Juno News - Canada's soft approach to the coronavirus

00:00:00.000 We're at a very interesting time right now when it comes to the coverage and conversation around

00:00:09.120 the coronavirus. As we speak the numbers of infected cases in Wuhan and the Hubei province

00:00:14.920 and all across China are increasing. Tragically so is the death toll. Now the number of cases in

00:00:20.880 other countries in western countries is increasing but ever so slightly and the Canadian increase is

00:00:26.580 very small. The number of suspected cases is actually decreasing. Most of the tested cases

00:00:32.960 roll over and end up being negative that the people they thought may have it actually just

00:00:36.800 end up having the regular flu or or something else. So that's good news I guess from that perspective

00:00:42.300 but there's still a lot of alarm after the World Health Organization called this a global health

00:00:47.740 crisis that Canada is perhaps not doing enough and doing things a little differently than other

00:00:54.680 countries and you got to step back and you've got to wonder why. There are some concerns about the

00:01:00.480 politicization of public health officials. I remember I first thought this back about eight

00:01:05.220 years or so ago when there were public health officials in cities all across Canada and also

00:01:09.740 in the United States who all jumped on this bandwagon advocating for a pop ban, a soda ban or some sort of

00:01:15.480 tax. There are different variations in different cities but you get the idea and I thought hold on a

00:01:20.660 second. Even if you think these bans are a good idea why are top-notch public health officials who

00:01:26.380 we should be trusting to say nothing but advocating to you know keep our water and beaches clean and all

00:01:31.800 that kind of stuff and talking about immunization they're basically advocating for public policy in a

00:01:38.360 way that it can become a partisan battle. This is not good to see them in this political realm.

00:01:42.800 Likewise it was not too comforting to see Toronto's chief medical officer Dr. Eileen Davila

00:01:49.100 attending a press conference alongside Toronto Mayor John Tory where he was not talking about the

00:01:54.440 nuts and bolts and basic facts of the coronavirus but condemning hate and racism and misinformation

00:02:00.540 and discrimination that was all happening. Now when he made that press conference that was

00:02:05.200 back on Wednesday that stuff just wasn't really happening and when one of my colleagues asked him to

00:02:11.180 give an example of these racist incidents and to back up his claim that people were calling for the

00:02:17.140 Chinese Canadian community to be quarantined. I mean that is quite something to say he refused to answer

00:02:23.480 the question. I don't know what was going on at this press conference. It seemed to be some sort of

00:02:27.820 well let's get in front of racism in case it happens or I don't know were they talking about the fact that

00:02:32.680 two or three idiots on Twitter were saying racist things as two or three idiots on Twitter will always

00:02:37.560 do. I just don't know. I think it was some sort of political correctness well just in case there is

00:02:43.280 intolerance let's sort of preemptively denounce it kind of thing. Politicians like to do that sort of

00:02:49.020 stuff. Public health officials though should not be doing that stuff. They should not be doing the

00:02:54.540 sorts of things that politicians like to do. They should be just the facts man keeping it plain

00:03:00.080 straightforward. We didn't see that and I think that troublingly compromised the integrity of Canada's

00:03:05.600 public health officials at the very time when we need to trust them the most. Now there is another

00:03:11.060 politicized angle going on here or it could be a politicized angle. Conversations about bringing

00:03:16.880 Canadians back from Wuhan on different chartered planes because of course flights are restricted

00:03:22.120 but different countries can say we want to get our citizens out. Now there are about 250 or so

00:03:27.860 Canadians in Wuhan and 180, 190 of them or so have said okay we want to come back to Canada. Now there

00:03:34.880 are a number of other countries who are doing this and they are quarantining their people for two weeks.

00:03:40.200 That seems to be the protocol that other sort of developed nations like-minded countries to Canada

00:03:46.300 is undertaking but at the time of me recording this right now and I know this stuff changes pretty

00:03:51.200 much every hour all the facts and figures and so forth. Canada was saying no we are not actually

00:03:57.080 going to be quarantining it and and public health minister Patty Hadji just said if they show symptoms

00:04:02.420 we'll quarantine them. Why are we so out of step with other countries? And then there is the banning of the

00:04:09.880 flights. There are other countries that the country itself, the federal government has been banning

00:04:15.480 flights from Wuhan or from China entirely. Here in Canada we've had Air Canada and I guess now other

00:04:21.400 carriers, they have made the choice to pull back their flights but not the government and I wonder why.

00:04:28.300 Now we know Canada has a lot of problems with China right now that put at risk various trade measures and of course

00:04:33.800 put at risk the lives and safety of people like Michael Kovorg and Michael Spavor. Could we perhaps

00:04:39.560 be soft on our response to China and the coronavirus because of this? Because of our other relationship

00:04:46.220 with China? That would be very worrisome to see. That would be the further politicization of this

00:04:50.660 incredible health issue. But I'm left wondering why is it that we are so out of step with what other

00:04:56.980 countries are doing, so reticent to do it? And why are we haranguing and hectoring our citizens about

00:05:01.900 misinformation and disinformation and so forth without evidence? I don't know what they mean.

00:05:07.200 Are there people online and various online accounts that are saying completely ridiculous things that

00:05:11.980 we should not follow? Yes. But there are also epidemiologists and health experts from other

00:05:16.640 countries who are advising things be done differently than Canada is doing them. So do we trust those health

00:05:23.480 officials? We're told trust the experts. But then there are experts advocating for things

00:05:28.020 differently than Canadian health officials are asking to be done. Which is the misinformation

00:05:33.920 and the disinformation? There's a lot of confusion out there right now and I think that's only natural

00:05:40.300 given how there are so many moving parts and variables. And I just think Canadian politicians and

00:05:45.640 public health officials could be conducting themselves a little bit better right now to sort of calm the

00:05:51.180 uncertainty and to get everybody on the same page.

Juno News - February 02, 2020

Canada's soft approach to the coronavirus

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