Canadian flag raisers get a workout

Canadian flag raisers and lowerers are about to get more of a workout than they've had for quite some time. 

Official Canadian flags on federal buildings have been at half-mast since the end of May to honour Indigenous children who were found dead at former residential schools. Most Canadians were on-board with that, although a majority believe it is now past time to raise them again (and it is true that the impact of lowering a flag starts to fade over time, until it becomes all but meaningless). Indigenous groups, though, have been campaigning tirelessly to keep the flags at half-mast, arguing that raising the flag would disrespectful. War veterans, on the other hand, think that not being able to lower the flag on Remembrance Day would be highly disrespectful. What to do?

Anyway, the government has been negotiating with all stakeholders, and believe that they have come up with a solution, albeit a rather labour-intensive one. The plan is that the flags will be raised on the 7th November, lowered on the 8th for Indigenous Veterans Day (which I must confess I've never heard of), then raised again (presumably on the 9th or 10th), so that they can be lowered to half-mast again on November 11th for Remembrance Day, and then raised again on the 12th for the foreseeable future (or until some other group complains).

Wow, what a performance! I don't mean to make light of it all; some people take this stuff very seriously. But after all, it's just a flag. Can we not play politics with it? Apparently there have been no less than six occasions since May when the flag would normally have have lowered - apparently, there are rules for these things - but that was not possible because it was already lowered. Prime Minister Trudeau, though, has vowed to keep the flag at half-mast "until it is clear that Indigenous People's are happy to raise them again". Do we need need a three-quarters level or something? It's all getting a bit ridiculous.

US study shows COVID vaccines' efficacy wanes even more than thought

There have been quite a few studies looking at the decline on effectiveness in COVID-19 vaccines over time, but none have been quite as depressing as a recent study of 780,000 US veterans.

This study, published in the journal Science, shows a huge drop in efficacy in all the vaccines in the six months between March and the end of September. Two doses of Moderna's effectiveness fell from 89% to just 58%; Pfizer/BioNTech's effectiveness fell from 87% to 45%; and the single dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine's efficacy fell from 86% to a paltry 13% over the same period. AstraZeneca vaccines have not been used in the USA, but you can probably assume that its performance will be more similar to the Johnson & Johnson shot than to the mRNAs.

The study only looks at US veterans, generally older and largely men, but this nevertheless seems to be a real wake-up call, and will only serve to increase the clamour for third doses after six months, which many developed nations are already embarking on.

Ontario's embarrassing "doctors"

Speaking of the anti-vaccine axis, it's embarrassing to report that at least four doctors right here in Ontario have been issuing COVID vaccine exemptions to all and sundry for money. Medical exemptions should be extremely rare, in tbe region of one in a hundred thousand, according to the province's medical regulator, and doctors have been instructed to be judicious in the issuing of exemptions.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons in Ontario is applying to the Ontario Supreme Court to force the four MDs - yes, let's name them: Dr. Rochagne Killian, Dr. Mark Raymond Trozzi, Dr. Celeste Jean Thirlwell and Dr. Mary Elizabeth O'Connor - to cooperate with the medical regulator's investigations into their COVID-19 practices, including their issuance of medical exemptions for vaccinations. All four have refused to release medical records requested by the College, claiming that the medical regulator does not have the required jurisdiction (i.e. they don't want anyone poking around in their books, and are doing everything they can to obstruct the investigations).

Dr. Killian has had her medical license suspended, after having already been barred from issuing medical exemptions for COVID. She runs a website called Enable Air which claims it "facilitates the purchase of vaccination exemptions for a fee", and describes vaccination passports as a "fascist document". 

Dr. Trozzi was also barred from issuing exemptions last month, after arguing that doctors are "free to provide medical exemptions related to COVID-19 vaccinations as he or she sees fit". 

Dr. Thirlwell  says that the College lacks jurisdiction to "police" medical exemptions, and warns that any attempt to obtain records from her office will be "resisted physically, by secrity services".

Dr. O'Connor has, for some reason, called on the College to "define COVID-19", and has called the vaccines "gene therapy experiments ... being administered to humanity without consent". Don't ask me...

And this, mark you, is in Ontario. Not Texas. Not Tennesse. Ontario. I hang my head in shame.

Quebec and Ontario blink before anti-vaxxers

Quebec has just backtracked shamefully on its initial vaccine mandate for healthcare workers, and Ontario hasn't even bothered trying.

Quebec did have a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for hospital and other healthcare workers, but it first extended its deadline, and then abandoned it completely when it judged that too many workers were still not vaccinated, and that the province faced potential shortages of medical staff if the policy were to be followed through.

Ontario had been mulling the idea of a vaccine mandate for healthcare workers for some time, but it too ultimately decided against it - in spite of the explicit advice of all major healthcare organizations and advisors - due to the "potential departure of tens of thousands of healthcare workers" (an unsupported claim). So much for "following the science"! Many hospitals have their own vaccine mandates, and some have had to lay off anti-vaxxers, but at least this can't be pinned on the Conservative government!

