Western Standard - Families torn apart by lingering vaccine travel restrictions in Canada and US

00:00:00.000 Good evening. I'm Melanie Rizdin with the Western Standard. Joining me tonight are some families

00:00:15.480 that are either Canadian citizens based in Canada, they're Canadian citizens based in the U.S.

00:00:22.360 But we're basically going to be talking with families who have been experiencing a lot of, you know, frustration and grief with the lingering vaccine mandates when it comes to travel between the U.S. and Canada and Canada in the U.S.

00:00:38.900 These families have family members that are either, you know, across the border and they haven't been able to see them for months, if not years.

00:00:48.900 We even have some families who have lost family members and were unable to come and see their parents or attend the funeral.

00:00:58.120 So we're going to we're going to chat with these families tonight just just to get an idea of of how this has been impacting a lot of families between Canada and the United States.

00:01:08.880 First of all, we're going to speak with Marcella Pacone.

00:01:11.840 She's out of Buffalo, New York, and Marcella was the one that originally contacted me and

00:01:18.720 we started discussing the situation that she's facing. Marcella has a fiancé that is a Canadian

00:01:27.360 citizen and he lives in Stony Creek, Ontario. Now, Marcella was originally part of a Facebook

00:01:34.160 group called Families Are Essential, but then started her own Facebook page called For the

00:01:40.560 the love of family. Marcella, thanks for joining us. Thank you so much for having me to allow us

00:01:45.420 to share our stories today. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. Why don't you tell me a little bit

00:01:49.640 about your situation with your fiance and how this all sort of got started with the Facebook

00:01:56.100 groups and just looking to support other families? Yeah, so my fiance is Canadian. He's a permanent

00:02:04.100 resident Canadian. We've been together for six or seven years. We have two kids together, a three-year-old

00:02:09.480 and a two-year-old. And obviously prior to COVID, we were allowed the luxury of being able to cross

00:02:15.940 back and forth. We actually are about 45 minutes away from each other. So it was always a quick

00:02:21.580 drive. So then obviously when the pandemic hit in March of 2020, both of us wanted to stay in

00:02:28.760 our own countries. We obviously wanted each other's healthcare system. We're not married. So

00:02:33.360 obviously my passport allowed six months to be in Canada. And obviously he has the six months to be

00:02:39.460 able to come in and out of Canada as well. So we just are a family that went back and forth from

00:02:44.120 two households that happened to be in two countries. So when the pandemic hit and there

00:02:49.040 was the chatter of shutting down the bridge the week of March 14th, you know, nobody ever thought

00:02:55.640 that it was going to be two years in. I think we were all led to believe 14 days to flatten the

00:03:01.080 curve. So again, we didn't think anything of it. And again, every 30 days, there was just a

00:03:06.820 continued extension. And now we're on, you know, two years. So I would say a year into the border

00:03:13.600 closure, there was a Facebook group that was started for them. Families are essential. The

00:03:18.800 original goal on that was to try to get families deemed essential because both sides of the border

00:03:25.740 had categories of who couldn't, who could or couldn't cross the border. The potato chip cup,

00:03:32.340 the potato chip truck driver was able to cross the pepsi guy was able to cross

00:03:37.620 healthcare workers were able to cross so we wanted to start advocating to expand the categories of

00:03:45.300 who can cross the border so families are essential was created with two admins michelle and sandy

00:03:52.180 and their objective was to protest the various bridges throughout the country sandy is in fort

00:03:59.140 erie she has family in the u.s and canada so she started every sunday at one o'clock

00:04:05.460 she had american families on one side of the bridge and canadian families on the other side

00:04:10.020 of the bridge so through the power of social media there was a couple other facebook groups

00:04:15.060 that also popped up that were advocating to get the border open to exemption so we met

00:04:20.900 and for nine months straight every sunday at one o'clock we were at the bottom of the peace bridge

00:04:26.500 the Americans were at Pat Soule Park and the Canadians were at Martha Park. And, you know,

00:04:32.680 we got the attention of the media. We got the attention of our congressman. Actually,

00:04:37.680 Congressman Chris Jacobs introduced legislation last year with the advocacy work that we were

00:04:42.820 doing. And obviously there was a lot of trending going on in the summer of 2021 that the border

00:04:49.880 was going to open, you know, vaccine, not vaccine, testing or not. And people started advocating only

00:04:57.380 the vaccinated, only the vaccinated opened the border. So I recognized in the beginning that

00:05:02.580 if the border was really going to open up to only fully vaccinated, there was going to be

00:05:08.380 thousands of families that still needed to advocate for a pathway. So sometime in the middle of that,

