The COVID-19 pandemic

[danbrotherston]

[jeffster]

Province wide shutdown to end with gradual return to colour coded system; stay-at-home orders to continue until at least Februrary 16th (with the exception of the GTA): https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/60261...save-lives

Colour Coded System:

Green: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Blue: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Yellow: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Orange: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Red: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Grey??!: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.

N.B. Obviously "restaurants" does not mean literally just restaurants, but is a metaphor for all government restrictions.

I don't think there was a lot of proof that these places were a major contributing factor to covid-19. While places like Costco and Wal*Mart were. Let these small retailers open before they go out of business entirely (though it might be too late for many). Seems that Toronto and Peel at the very least will have to wait a bit more.

Onto the vaccine rollout, Canada has fallen to 38th place in the world.

https://financialpost.com/investing/cana...e-outraged

I'll put this out there. The US has no desire to help Canada until every one of their citizens, including those on the far right, and the covid-19 deniers, get their vaccine first. Now the US committing to vaccinating their vulnerable population first, before helping other countries, is one thing. This shouldn't be seen as a negative. Especially when you keep in mind that Canada was dealing with China for a vaccine before the US companies.

However, not helping an ally at a time of need until well after that, is a problem. I don't view the US as a friendly country anymore. So what I would like to see: Since Canada is dangerously entangled in this feud between the United States and China, they need to release Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei. Just do it. We have no issue with her. We did the US a favour by holder her hostage (although beautiful house arrest, not so bad when you have a lot of money). The US, on the other hand, does us no favours. Either way, we need to exit out of the feud, and there is no reason for us to be in it. Biden America First approach isn't a positive for us. So, we need a Canada First approach as well.

While I hate that we may have to deal with a country that many consider an enemy, China, I think we'd be better off. It'll make it easier for us to get vaccines outside of US based companies. And hopefully get us back into business before too long.

[danbrotherston]

Colour Coded System:

Green: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Blue: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Yellow: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Orange: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Red: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.
Grey??!: Stay home! Oh, but totally go to restaurants they're all open.

N.B. Obviously "restaurants" does not mean literally just restaurants, but is a metaphor for all government restrictions.

I don't think there was a lot of proof that these places were a major contributing factor to covid-19. While places like Costco and Wal*Mart were. Let these small retailers open before they go out of business entirely (though it might be too late for many). Seems that Toronto and Peel at the very least will have to wait a bit more.

Onto the vaccine rollout, Canada has fallen to 38th place in the world.

https://financialpost.com/investing/cana...e-outraged

I'll put this out there. The US has no desire to help Canada until every one of their citizens, including those on the far right, and the covid-19 deniers, get their vaccine first. Now the US committing to vaccinating their vulnerable population first, before helping other countries, is one thing. This shouldn't be seen as a negative. Especially when you keep in mind that Canada was dealing with China for a vaccine before the US companies.

However, not helping an ally at a time of need until well after that, is a problem. I don't view the US as a friendly country anymore. So what I would like to see: Since Canada is dangerously entangled in this feud between the United States and China, they need to release Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei. Just do it. We have no issue with her. We did the US a favour by holder her hostage (although beautiful house arrest, not so bad when you have a lot of money). The US, on the other hand, does us no favours. Either way, we need to exit out of the feud, and there is no reason for us to be in it. Biden America First approach isn't a positive for us. So, we need a Canada First approach as well.

While I hate that we may have to deal with a country that many consider an enemy, China, I think we'd be better off. It'll make it easier for us to get vaccines outside of US based companies. And hopefully get us back into business before too long.

Emphasis added for clarity.

Ultimately, I don't think there's any more local data that Costco/Walmart were bigger contributors than other places. Frankly, I think our data is pretty garbage, and not without good reason, we've made little effort to gather this data. That being said, we can make reasonable assumptions that the spread in other similar places would apply here, so I think its reasonable to use data from there to inform our policy. I am not certain what that data has said about different types of retail outlets.  I do think that closing restaurants will have an outsized impact on private gatherings...closing restaurants makes clear that we are not to gather and socialize, while opening restaurants strongly suggests doing so is fine.

I do agree that the US is no longer the same aly they used to be, but this has been a decades long process that has only crescendoed (well hopefully) with Trump. But this is hardly unique to us, the rest of the world is feeling it, albeit not as acutely as we are.

[ac3r]

Meanwhile, the well connected and wealthy are getting their vaccinations ahead of the rest of us. The rationale? They claim they need to use them up before they expire... https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/covid-19-vacc...-1.5299747

[plam]

Meanwhile, the well connected and wealthy are getting their vaccinations ahead of the rest of us. The rationale? They claim they need to use them up before they expire... https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/covid-19-vacc...-1.5299747

I mean, that seems upsetting, but the reverse is even worse: Gov Cuomo had proposed stripping licenses of anyone who gave vaccines out of priority order, and then you really do have wasted vaccines. How do you walk that line?

