Since the Sixties, Canadians have expected everyone except them pick up the global slack.
The chickens have come home to roost:
The United States and the United Kingdom hit home runs on COVID vaccine development. Canada hit a single and is stuck on first base.
There’s one big reason why: our federal government failed to move quickly on procuring COVID vaccines because its leaders did not make Canadian vaccine procurement an urgent national priority, one where failure was not an option.
Contrast that approach with the U.S. and the U.K., where against great odds, their political, business and scientific leaders developed new vaccines and manufacturing in less than one year.
Canada’s federal government failed to organize quickly enough, failed to set ambitious deadlines, and failed to invest the necessary billions in Canadian vaccine developers and manufacturers.
Essentially, we counted on the ambition, hard work, brilliance and goodwill of strangers. Now we’re paying the price.
Canada ranks 55th in the world with 3.5 vaccines per 100 people, with the U.K. at 24.7 vaccines per 100, and the U.S. at 16.8 per 100.
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Biomedical experts testified on our failure this week at the House of Commons Health Committee, and I talked at length on the matter with University of Alberta immunologist Lorne Tyrrell, the distinguished hepatitis researcher and a member of the federal COVID-19 Vaccine Task Force. ...
Right away a massive public-private partnership mobilized, with the highest level of U.S. government officials, starting with Trump himself, insisting on an aggressive deadline of the end of 2020 for COVID vaccines.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau set no such deadline. Canada’s own vaccine committee of industry and research experts like Tyrrell didn’t have its first meeting until June.
Some critics, such as University of Ottawa medical law expert Amir Attaran, allege Canada’s vaccine committee was crippled by conflicts of interests, with committee members having secret ties to potential COVID developers.
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Indeed, there’s no excuse for the Trudeau government not making such conflicts of interest public, but Tyrrell says on Canada’s COVID committee itself any conflicts were known and were handled well. Task force members sat out any discussion on a vaccine program they were linked to in some way. “They didn’t make decisions if there was any hint of a conflict.”
It’s worth noting that massive conflict of interest wasn’t fatal to Warp Speed. Pharmaceutical industry veteran Dr. Moncef Slaoui, its chief scientific adviser, had financial interests in two companies developing vaccines, including Moderna, but as the New York Times has reported it was seen as crucial to have people with vast experience in the industry oversee the U.S. effort.
There’s now been a huge outcry that Canada teamed up last May with a Chinese business and the Chinese military on the CanSino vaccine, providing $44 million for this promising vaccine to be tested and manufactured in part in Canada. Infamously, Canada quickly got snubbed by the Chinese, almost certainly due to diplomatic tensions.
It’s fair to wonder why we trusted the Chinese dictatorship on vaccines. But I’ll also suggest the real issue isn’t that we tried to make this partnership work, it’s that we failed to pursue other partnerships early on with equal enthusiasm.
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Having engaged in an immense amount of research, interacting with both doctors and frontline healthcare workers, it is apparent that the negative effects of the government lockdown measures on society far surpass the effects of COVID-19. The science being used to justify lockdown measures is both suspect and selective. In fact, there is no empirical evidence that lockdowns are effective in mitigating the spread of the virus. We are gravely concerned that COVID-19 is being used to fundamentally alter society and strip us all of our civil liberties. By the time the so-called "pandemic" is over, if it is ever permitted to be over, Albertans will be utterly reliant on government, instead of free, prosperous, and independent.
As such, we believe love for our neighbor demands that we exercise our civil liberties. We do not see our actions as perpetuating the longevity of COVID-19 or any other virus that will inevitably come along. If anything, we see our actions as contributing to its end – the end of destructive lockdowns and the end of the attempt to institutionalize the debilitating fear of viral infections. Our local church is clear evidence that governmental lockdowns are unnecessary. In fact, it is also evidence of how harmful they are. Without going into detail, we recently lost the life of one of our precious congregants who was denied necessary health care due to government lockdown measures.
Consider the following statistics. It is alleged that 129,075 Albertans have tested positive for the virus. That works out to just less than 3% of the population. However, it needs to be pointed out that the PCR test being used to test for COVID-19 is fraught with false positives. This is especially true, since at least until recently, Alberta was running the PCR test at 40 amplifications. As such, the number of Albertans who have actually contracted the virus is likely significantly less. It is also vital to highlight that more than 99% of those who contract the virus will fully recover.