00:05:15.220 I started another Facebook group called For the Love of Family Reunification for All 0.85

00:05:19.320 because I just knew that when the border was opening up to fully vaccinated, either Americans

00:05:24.360 or Canadians, that the advocacy work was going to sort of stop. One of the things is Canada always 0.52

00:05:31.240 allowed exemptions for family reunification. It actually started in June of 2020. So if you had

00:05:37.580 an immediate or extended family in Canada, as long as you were able to meet the cumbersome

00:05:44.360 requirements of quarantining, you were able to enter Canada. And my family will forever be

00:05:51.040 grateful for the family reunification exemptions that the Canadian government did allow for foreign

00:05:57.500 nationals, because I did have the luxury and the privilege of being able to quarantine for 14 days.

00:06:04.580 I had a remote position, I was working from home. So for me to cross the land border to isolate with

00:06:10.380 two little ones, you know, in the privacy of my own home so that I could reunite with my fiance

00:06:15.880 during that pandemic was a miracle for me. So I always advocated and my voice was always for

00:06:22.720 other people that, you know, didn't work from home. They can't take two weeks off.

00:06:27.100 Like you need to understand bi-national families and bordering towns, we're 10 minutes away from

00:06:32.860 each other. We're closer to Canada than we might be to a bordering state of Pennsylvania and Ohio.

00:06:38.460 So that's what led me to continuing to keep advocating for everybody to get back to this pre-pandemic way of life, get back to what we knew and the luxury and the freedom that we all had as American citizens and Canadian citizens to cross each other's border. 0.71

00:06:57.800 You know, you have people that come into the U.S. to just pick up gas, go to the grocery store, go to our malls.

00:07:04.660 And again, it's quicker to pop into the U.S. than it is to maybe go to the supermarket down the street in Canada.

00:07:12.000 So when the pandemic hit and when the borders were shut down, families were forced to be separated with no pathway.

00:07:20.200 I mentioned that Canada did these exemptions in June of 2020 and October of 2020 for immediate

00:07:26.920 and extended families. But unfortunately, the U.S. had no exemptions by land. The land border has

00:07:34.240 been closed to the unvaccinated over 18 months now. Again, we're going on two and a half years.

00:07:40.380 The U.S. always deemed a Canadian family trying to reunite as non-essential. So again, they have

00:07:47.920 not been able to cross by land in their own individual car um something that was also odd 0.50

00:07:54.480 was an unvaccinated canadian for 18 months was able to fly into the u.s so if you were afforded

00:08:02.640 the luxury of being able to afford um a plane ride you were able to you were able to do that

00:08:11.120 sorry about that um you were able to pay you know you're able to pay your flight

00:08:15.840 and you instead of driving 10 minutes over the border you had to drive an hour to toronto take

00:08:21.280 two flights spend an hour and a half from toronto to detroit detroit to buffalo so

00:08:27.600 the science never made sense the u.s was always saying an unvaccinated canadian was safe to fly

00:08:34.320 into the u.s but they were never able to drive and you know fast forward we're now two and a

00:08:39.840 a half years in, there's over 44 countries that have dropped all COVID mandates. Norway, Iceland,

00:08:47.500 Ireland, United Kingdom, Aruba, Costa Rica, Sweden, Poland, Denmark, Argentina, and the US and Canada

00:08:55.280 are not on that list. There's still restrictions with either being fully vaccinated, having a

00:09:01.780 pre-arrival test, or downloading an app to get into Canada. This is not where we are. The science

00:09:08.880 never said that families should be separated. So I continue this advocacy and I have met

00:09:15.040 thousands of families that have struggled with not seeing each other for two plus years.

00:09:21.060 And until the border on both sides gets back to where we were, I will continue to keep fighting

00:09:26.820 Congress, members of parliament, the president, anybody that's willing to listen.

00:09:31.880 Well, and I think a lot of people had high hopes that April 1st, when the U.S. border

00:09:39.960 or the U.S. restrictions at the land borders, so specifically for driving at land borders,

00:09:47.640 were set to expire, but of course very quickly it was extended and there is no date mentioned

00:09:56.680 as to sort of an end date for that extension.

00:10:00.220 And not to mention that, there's also been talk

00:10:03.660 within the federal budget that they have sort of put aside

00:10:09.440 enough money to sort of further these travel restriction mandates

00:10:15.340 within the Canadian border for the next three years.

00:10:20.660 So moving until 2024.

