There’s a wind blowing in Canada, and it’s blowing away from public health measures that have kept most Canadians healthy and safe from the pandemic crisis primary driver, the SARS-CoV2 virus. Somewhere between 1010 Saskatchewanians and about 4000 have perished in the last 2 years from the virus, while more than a tenth of the population has directly experienced infection.
With the world not rising to the occasion, and failing to equitably produce and distribute vaccines to all people, variants have arisen and shaken the resolve of public officials and the public at large. I had several anti-waxxers on Saturday questioning me specifically about why I’d want a vaccine that wasn’t “100% effective”. They didn’t seem educated enough to have ever heard that perfect is the enemy of good.
“Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.” — Confucius, [1]
So, we have Dr. Tam and others saying that we’ll have to pretend the crisis is over and accept routine crippling sickness spreading through our air(ports) and beyond.
“For better or for worse, this is what’s going to happen across the whole country,” said Dr. Alexander Wong, an infectious diseases physician at Regina General Hospital and associate professor at the University of Saskatchewan.
“The question is, why are we in such a rush to do all of this? It’s clearly political.”
It sure as heck isn’t a very rational, or scientific approach to getting our lives back to an old normal where the biggest reason people would be uncomfortable about going to a restaurant was the tab at the end of the night, instead of the dread of life crippling/ending infection discovered days later. Then, watching that infection spread through your family and friends…
I see this as analogous to how we handle the climate crisis also, with politics, but not science informing those political decisions. Experts explain how masses of ice poised to swamp every global coastal city are on the knife’s edge, and municipal, provincial, and federal politicians still want to build more fossil fuel pipelines and highways. Just keep piling those straws onto our camel’s back, it’s worked so far.
Saskboy's Abandoned Stuff 
The best are simply throwing in the towel and conceding to the shit-heads. Given the power differentials I can’t say that I blame them.
The bitter irony is that the political timing actually couldn’t be worse to loosen restrictions. Whether this was already in the works (more likely it wasn’t) or not by going soft it now suggests to every aggressive violent minority with a grievance that they too can set public policy by mobbing federal or provincial parliamentary precincts, breaking laws, and vaguely threatening violence.
No matter how it’s spun, the flutruxklan will be doing victory laps and then n to their next conquest, cause this is not over by a long shot. They have a cheering gallery in Bergen and her team of misfits. Just like their drug addicted, depends wearing, rapey, crime riddled overlord they’ve seen that they can get away with anything, so why stop there? At some point we will see parliament disrupted, starting with the gallery and then onto the floor and ransacking offices. Welcome to 2022!
These people are looking to replace Trudeau with the likes of a Pinochet or a Lukashenko, and I do not consent to that.
I don’t care what these backward politicians open up any time soon. As aa retiree, I can make my own decisions, and I choose to do what I have done since the 1st of March 2019: Leave home once every 2 weeks to purchase grocery needs and pick up some liquid refreshments and another store all the while wearing my mask and keeping as safe a distance as I can.
This means I will still not be doing regular “laps in the mall” any time soon just to make purchases of things I don’t really need or might be “nice to have, sorta” which has allowed me to already purchase my Tax Free Savings Account at my local bank.
The thing I like best, though, is that I only fill up my vehicle with gas once every 2-1/2 to 3 months and even got 4 months out of one tank. I feel good about that!
This means, though, that I have contributed minimally to that vaunted GDP that the corporations (as well as politicians) that worship at the alter of.
2020, I presume you meant.