[tomh009]

Meanwhile, the well connected and wealthy are getting their vaccinations ahead of the rest of us. The rationale? They claim they need to use them up before they expire... https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/covid-19-vacc...-1.5299747

I mean, that seems upsetting, but the reverse is even worse: Gov Cuomo had proposed stripping licenses of anyone who gave vaccines out of priority order, and then you really do have wasted vaccines. How do you walk that line?

Agreed. Unless there were targeted people in line who did not get their shots, I would much rather vaccinate any random people rather than let the vaccines expire.

[danbrotherston]

I mean, that seems upsetting, but the reverse is even worse: Gov Cuomo had proposed stripping licenses of anyone who gave vaccines out of priority order, and then you really do have wasted vaccines. How do you walk that line?

Agreed. Unless there were targeted people in line who did not get their shots, I would much rather vaccinate any random people rather than let the vaccines expire.

While true, "family of the board" doesn't seem to be random.

[tomh009]

Agreed. Unless there were targeted people in line who did not get their shots, I would much rather vaccinate any random people rather than let the vaccines expire.

While true, "family of the board" doesn't seem to be random.

Sorry, maybe "random" wasn't the best word there. I basically don't care who gets the surplus shots if it prevents them from being wasted.

[ac3r]

Exactly. There are other people they could offer excess vaccines to, particularly the poor and people of colour.

On a somewhat related note, the region is temporarily opening two additional testing locations in predominantly working class, poor and racialized neighbourhoods as data has shown these are - naturally - the hardest hit due to various factors: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener...-1.5906157

[danbrotherston]

While true, "family of the board" doesn't seem to be random.

Sorry, maybe "random" wasn't the best word there. I basically don't care who gets the surplus shots if it prevents them from being wasted.

I mean, that's fair, and if they were really left over, that's fine. But this gives a strong image of impropriety, like, "oh no, we opened 3 vials at the end of the day for our last three residents, and now have 12 leftover shots, good thing the board's family happens to conveniently be here..."

I'm no saying that's what happened, but it looks bad, and the boards family isn't someone I'd expect to typically be nearby.

There's obviously a fine line to walk, but I've heard of far far less suspicious instances of people getting leftover shots, including nurses giving out their last shots on the side of the highway after the highway was closed due to a crash. That was a fun story.

[tomh009]

Exactly. There are other people they could offer excess vaccines to, particularly the poor and people of colour.

How would they do this in practice if they end up with surplus shots? Stop people in the street and ask them whether they want to be vaccinated? Is that realistic?

[danbrotherston]

Exactly. There are other people they could offer excess vaccines to, particularly the poor and people of colour.

How would they do this in practice if they end up with surplus shots? Stop people in the street and ask them whether they want to be vaccinated? Is that realistic?

Sure....

Or...as the did, give them to other staff at the facility....

The "family of board members" is the highly suspicious part.

[taylortbb]

Exactly. There are other people they could offer excess vaccines to, particularly the poor and people of colour.

How would they do this in practice if they end up with surplus shots? Stop people in the street and ask them whether they want to be vaccinated? Is that realistic?

Hospitals are supposed to maintain standby lists of people to be called if there's leftover shots. Generally it includes people that work in the hospital in non-patient-facing roles (e.g. IT help desk). I think most LTC homes are being vaccinated currently by mobile units from the hospitals, which makes it suspicious that they didn't follow the regular standby list. I definitely find it hard to believe that "family of board members" was the best they could do, any family of the front-line staff would be a better choice. Given the less than 100% efficacy of the vaccines, anyone that lives with front-line staff is likely still at elevated risk compared to the general population. Can't say the same for family of board members.

All that said, if the alternative truly was wasting the shots, then family of board members is a better option. It just looks pretty suspicious.

[tomh009]

I agree that the optics are not good. But I personally don't see this as a big enough issue to get worked up about. Hopefully by the end of the month the vaccines supplies will be strong enough that it's the delivery mechanism, not vaccine supplies, that is the constraint.

[ac3r]

It just sets a bad example, which is what most people seemed to be irritated about when this news came out. It would have even made more sense to give them to family members of actual front line staff in LTC homes - the family of the PSWs, RN/RPNs, housekeepers, the screeners - rather than family members of board members.

Related to vaccinations, the province is reportedly developing a web portal for vaccination booking using the software Skedulo, which has been plaguing the vaccination rollout in the USA as millions of people fight to book spots. Hopefully we don't suffer the same fate here: https://outline.com/DKq6vp