00:10:23.280 so so very very tough you know very tough for a lot of families to hear both of those stories

00:10:31.520 so you bring up a really good point there is a lot of high hope i have hope that the u.s cannot

00:10:37.040 continue this covet theater the covet mandates need to get dropped you know there is chatter

00:10:43.600 of what's happening at the southern border with rescinding title 42 and that allows um asylum

00:10:49.680 seekers to enter the asylum border. And there's talk that there's no longer this public health

00:10:53.940 crisis to maintain Title 42. So as an American citizen, where you have my government advocating

00:11:01.220 for these open borders down south, I'm advocating and I'm screaming to the Biden administration 0.95

00:11:08.720 to have the same sympathy for me as the American citizen to allow an unvaccinated father, mother,

00:11:16.200 grandparent sister to reunite. So if there is no public health crisis on the southern border

00:11:23.480 because that article 42 is dropping, Title 19 should also get dropped because we all know that

00:11:30.660 we can reunite safely. We all know that there's vaccines and therapeutics and there's all these

00:11:35.840 strategies in place. We know that we're not going to get to a COVID zero. So, you know, two years in,

00:11:41.480 i think continuing to punish families that choose to be unvaccinated is no longer

00:11:47.800 you know the free society that americans or canadians believed that we were a part of

00:11:54.280 so yes in my hardest of my hearts i believe that the u.s is going to join that list of 44 other

00:12:00.920 countries that no longer have covid mandates unfortunately it's only going to be a matter of

00:12:05.880 time politics a major role on why these mandates are still in place yeah and i think it might be

00:12:12.600 a bigger uphill battle for canadians to have that expectation here for sure marcella thank you for

00:12:20.680 connecting me with these uh these next families uh one quick question for you marcella and and this

00:12:26.920 is you know uh this is uh considering that there are going to be viewers who are thinking to

00:12:33.320 themselves we'll we'll just get vaccinated and this all goes away what are your thoughts around

00:12:38.040 that around that that that perception from some people that you know you're you're you're struggling

00:12:45.160 to to reunite with family why don't you just get vaccinated you know families have sacrificed for

00:12:50.920 the last two years to not reunite they have made a decision to not get vaccinated and two years in

00:12:58.280 they're not going to make that decision so that they can actually reunite the government should

00:13:02.440 not be forcing a medical decision on families to choose on reuniting with your family so again i

00:13:11.560 think families are going to continue to stand their ground you know stand on the foundation

00:13:17.720 of freedom and medical choice and allow that the government is going to do the right thing

00:13:22.440 by both american and canadian citizens i could hold my government accountable that the amount

00:13:28.520 of energy we put into being a free democratic society we are not free until the u.s absolutely

00:13:36.920 has open borders and everybody regardless of medical vaccination status could enter the u.s

00:13:45.080 marcella thanks for joining us marcella is the um the creator of for the love of family

00:13:51.960 facebook page and it looks like you've got your hands full there with a couple of little ones so

00:13:57.000 So we'll let you go and thank you again for connecting us with these families through

00:14:02.720 your Facebook group and through your advocacy and your support, you know, continued support

00:14:10.000 for families who are struggling to reunite with these lingering mandates.

00:14:14.820 Thank you very much for what you're doing.

00:14:16.580 Thank you very much.

00:14:17.460 I've met some wonderful families.

00:14:19.000 We all have some heartache of stories.

00:14:21.220 So hopefully your viewers understand what we're going through and why we continue to

00:14:25.220 keep making that decision on why families choose to not be vaccinated right okay and so we are going

00:14:34.040 to speak with a few other families now just to to hear some stories about how these travel

00:14:41.040 restrictions these border restrictions between Canada and the U.S. have been affecting them and

00:14:46.740 impacting their ability to see loved ones uh we'll talk with Tanya first we've got Tanya Mead she is

00:14:53.000 out of North Vancouver, BC. And Tanya has a couple of kids that attend school in the U.S.

00:15:00.980 Thanks for joining us, Tanya. Thank you for having me. Okay, so why don't you fill us in

00:15:06.260 on the situation with your kids that are attending school in the U.S.? So I have two kids who are in

00:15:13.020 opposite cities, so they're apart, they're not together. They are in the same state. One is a

00:15:21.100 Canadian citizen. She's on an F-1 visa and one is a dual citizen. I've not seen, our Canadian

00:15:29.680 daughter has not been back to Canada since December of 2020, so she has not seen her dad.