Alberta is currently reporting 1,782 COVID-related deaths. It is critically important to articulate it this way. There is a big difference between dying from COVID and dying with COVID. But it is also critical to note that these COVID-related deaths, as tragic as they are, have not resulted in a statistically significant increase in excess deaths (and the average age of those who have died related to COVID-19 is 82, consistent with life expectancy in Alberta). Sadly, most of these individuals would have likely died due to various other lethal co-morbidities (and it immensely grieves us that in many cases they were forced to die apart from their family unnecessarily). In addition, experts estimate that deaths, in the long run, resulting from government lockdown measures will surpass COVID-related deaths 10 to 1 (e.g. premature deaths resulting from not receiving necessary health care, suicides, drug overdoses, addictions, the development of chronic health conditions, total loss of income, family breakdown, etc.). In fact, it would seem that COVID-related deaths are being treated as though they are somehow more tragic than any and all other deaths.
Many Albertans are afraid and are convinced of the efficacy of government lockdowns for two reasons: misinformation and fearmongering. The media has so pounded the COVID-19 drum since the "pandemic" began, almost exclusively emphasizing caseload and deaths, that people are fearful. So fearful, in fact, they have been convinced that yielding up their civil liberties to the government is in their best interests. It is difficult to have not lost confidence in the mainstream media. It would seem as though journalism is on life-support in our province. The media should be made up of the most thorough, discerning, and investigative people in our society. Instead, many of them seem to be serving an ideological agenda. Now more than ever, it is vital that Albertans exercise discernment when listening to the mainstream media.
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Employees said the three-night COVID package at the Alt Hotel Toronto Airport is $1,017; at the Calgary Airport Marriott In-Terminal Hotel it is $1,272. At several other hotels, staff declined to provide the cost, one saying they were specifically told to “keep the price quiet” and direct callers to the government-issued phone line.
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Just print more money. What could go wrong?:
Sickness benefits, caregiving benefits and the Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB) are all getting top-ups when it comes to the duration during which each can be claimed — meaning Canadians will be able to access financial help for an even longer stretch of time.
The total cost of these beefed-up benefits will be $12.1 billion, the government confirmed on Friday.
Also - what can go wrong? Maybe a lot:
Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE have started an international study with 4,000 volunteers to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of their COVID-19 vaccine in healthy pregnant women, the companies said on Thursday.
Because it's not like there was never a risk.
If teachers' unions didn't exist, what would happen then?:
Over the past month or so in the province, there has been a gradual return of in-person learning, depending on jurisdiction and COVID case loads, with school districts in York, Peel and Toronto the last to return to in-person learning this week.
The government source pointed to a variety of pandemic-related initiatives the government has battled with the unions: scrapping a seniority-based hiring rule in October to get more teachers into classrooms; extending the time retired teachers can teach; and pushing back on mask policies that required their use both indoors and outdoors.
The province has introduced a number of measures it says will keep students safe in classrooms, including procuring up to 50,000 asymptomatic tests for students per week, both PCR and rapid test. It has also improved ventilation in around 95 per cent of all Ontario schools.
The province has also provided funding for the hiring of 625 public health nurses, 3,400 additional teachers, 1,400 custodians and hundreds of principals, vice-principals and admin staff to support virtual learning.
There are also mask policies for everyone in the classroom. Students and staff are also required to self-screen for COVID-19.
“They’ve basically thrown up every obstacle possible, despite our best intentions,” the source said.
Sam Hammond, president of the Elementary Teachers of Ontario, said they’re focused on safety in schools, and the issues the Ontario government has with the unions is “us doing our jobs.”
“It just seems that if you disagree with anything this government says … if you speak out about what they’re doing or suggest something else, you become an obstructionist,” Hammond told the National Post.
“Ontario is leading this country with a comprehensive plan to keep schools safe … we will do whatever it takes to protect students and staff,” said a statement from Education Minister Stephen Lecce. “We will continue to be guided by the best public health advice, not teacher union rhetoric, but science and facts that have proven that schools have been safe and can continue to be safe with the continued adherence to the rules.”
The government says it has a low rate of COVID-19 cases for those under the age of 20 compared to other provinces, with around 1,200 cases per 100,000 people. Quebec has almost 2,900, Alberta has 2,500, while British Columbia has just shy of 1,100 cases per 100,000.
Provincial data shows some fluctuation, week over week, for new cases among school-aged children and youth, but with an overall downward trend. The week of Feb. 3 to 9 shows 806 new cases, and Feb. 10 to 16 shows 761 new cases. But, if you look at symptomatic cases, as Ottawa biostatistician Ryan Imgrund did, it shows that after weeks of declines, the under 20 age cohort — not exactly the same as the above figures — experienced a 14 per cent increase in the past week.
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