Slow arrival of vaccines is costing lives

The slow arrival of COVID- 19 vaccines is the latest setback for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in confronting the biggest challenge of his political career. His overarching responsibility is to reduce the number of infections and mortality from the pandemic and mitigate its devastating impact on the economy. Tragically for the country, that delay extends the time Canadians are at risk of exposure, illness and death.

Trudeau inherited a naive affection for China’s dictatorship that devolved into craven passivity in the face of blackmail. What else can explain his willingness to work with Tianjin- based Cansino Biologics on a COVID vaccine, given our highly contentious relationship with China and while the two Michaels languish in jail? The deal collapsed when Chinese authorities blocked exports of vaccine to Canada.

Then the government pursued a controversial and now delayed $ 170- million initiative with a National Research Council lab that was supposed to be ready last November. Industry players were rightly skeptical and believed a better approach would have been to fund private- sector companies like bio-manufacturer Pnuvax Inc. or clinical- stage biopharmaceutical Medicago, both located in Quebec (Pnuvax also has offices in Kingston, Ont.). The good news is the government will be ready for the next pandemic. In the comforting words of the prime minister, “We will not be caught on the wrong foot again.” It may be uncharitable to say, but he does seem to favour that foot a lot.

Nevertheless, Trudeau is right that we need domestic vaccine production capacity, just like we need local access to PPE and other essential goods and services in a pandemic or other emergency. Self- reliance may be more costly in some instances, but it is in the national interest. We can achieve it selectively, while pursuing our vital trade relationships. For example, it should be unacceptable that Canada, with its vast oil and gas reserves, is dependent on imports from politically unfriendly countries — to say nothing of the immense opportunity cost of not exporting our energy resources to overseas markets.

Belatedly, the government was forced to join the queue behind other countries that cut earlier deals with international pharma companies. The prime minister would have us believe there was nothing he could have done differently. Not so.

Perhaps to compensate for these serious missteps, the government secured access to 414 million vaccines, far more per capita than any other country and 10 times the number needed domestically for adult inoculations. Unfortunately, bragging rights about having the biggest stockpile or jumping ahead of poor countries (and being criticized for “vaccine hoarding”) do not rectify a life- and- death failure: The government has been slow to fulfil its highest moral obligation — to protect Canadian lives.

Based on the latest information, by the end of January Canada may have enough vaccines to inoculate about two per cent of its population, compared with 13 per cent in the U.S. and 22 per cent in Israel. The U. K. expects to vaccinate every Brit by early April. Israel, which has already completed one million vaccinations, will be done by March, if not earlier. The prime minister says we will have to wait until September.

I recently talked to a couple in their 70s who live in Haifa, Israel. On Dec. 28, they received drive- thru COVID tests administered on the driver’s and passenger’s sides by two nurses. The next day they were inoculated simultaneously in their car and instructed to return in three weeks for booster shots. Competent organization makes a difference.

Another contrast: Florida’s governor informed snowbirds they are eligible for vaccinations in his state. Visitors from Toronto and Montreal may end up being inoculated in Miami and Naples before their neighbours who stay-cationed in the great white north because they were advised it was unsafe to leave. Government spin meisters must be desperately wondering how to deal with photos of grateful seniors from TroisRivières and Vaughan getting COVID shots in Fort Lauderdale and Sarasota. Or stories about middle- aged golfers happily immunized before their more elderly fellow citizens confined to their homes in the frozen north. Good luck with that.

More than 16,000 Canadians have died from the novel coronavirus. Many more will perish due to delayed inoculations, a terrible inevitability the mainstream media has shamefully chosen to ignore. Even if our national broadcaster pretends next fall is an acceptable deadline for inoculating the population, ordinary Canadians are anxious about getting sick and increasingly frustrated they cannot go back to living normal lives in safety. Too many are hurting psychologically and facing financial ruin. No amount of spin can hide the obvious: competent federal planning would have meant a superior health outcome and a less destructive blow to the economy.

Every effort must now be devoted to accelerating the arrival of vaccines and their efficient distribution across the country so that an already tragic situation does not deteriorate further.

competent federal planning would have meant a superior health outcome.