00:15:35.400 She has not seen her two younger siblings since Christmas of 2020. Last summer, I was able to fly

00:15:43.520 into the United States with my son to check him into his dorm for freshman year, and I have not

00:15:50.280 seen either of them since uh they've spent christmas alone uh in campus housing uh you know

00:15:57.960 they had to go buy their own little christmas tree they had no christmas dinner they have no family

00:16:02.280 there we we don't know anyone there at all no family no friends it's just the two of them

00:16:09.320 thankfully they were able to get together for christmas um you know we've had other instances

00:16:14.520 where my son has needed a visit to the er and i've had to facilitate his treatment with the

00:16:21.560 doctors through a zoom call from the house because i can't get on a plane and fly to him

00:16:27.400 um sorry um as a mother it's heartbreaking to see your child who's um who needs you

00:16:36.680 and you just can't get to them i can't imagine that's going to be very hard tanya yes how old

00:16:44.120 are your kids um so my son is 19 and my daughter is 22. okay and it's your daughter that you said

00:16:52.440 has not been able to come up uh since i think you said it was december of 2020. correct um

00:17:00.760 and now with these new rules she she was you know she's scared to come back because of all the 0.72

00:17:06.200 continuous changes and if she comes back to canada now she would be inadmissible 0.81

00:17:13.320 back into the United States to finish her studies because she is unvaccinated. She's chosen that 0.99

00:17:17.240 for herself. She's made that informed consent to not be vaccinated. She's gotten that herself.

00:17:27.560 And she wants to finish her degree. And in order to finish her degree, she has to stay in the 0.73

00:17:32.040 United States. She can't come home. And she's called several times crying and she misses her 0.82

00:17:39.320 family and she wants to see her siblings and she can't because of these travel mandates

00:17:46.440 and she's how old are her siblings so she's um they're both 17 they're twins uh a woman girl um

00:17:56.360 and you know and she's covered recovered she's had covid she recovered she's fine um

00:18:03.800 to me there has to be that has to count for something you know to have that natural immunity

00:18:09.320 So do you guys FaceTime a lot? Is there, you know, is that sort of the, what you rely on to

00:18:17.180 feel connected, help her stay feeling connected? Yes, we text multiple times a day. We're a very

00:18:25.180 close family. And before all this happened, you know, we've never spent a Christmas apart,

00:18:30.000 a birthday apart, a Thanksgiving apart. We were together all the time and extremely close. So

00:18:36.760 yeah, we FaceTime very often, if not every day, then every other day. But we definitely text

00:18:43.640 all day from, you know, I get texts sometimes the time difference. So, you know, she may text me at

00:18:49.260 5am, but my phone is always by my bed. So they know I'm there if they need me. And I'm going

00:18:56.100 to answer that phone. I don't care what time it is. Yeah, I can't imagine having a child,

00:19:01.360 you know, no matter what age, I mean, we're always a parent no matter how old our kids become

00:19:07.740 and not being able to see them or be there for them, especially in a situation where they're

00:19:15.480 needing medical treatment or care, that must have been very hard. Tanya, your two kids, where they

00:19:23.060 are residing or the state that they're in, have they also been like struggling with their schools

00:19:30.660 when it comes to the mandates or was the vaccine mandates never applied at either of their schools?

00:19:37.780 So one of the schools in 2020, 2021, they had, my daughter's an athlete, so they had

00:19:51.220 regular testing and they had masks in the classroom. But this past school year, since

00:19:59.580 August of 2021, they've had nothing. There's no vaccine mandates. There are no masks. Life

00:20:04.880 is completely back to normal. They're going to concerts. They're going to sporting events.

00:20:10.040 You don't need anything. It's pre-pandemic. There's no testing in the schools anymore.

00:20:17.980 I'm happy that they have that because I can't imagine, you know, being separated from your

00:20:25.340 family and then not being able to do anything to be in lockdown. You know, the way we've had it in

00:20:30.900 Canada, we're here in BC, we just recently had the vaccine mandates lifted. Yeah, I was just

00:20:37.500 going to mention that. I mean, that's a really stark contrast to BC. I think BC was the last

00:20:44.080 canadian province to lift the mandates uh so that's very new for you very very new and and

00:20:52.320 you know it's been so long since we've been able to get it and do that stuff so i you know if my

00:20:58.160 kids were in the u.s living like that i think it would have been much even even more difficult than

00:21:03.520 it already has been you know there's so many kids struggling in these states where they are in

00:21:09.920 lockdown and they are still having to wear masks or vaccines are mandated um you know it's really

00:21:18.320 tough on these young kids you you get out of high school and you go straight into college and it's

00:21:24.160 it's supposed to be the four you know best years of your life they say and and you're locked down

00:21:28.800 and you you can't go do the things that you want to do it's mentally and then to be separated from

