A Lockdown New Year!
by Maj (ret'd) CORNELIU E. CHISU, CD, PMSC,
FEC, CET, P. Eng.
Former Member of Parliament Pickering-Scarborough East
Politicians all over Canada are running around like headless chickens chasing the Coronavirus pandemic, as cases increase by the minute. There is no apparent coordination, no coherent thought put into counter-measures, only sad efforts at improvisation at both the federal and provincial levels. The medical professionals in charge give contradictory advice; mask/no mask, more lockdown/less lockdown by rainbow colors, vaccine/no vaccine for allergies, and so on. Nobody seems to care about the people losing businesses and livelihood for their families, with public service employees enjoying secure jobs paid for by tax dollars, looking on, seemingly twiddling their thumbs.
Ontario, Canada's most populous Province, has announced that as of Boxing Day, southern Ontario, will be entering a 28-day lockdown. The new rules include restrictions on businesses and gatherings, as well as shutting down some outdoor activities such as downhill skiing. Parks, skating rinks and cross-country ski and snowshoe trails across Ontario will remain open. Incongruously, just across the Quebec border, hills will be still open.
The lockdown for southern Ontario will be in place from Dec. 26 until Jan. 23, but will be lifted for northern Ontario on Jan. 9. Health officials have criticized the delay, with one top infectious disease doctor saying it was ridiculous to wait until the day after Christmas to shut down. I wonder what date the good doctor had in mind for going into lockdown?
"We had hoped not to see a shutdown," Joyce Lock, the medical officer of health for Southwestern public health, said. "This has many implications for individuals, businesses and services. (No kidding! LOL). "However, this virus is raging within our communities. This is the best tool we have to keep distance between people and stop the spread."
There is no mention of the best non medical advice, of course, which would be to continuously educate people to respect each other and hygiene rules, to allow small businesses to survive. The role of the state is to help its citizens live peacefully and enjoy their freedom. It's not to impose arbitrary rules that serve their own interests; implementing contradictory, baseless, and ad hoc measures.
With the worrying surge of cases across the province potentially putting more patients into Ontario hospital beds, many seem to consider the lockdown a necessary precaution. The question is why we do not have enough doctors and nurses in the province to face this kind of exceptional event? And what about people whose life saving surgeries are on hold; being delayed indefinitely? Need they become victims of the virus too? The medical profession is silent and politicians do not know what to do. They are ready to declare however, that if the lockdown is not taken seriously, we risk more people becoming very, very sick, and will overwhelm the health-care system. My question is this: how can we justify a healthcare system in this country, which swallows billions of tax dollars every year, and gets worse, instead of getting better?
The new measures in Ontario- the most stringent since the spring lockdown - will ban in-person shopping in most retail stores, shutter gyms and recreation facilities and force restaurants to offer takeout or delivery only. The lockdown also prohibits indoor social gatherings, except with members of the same household, and caps outdoor gatherings at 10 people.
On top of these worries, there is now a new variant of COVID-19, which appeared in Britain and has prompted many countries to implement travel restrictions against the United Kingdom. Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam says that this mutation has not yet been identified in Canada. Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) has said it is analyzing known cases to determine whether the new strain, which research suggests is significantly more transmissible than the variant currently dominant in Canada, is already in the country.
"Obviously it's an evolving situation," Tam said. "We've been very active in the last couple of days and activated all the scientific networks in Canada."
Unfortunately, long before they will have all "the results" the virus will have taken many more victims. The appearance of the new variant of COVID-19 has also sparked concerns that it may reduce the efficacy of existing vaccines.
Tam is clinging steadfastly to her stock phrase, saying that current "expert research" suggests it is unlikely to have a significant effect on the current or soon-to-be-approved vaccines. "Right now, we remain optimistic on that front," she said. Tam affirmed that it was important to work with the vaccine manufacturers and international partners - particularly the United Kingdom, which is also rolling out the Pfizer vaccine - in order to determine the potential effect of the new variant. Tam also warned that Canada was currently on track for a strong resurgence of the virus over the next several months. She pointed to disturbing trends in cases, hospitalizations and mortality, and urged Canadians to continue to follow public health guidelines.
"This is a perilous time," she said, noting that unlike the first wave of the pandemic in the spring, the virus is now reaching remote communities. "With the widespread resurgence right now, there's a much more broad impact across all areas of Canada, and you can see the impact in Nunavut," Tam said. Nunavut reported its first two deaths related to COVID-19 last week. "And we're only getting into the winter," she said.
She further stated that the exhaustion of health-care workers, and ordinary Canadians, was one reason the next few months would be so difficult.
As of this week Canada had recorded a total of 520,045 cases of COVID-19, and a CBC News tally of deaths stood at 14,402. Ontario and Quebec are each recording more than 2,000 new cases daily.
On top of this, planes are still arriving with people not required to be tested before entering Canada, a precaution many nations have implemented. Public Safety Minister Bill Blair has said that the screening and quarantine measures in place since the spring in Canada are adequate and proudly claimed that Canada has been among the most aggressive countries in controlling entry during the pandemic, alas, without backing up his statement with proof. (A pompous, politically motivated understatement perhaps?) "We have not been slow and not been unresponsive to the concerns that Canadians have," Blair claimed.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford described the border as a "sieve" and argued for a more effective testing system at airports across the country.
He said that he was asking the federal government to implement a requirement for pre-departure tests for people trying to enter Canada. Blair's counter argument is that international travel was the source of just 1.8 per cent of COVID-19 cases in Canada throughout the pandemic. "What we're seeing now is that the biggest problem in Canada is community transmission inside Canada, it's not really the importation of cases," claimed Deputy Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Howard Njoo, with confidence.
With this deadly new virus cocktail on the menu for politicians and medical professionals, let us hope that we will still be able to enjoy Christmas and New Year with our families.
Wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
