Are you familiar with Tod Maffin? He was a national CBC Radio host and producer during his career. Maffin was born in Vancouver, beginning his career in journalism in the 1990s. He was an early advocate of podcasting. I became more aware of Maffin’s work with his Canadian Healthcare Infusion, an initiative to bring American health care workers to Canada. Maffin and his wife Jocelyn run the project together.
I would guess, judging by Maffin’s character, that being a community advocate is probably the work that is closest to his heart. “The health-care infusion is basically a volunteer-run community,” Maffin told CBC in February of 2026.
It is not a government program or a recruiting agency but rather an idea Maffin and Jocelyn came up with to help guide healthcare workers to communities in need of medical support. It is a type of chat room that provides a platform for locals to chat with those, such as American healthcare workers, who may be interested in coming to their community, and participation is free.
In 2024, it was reported that 163,000 Newfoundlanders were without a family doctor. Melanie Ball, a Newfoundlander, joined the project, launching the Newfoundland/Labrador Healthcare Infusion Chapter in January 2026. She felt certain it could only help to attract a nurse in Florida if she was able to chat with another mother in Newfoundland to ask what life there was really like. “It is community helping community,” says Melanie. There are 24 Healthcare Infusion Chapters across Canada now.
Where I bump into Maffin regularly and now consider him a friend is on Instagram. He calls himself an “emotional support Canadian”. Maffin makes me laugh, shares important information, shines the light on those Canadian qualities that matter, and is generally one of the good guys. He is a bit softer than Rick Mercer but just as passionate about Canada.
One video that stuck with me was Maffin’s reference to Mark Carney’s Address to the Nation on April 19, 2026, citing the country’s long standing economic relationship with the United States, which was now a serious vulnerability, and that Canada cannot rely on one single foreign economic partner. Mr. Carney held up a tiny toy soldier modelled after Major-General Isaac Brock and referenced Brock’s historic might in fighting the Americans in 1812.
We studied Brock in history class and were told he was the hero of Upper Canada for his battle plan that outwitted the Americans in the War of 1812, which saw the capture of Fort Detroit. That’s the extent of what we learned of that specific battle.
There’s more to the story. Brock managed to pull off the greatest bluff in Canadian military history, Maffin explained in the video. Brock arrived in Canada in 1802 and wasn’t happy to be here when he would far rather have been off fighting Napoleon. War was declared by US President James Madison on June 18, 1812.
The Americans seriously outnumbered the British Army, so Brock sought an alliance with Indigenous people who had “lived on the land long before settlers came”, Maffin reminded. Brock met with Shawnee leader Tecumseh, forming a pact that saw Tecumseh draw detailed maps of all the area surrounding Fort Detroit.
Their numbers were still too few to wage an effective assault, but the Americans didn’t know that. Brock had his militia dress in spare red military tunics to give the impression of a much larger professional army. Tecumseh’s people crossed the Detroit River in the dark of night, sweeping through the forest raising war cries that gave the impression of a sizable force. Fires were lit all along the flanks of the fort, again to imply serious numbers of warriors, before advancing on Fort Detroit.
