed and thousands left without electricity after high winds, links infrastructure damage with risks such as loss of cooling, food spoilage and the strain on emergency services.
Together, these pieces show a consistent pattern: he treats smoke, heat, storms and outages as public health stories, not just weather, and pays close attention to official advisories alongside the practical realities for people who cannot easily follow them.
Health systems, policy and workplace oversight
He also reports on the governance and internal functioning of health and social service institutions. His coverage of a review of Manitoba’s Mental Health Act shows how legislative frameworks intersect with policing and care, pressing on what changes are promised, what is under review and what questions remain unanswered.
He has written about a workplace investigation at Klinic, a Winnipeg health centre, reporting that its workplace was described as “in distress,” that a transformation was deemed necessary, and that several directors were fired with their positions eliminated days after the report was shared with staff.
In these stories he focuses on internal reports, decision timelines and the repercussions for both staff and clients, rather than on personalities. He has also reported on large dairy projects in North Dakota and their expected pollution of the Red River, connecting agricultural development and cross-border regulation to downstream environmental and health concerns. Alongside more general local news contributions, such as filing on accessibility at Winnipeg Beach and severe storm coverage, this strand shows him as a reporter who moves easily between front-line health stories and scrutiny of the institutions and policies that frame them.
4 more health journalists.
Alanna Smith
Alanna Smith is a national health reporter whose work links health policy and politics to real access to care, with a constant focus on health equity, infectious disease and the toxic drug crisis. She reports for The Globe and Mail on infectious diseases, hospitals and long-term care, mental health, drug policy and the pressures on health systems in Western Canada. Her stories connect big-picture decisions to patients, families, front-line workers and volunteers, showing how funding, privatization and federal standards shape public care. She has covered trauma care inequities, proposed public‑private models in Alberta, drug toxicity and overdose policy, respiratory virus surges, measles elimination, gene‑editing advances and gender‑affirming health care laws. Her work combines narrative reporting, data, legal and policy analysis, and has been recognized by national journalism and press freedom organizations.
Allan Levine
Allan Levine is a historian and author whose journalism uses the past to explain present-day issues. He writes for the Winnipeg Free Press, including the Now & Then column, which examines current events through history. His subjects include public health, disease, medical treatment, health systems, politics, social conflict, strikes, wars, antisemitism and Canadian public life. His polio reporting traces Manitoba epidemics, hospital pressures, treatment, mortality and the arrival of vaccines through archival data and medical history. He also writes about the Winnipeg General Strike and Jewish communities, including discrimination, rights and security. His work draws on books about Canadian political leaders, Jewish history and the wartime economy, including The Dollar A Year Men. He writes long-form, analytical pieces that combine dates, statistics, policy decisions and narrative storytelling to connect people and institutions with broader historical change.
Angela Amato
Angela Amato is a digital news producer with CTV News, and her coverage is distinct for linking health research and public safety concerns to legal and policy decisions that shape daily life. She reports on health, justice, politics, business, arts and culture, crime and public-interest stories. Her health work covers academic and clinical research, including studies on vaping and lung blood flow, exercise tolerance and early heart dysfunction in young adults. She also reports on motorcycle gang arrests, homicide and death investigations, Indigenous justice stories, wildfire evacuations, ambulance contracts, property taxes, labour negotiations and political advocacy rules. She explains complex findings in plain language and stays close to documents, data and expert sources. Her background includes investigative and daily newsrooms, and she has earned nominations for national journalism awards.
Apoorva Mandavilli
Apoorva Mandavilli covers the collision of infectious disease science, vaccine policy and public health agencies for The New York Times, following how research, regulation and politics shape outbreaks and access to vaccines. She reports on science and global health with a steady focus on infectious diseases and pandemics, including Covid-19, mpox, H.I.V., malaria and tuberculosis, treating them as ongoing global threats. Her work explains complex epidemiology and virology in clear narratives about risk, evidence and the consequences of scientific decisions. She repeatedly returns to vaccine policy, law and misinformation, tracing how court fights and agency disputes affect immunization schedules and public trust. She also reports on global health programs, funding cuts and inequity in care and technology. A longtime science journalist and former founding editor in chief of Spectrum, she has written widely on science and health and received major honors for medical science reporting and pandemic coverage.