Dr. Anjali Helferty

Interim Executive Director, Toxics Campaign Lead

Anjali started her engagement in climate activism as the first Council chair of the Canadian Youth Climate Coalition (CYCC) while working as the National Coordinator for the Sustainable Campuses Project at the Sierra Youth Coalition (SYC). Following her time at SYC, she worked at the US-based Energy Action Coalition (now Power Shift Network). She subsequently worked as the Interim Director for the Southern Energy Network, a youth climate organization working in the Southeast United States. Anjali completed a Master’s in Organizational Change Management in 2013 and a PhD in Adult Education and Community Development in 2020 focused on settler climate activists and solidarity with Indigenous peoples.

Anjali can be reached at anjali@cape.ca.

Jennifer Kuhl

Policy and Campaign Lead, Climate Change

Jen is delighted to bring her passion for climate action, her campaign organizing experience, and her training in public health to her position as CAPE’s Policy and Campaign Lead. Jen’s recent work includes coordinating the WHO-Civil Society Working Group on Climate and Health and supporting the Global Climate and Health Summit at COP25 in Madrid, both with the Global Climate and Health Alliance.

Prior to that, Jen worked as a research data analyst with the department of International Health at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She has also worked as campaigner and organizer with the BC Health Coalition, advocating for improved public health care, and as a research assistant with BC Children’s Hospital’s RICHER initiative for social pediatrics. Jennifer was a member of Leadnow.ca’s founding team. Jennifer holds a Masters of Public Health from Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Jen can be reached at jennifer@cape.ca .

Robin Edger

Executive Director and CEO (On Leave)

Robin is on leave from his position as Executive Director & CEO. He leads CAPE’s policy, fundraising, and communications work.

In his previous role leading the Ontario region for the Pembina Institute, Canada’s largest clean energy thinktank, Robin executed strategies leading to public policy change. He also led regional fundraising, including developing corporate partnerships and preparing funding proposals for foundations and government.

Prior to working at Pembina Institute, Robin practiced law at Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP in the Government Relations and Strategy practice group. He developed and executed government relations campaigns and strategies on various government initiatives, such as broad policy reviews, statutory reviews, and international trade negotiations.

Robin was also formerly a senior advisor to Ontario’s Deputy Minister of Health. In that role, he provided strategic advice to the Deputy Minister to coordinate the work of the ministry and deliver on healthcare priorities. He developed subject matter expertise in the management of health care systems, including the oversight of hospitals, health care professionals, and public health.

Robin holds a Master’s of Law from Osgoode Hall Law School.

Robin can be reached at robin@cape.ca .

Dr. Joe Vipond

CAPE Board President 

Joe Vipond has worked as an emergency physician for fifteen years, currently at the Foothills Medical Centre and the Peter Lougheed Hospital. His interest in the environment began at a young age with many hikes and natural explorations, and solidified further when he worked for three summers at Dinosaur Provincial Park. In his own community of Hillhurst Sunnyside he, along with some neighbours, re-established the highly local, highly organic Farmers’ Market. More recently, his interest has turned back to the environment, sitting on the board of CPAWS-Southern Alberta (2012-2015), and the Alberta Wilderness Association (2015-ongoing) and becoming a  spokesperson for the Alberta Coal Phase Out movement, and more recently, the Canadian Coal Phase Out network. He runs three Facebook pages, including Alberta Acts on Climate Change, and often reaches upwards of 15,000 people per week. Joe grew up in Calgary and continues to live there with his wife and two young daughters.

Dr. Melissa Lem

CAPE Incoming President

Dr. Melissa Lem is a Vancouver family physician who also works in rural and remote communities across Canada. Director of Parks Prescriptions for the BC Parks Foundation, she is a longtime advocate for the health benefits of time spent in nature. Currently a senior writer for the CBC, she was the resident medical expert on CBC TV’s hit lifestyle show Steven and Chris for four seasons and continues to educate diverse audiences on air. Her writings on the environment and human well-being have also been published by national media including the Vancouver Sun, Toronto Star, Montreal Gazette, National Observer, and Alternatives Journal. She was the inaugural winner of University College’s Young Alumni of Influence Award at the University of Toronto, and is a Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of British Columbia.

Dr. Courtney Howard

CAPE Past President

Howard is a Simon Fraser University, University of British Columbia and McGill University-trained Emergency Room Physician who practices in Yellowknife, in Canada’s subarctic.