This is a pusillanimous abdication of responsibility on the part of the Ford government (and the Legault government in Quebec), and gives entirely the wrong message: anti-vaxxers will see this as a resounding victory. These decisions will almost certainly embolden the anti-vaccine mob at a critical time, with child vaccination just around the corner. 

Do you want to go for a hospital procedure and not know whether the doctor treating you, or the nurse helping you recover, is vaccinated or not? Can healthcare workers now refuse to take currently-mandated vaccines like Hep B? Can they choose not to wear a mask or wash their hands? Where does this all end? And, anyway, do we really want healthcare workers who don't believe in vaccines and don't trust the medical establishment. Sounds to me like an ideal time to weed out some proverbial "bad eggs"...

British Columbia, on the other hand, did not blink, and has had to lay off 3,000 healthcare workers who were either unvaccinated or unwilling to disclose their vaccination status (what's that about?). And, guess what, the sky hasn't fallen. It hasn't been easy, but they have coped, and are coping. 

In Quebec, an estimated 8,000 workers were at risk, or around 2.4% of the workforce, including 5,000 who are in direct contact with patients. Not an easy problem, to be sure, but doable. In Ontario, the numbers are less clear (the province is unwilling to release information on holdouts for "privacy" reasons), but certainly less than the "tens of thousands" improbably claimed by Ford and Health Minister Christine Elliot (it is probably in the region of 2-3% too). 

It is also far from likely that worst-case scenarios would pan out, when push comes to shove and well-paid unionized jobs are at stake. When the New York police force was faced with a vaccine mandate, there were dire warning that up to a third of the force would rebel; in the end, just 34 of 35,000 police officers (and 40 of 17,000 civilian employees) gave up their jobs. The City of Toronto has had to suspend just 248 of its 32,000 staff members (much less than 1%) for non-compliance with the City's vaccine mandate.

Yes, it is a complex issue", as Premier Ford says, and a vaccine mandate would almost certainly result in the suspension of some services in the short term and the delay of some operations and other procedures. But complex issues are exactly where he should be guided by the medical establishment, which states unequivocally that healthcare staff should be vaccinated, for their own health and that of their patients. 

Most hospitals in the province are instituting their own vaccine mandates anyway, in the absence of government leadership. The Globe and Mail found that, of over three dozen Ontario hospitals they contacted, only one did not have its own mandatory vaccine rules, and only a handful of staff at each institution are not in compliance with the mandate. 120 of the province's 141 hospitals signed an Ontario Hospital Association letter to the government calling for a province-wide mandate, with several more submitting their own letters in support of it. Minister Elliott's claims that "some" (unidentified) hospitals had expressed "concerns" over a vaccine mandate rings pretty hollow.

Both provinces now find themselves in the embarrassing position of airlines and schools taking a harder line than the government on the issue, and of relying on individual hospitals and health authorities taking responsibility for vaccine mandates because the government did not have the cojones to follow the recommendations of its owns expert advisors. Does the fact that there is a provincial election on the horizon in Ontario play into this? I imagine that Premier Ford does not want to be seen by his conservative base to be forcing through a liberal agenda. 

Does "doing the right thing" even matter any more? Anti-vaxxers 2, provinces 0.

Canada's carbon emissons are a bit embarrassing

All the speechifying at the COP26 climate change conference has brought home the importance of carbon missions per capita as a measure. For example, China says it does not need to do as much as other developed countries because it is at a "special development phase", and because anyway its emissions per capita as much lower than that of many other developed countries. The first of these arguments is hogwash (as I have noted in another post), but the second point is actually salient.

According to Worldometer (and I've no reason to disbelieve it), the top 10 emitters are, in order: China, USA, India, Russia, Japan, Germany, Canada, Iran, South Korea and Indonesia. The top ten emitters per capita, however, are: Qatar, Montenegro, Kuwait, Trinidad & Tobago, UAE, Oman, Canada, Brunei, Luxembourg and Bahrain. The common element? The only country in the top ten of emitters and emitters per capita is ... Canada (at No. 7 on both lists). The only other G20 countries that even come close are Australia (No. 14 and No. 11 respectively on the two lists), and Saudi Arabia (No. 11 and No. 15), and maybe the USA, incidentally appears at No. 2 and No. 16.

So, are we really in a position to be lecturing the rest of the world? Granted we live in a cold country that also gets very hot in the summer, but still...

And what about carbon emissions per unit. Of GDP, you ask? Well, Canada's up there too, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, Canada appears in 11th place again, after a bunch of Eastern European countries and Russia, with the USA some five places below. Not good.

China's claim to be at a "special development stage" the height of hypocrisy

America may be "back" as regards climate change and their pledges at the COP26 climate conference, but, unfortunately, China is still China.

