Calgary doc who’s fighting for more COVID lockdown taking trip to pandemic hotspot
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
157.25519
Summary
Calgary Emergency physician Dr. Joe Vipond, who heavily criticized the Alberta government and Alberta Health Service s COVID-19 response, is shifting his fight to climate change and heading to Glasgow, a COVID case hotspot.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Calgary emergency physician Dr. Joe Vipond, who heavily criticized the Alberta government and
00:00:05.400
Alberta Health Service's COVID-19 response, is shifting his fight to climate change and heading
00:00:10.920
to Glasgow, a COVID case hotspot. Vipond tweeted Sunday that he and his daughter are heading to
00:00:17.100
Glasgow for COP26, the 26th annual United Nations Climate Change Conference, despite reports COVID-19
00:00:25.620
infections are surging in the area. Vipond attended many protests in Calgary and Edmonton
00:00:31.520
and actively spoke out against the provincial government's easing of restrictions through the
00:00:36.380
summer. The emergency physician became the mainstream media go-to doctor for his stance
00:00:41.520
on continuing health measures and pandemic controls, then came under criticism when his
00:00:46.780
financial support of the Alberta NDP government surfaced and revealed a number of substantial
00:00:52.160
donations to the party. Vipond dismissed allegations of his partisan affiliations in an early August
00:01:00.920
There is a record of me donating to one political party. I would just like to say that's a normal
00:01:05.760
part of our electoral process and it's a normal part of our democracy, end quote.
00:01:11.200
Now looking to focus on a new fight, Vipond will travel with his daughter, a climate change activist,
00:01:17.060
to Glasgow at the end of October for the two-week conference, despite the Greater Glasgow and Clyde
00:01:23.440
Health Board area currently recording the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the country.
00:01:29.200
Despite significantly lower infection rates around the country, a Glasgow news site says 507 cases were
00:01:35.720
recorded Sunday and a number of neighborhoods in Glasgow are seeing a seven-day positivity rate of
00:01:41.400
more than 400 per 100,000 of the population. A number of comments posted on Vipond's Twitter
00:01:47.420
thread accused those traveling to the climate conference of being hypocritical, citing the
00:01:52.280
footprints they will leave in the wake of their travels. Jason Loeb commented,
00:01:57.020
You mean flying on a jet plane around the world leaving a massive footprint?
00:02:01.060
Yes, her dad is teaching her what every climate change person knows.
00:02:07.260
Another Twitter response, Non-essential jet travel in a pandemic. Hypocrisy is thy name.
00:02:14.500
Sandy B commented, The hypocrisy of the people flying to a climate change meeting is mind-boggling.
00:02:20.580
Wonder what that total carbon footprint of all those jets will be.
00:02:24.180
And finally, someone tweeted, So let me get this straight.
00:02:27.520
You're going to fly across the world to talk about how other people shouldn't be allowed to fly across
00:02:32.160
the world. An estimated 30,000 delegates from around the world are expected to attend COP26 in Glasgow
00:02:38.920
from October 31st to November 12th, including thousands of official negotiators representing