Motivated by work on a Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) pediatric malnutrition project in Djibouti, and by climate-related health impacts on her Northern patient population, she led the Northwest Territories Medical Association team in the successful campaign to have the Canadian Medical Association divest from fossil fuels.

As president of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) she helps to coordinate MD-advocacy on climate-health across Canada and has been involved in work on active transport, plant-rich diets, integrating health impact assessments into environmental assessments, carbon pricing, coal phase-out, and the health impacts of fracking.

She helps to coordinate medical education on the ecological determinants of health as chair of the committee for allied health professionals on the Ecological Determinants Group on Education associated with the Canadian Public Health Association, and is the North American Co-Chair of the World Family Doctor’s (WONCA) working group on the Environment.

In Yellowknife, she is a board member for Ecology North and is the local medical lead for the Ecology-North-supported “SOS-Summers of Smoke” research project into the health effects of wildfires, which she is writing up under the direction of Dr James Orbinski.

In a previous life she led the first randomized controlled-trial comparing menstrual cups to tampons—see FLOW-Finding Lasting Options for Women. (they work and result in a lot less waste. Try one!)

Courtney was the primary author on the 2017 Canadian Brief for the Lancet Countdown on Climate Change on behalf of the Canadian Public Health Association.  She represents CAPE on the board of the Global Climate and Health Alliance, most recently at COP23, where she presented on behalf of the health community at the Canada-UK Powering Past Coal announcement.

rMost recently, Courtney joined the board of Health in Harmony and is heading to Borneo to do clinical teaching at ASRI’s clinic site, and to connect her love of global health with an exploration of planetary health in the field. Check out her TEDx Talk here.

Dr. Larry Barzelai

CAPE Board Member

Dr. Larry Barzelai is a family doctor in Vancouver and is the head of CAPE’s B.C. chapter.

Helen Boyd

CAPE Board Member

Bio to come.

Dr. Samantha Green

CAPE Board Member

Dr. Samantha Green is a family physician at St. Michael’s Hospital and at Inner City Health Associates in Toronto. She also teaches a graduate course called “The Social, Political, and Scientific Aspects of Primary Care” and is chair of the advocacy group Health Providers Against Poverty. Samantha is an ardent cyclist and lifelong environmentalist, having formerly served on the Board of Directors of the Sierra Club of Canada. After completing medical school at the University of Ottawa and residency at McMaster University, she worked in the Yukon, Sioux Lookout, and Hamilton before settling in Toronto.

Dr. Ojistoh Horn

CAPE Board Member

Bio to come.

Felix Martineau

CAPE Board Member

Bio to come

Dr. Claudel Pétrin-Desrosiers

CAPE Board Member

Dr. Claudel Pétrin-Desrosiers is currently completing her training as a family doctor at University de Montréal. She shares a vision in which doctors are socially accountable to the communities they serve and in which they play a crucial role in reducing social inequities. She is the past vice-president of the International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations (IFMSA), the world’s largest and oldest medical students group, where she has been the voice of 1,3 million students in 130 countries. Over the past years, she has collaborated with the World Health Organization; has advocated nationally and internationally for a greater recognition of the health co-benefits of climate action; has lead several capacity-building workshops around the globe; and has been featured on several medias, providing insightful comments on climate related issues. She also sits on the board of Force Jeunesse, an organisation dedicated to intergenerational equity. Her outstanding leadership has been recognized by her peers at several occasions: the Judy Wasserheit Young Leader Award in 2017 for her exceptional commitment to improve health globally and the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) 150th Anniversary Award for Professionalism in 2018. She is the current chair the Québec chapter of CAPE, the Association québécoise des médecins pour l’environnement. In her free time, she enjoys talking about politics, reading new books and discovering microbreweries.

Colin Sue-Chue-Lam

CAPE Board Member

Bio to come.

Willow Thickson

CAPE Board Member

Willow Thickson is an Anishinaabe/Cree/Metís medical student currently studying at the University of British Columbia. She is on student council as the Aboriginal health representative, and is helping develop an EcoHealth club/movement towards divestment at UBC. The destruction of the land and water, as well as the deteriorating climate conditions, affect Indigenous people disproportionately. Something she is acutely aware of as she grew up in treaty 8 territory – home of the oil/tar sands. This knowledge of disparity fuels her to create change as she feels there is an obligation to leave a healthy environment for future generations.

George Tjensvoll Kitching

CAPE Board Member

Bio to come.