President Xi Jinping did not feel the need to attend the conference, sending instead his climate change lieutenant Xie Zhenhua to soak up the bad vibes that China was always going to receive at this conference.

When faced with criticism of China's continued reliance on carbon-spewing coal technology, Mr. Xie responded by saying that China is at a "special development stage", and so cannot be expected to rein in its coal-fired power stations any quicker than it currently is (i.e. it's not - China is continuing to build new coal power stations by the dozen). Xie insists that China is making its "biggest possible effort to address climate change", and just deflected the blame for the world's ills onto the USA, which is standard Chinese policy.

For China to play the aggrieved pauper - basically, it is saying that China is still a developing country and, as such, should not be expected to rectify a problem that was created by rich, developed countries - is the height of hypocrisy. China is the world's second largest economy, and the world's biggest emitter of CO2. To call itself a developing country whenever it suits the situation, based on its per capita wealth, is disingenuous in the extreme, and a slap in the face for real developing countries (including countries like Gabon, which is punching well above its weight on international change).

Buy, hey, that's just China being China, the country that every other country loves to hate but can't afford to antagonize.

Doug Ford's increase in minimum wage not out of deeply-held political convictions

Ontario Premier Doug Ford, after keeping a very low profile for several months as his popularity ratings tanked pretty much every time he made a public appearance and opened his mouth, has been making various announcements in recent days apparently intended to show his respect and his deep devotion to the lowly working stiff.

The latest such is an announcement that Ontario's minimum wage will be increased to $15 an hour in the new year. Wait, wasn't that the policy of the previous Liberal government, nearly four years ago? And wasn't it Doug Ford that cancelled the proposed Liberal increase in the minimum wage as one of his very first actions as the new Premier of Ontario, back in 2018? If he expects some credit for increasing the minimum wage now, after all this time, he must be very naïve. 

Besides, according to the Ontario Living Wage Network, a living wage in Ontario now, after the increases in the cost of living in the intervening years, is estimated to be between $16.20 an hour (Sault Ste. Marie) and $22.08 an hour (Toronto), with the provincial average therefore hovering somewhere close to $20 an hour. $15 is just not going to cut it.

So, why now? Has he spent nearly four years thinking about it, and decided that yes, it is a good idea after all? Er, probably not. For one thing, thinking is not Doug Ford's forte. And helping out the working classes is not one of his deeply-held political convictions.

No, this is all about timing. His handlers - the ones that persuaded him to remove himself from the spotlight as it was hurting his polling numbers - have reminded him that the next provincial election is just eight months away, and it is probably time to start burnishing his image a bit and portraying himself as a caring man of the people, and not a power-mad millionaire businessman.

It's a tough sell, and it won't be made any easier when people realize what his hidden agenda is - four more years in power.

What does "Net Zero Is Not Zero" even mean?

At the COP26 climate change conference in Glasgow, there are all the usual protesters and hangers-on that haunt this kind of international conference. At least one of the placards being hoisted by protesters outside the event reads "Net Zero Is Not Zero", and it wasn't entirely clear to me just what this meant. So, of course, I investigated.

It turns out that this protester's complaint concerns the whole concept of "net zero", which many environmentalists see as a dangerous development in the fight against climate change. Country after country has, in recent years, been espousing a commitment to achieve net zero by 2050 (or 2060 in the case of China, Russia and Saudi Arabia, or even 2070 in the case of India). However, this does not mean that, by 2050 (or 2060 or 2070), these countries will cease to emit any carbon dioxide at all.

What "net zero" actually means is that any carbon emissions are "balanced" by measures to remove carbon from the atmosphere, whether this be in the form of mass tree-planting, carbon-capture-and-storage, or more hi-tech solutions like direct air capture devices. That may sound like a reasonable compromise, at first blush, but part of the problem is that it is indeed a compromise, and that it is open to misuse and perversion. 

There is also the phrase "carbon neutral", which is often used interchangeably with "net zero carbon", but may have some different connotations in some cases. "Net zero" usually refers to zero emissions of all owned or controlled types (including electricity generation), while "carbon neutral" refers to all types of emissions including those indirectly associated with an activity or country.

Some industrialized countries certainly seem to be relying on being able purchase carbon offsets from other more carbon-responsible countries. It's arguable whether that kind of figure-fudging should count towards a "net zero" pledge anyway. After all, there are only three countries that are actually carbon negative, Bhutan, Panama and Suriname, and those three tiny countries can't provide carbon indulgences for the rest of the world.

Opponents of this kind of strategy claim that relying on technology to rectify problems caused by technology is no solution at all. Furthermore they say, relying on technology that is not yet fully developed is risky at best. And, perhaps worst of all, having a goal that is decades in the future is just putting off the evil hour, and tantamount to a "burn now, pay later" attitude that the world can ill afford: it diminishes the sense of urgency we need to curb emissions NOW.