00:21:35.120 your family it just adds that extra layer absolutely and and your husband i'm i'm assuming

00:21:42.960 this has been just as taxing on him not being able to see oh yeah of course of course and

00:21:49.840 you know your girls are your daddy's girls and and my daughter has called and she's crying she

00:21:54.160 was like you know i just really would love a hug from my dad and what is he supposed to do

00:22:01.040 yeah so he can't hug her he can facetime her and and call her and talk to her and you know our kids

00:22:10.240 are they're just fabulous kids and they call us for everything they're you know if they're feeling

00:22:15.760 sad they'll call and say i'm feeling sad you know i i just want to talk to you or whatever

00:22:21.600 so it's difficult tanya when when are your kids programs wrapped up when when is the potential

00:22:28.880 return for them if these mandates don't go away my daughter will graduate from her program may of 2023

00:22:37.440 okay my son's a freshman so he's still got a long long road uh but but she's about a year away from

00:22:45.680 from potentially returning and then yeah uh tanya have you and your husband your family

00:22:53.200 how have you been uh advocating how have you been uh trying to uh stand against these mandates

00:23:00.400 i have written to every single mp in canada every one of them and have you heard back

00:23:06.240 i heard back from one uh jonathan wilkinson who's our mp here who basically told me if i

00:23:13.760 chose not to get vaccinated then i would have to deal with the restrictions there was nothing you

00:23:18.480 could do because the majority of Canadians agree with these mandates and these restrictions?

00:23:25.360 I think that there has been definitely some statistics that would say otherwise. I think

00:23:32.560 a majority of Canadians have chosen to be vaccinated, but I don't believe that we're

00:23:40.640 looking at a majority of Canadians at this point who agree with these mandates staying in place.

00:23:46.240 No, I'm sorry. I have lots of friends who are fully vaccinated and boosted who now are changing

00:23:56.000 their tune and saying, you know, it's time for these mandates to stop. You know, if we're vaccinated

00:24:00.480 and we're safe and the majority of Canadians are vaccinated, then it should be fine to lift all

00:24:06.160 these mandates and just let everyone travel. So people are waking up. People are seeing

00:24:11.040 that this is more based on a political theme than it is on a health theme right now.

00:24:19.480 Well, and agreed. And I think the problem is with the awareness piece is if somebody has

00:24:24.800 chosen to be vaccinated and is not restricted anymore, then they're not perhaps even paying

00:24:30.360 attention as much to the fact that I believe it's somewhere around 6 million Canadians are

00:24:38.080 landlocked in the country cannot cross the border cannot leave cannot fly uh so you know that's

00:24:45.200 that's a startling amount of people um that are still sort of under this this mandate tanya i'm

00:24:53.520 gonna ask all all of you uh the same question and and again this is just to to help people understand

00:25:01.040 if if the solution is to get vaccinated why why are you and your family and your children choosing

00:25:08.960 um to you know to the choosing this choice and remaining sort of uh restricted from travel

00:25:20.240 i don't agree with anybody telling me what i need to put to my body

00:25:25.760 And I have done a lot of research on these vaccines from the companies, from Pfizer,

00:25:33.360 from Moderna, from the J&J, AstraZeneca. I've downloaded thousands of pages and read it,

00:25:42.560 and I just don't feel it's something safe to put into my body. I have friends and family members

00:25:51.200 who have gotten this vaccine who have had really bad side effects. I have one friend in the U.S.

00:25:59.600 who now has lupus and the doctor confirmed it was from the vaccine and high blood pressure

00:26:06.240 and this person is going to be on medication for the rest of their lives.

00:26:10.560 And that's just from the first dose. I know people who've had stroke symptoms.

00:26:16.080 is just there's not enough evidence to prove to me that the benefits outweigh the risks

00:26:26.640 of these vaccines. Well, thanks for that, Tanya, and thanks for sharing your story with us. And

00:26:32.940 part of the reason why I am asking this question is I think that there are a lot of people,

00:26:39.240 I've even had conversations with some who who believe that that certain people or people who are choosing to remain unvaccinated are doing so because they're not educated, because they haven't looked at the science, because they are, you know, vaccine hesitant and haven't educated themselves.

00:26:58.600 So I think this is a good question to ask at this point.

00:27:05.740 Let's talk to Justin.

00:27:06.960 Justin Reining is a Canadian with parents who live in the United States.

00:27:13.520 And Justin is from Fort McMurray, Alberta.

00:27:17.140 Thanks for joining us, Justin.

00:27:18.640 Why don't you fill us in on what your scenario is and how these mandates have affected your family?

00:27:27.540 yeah thanks for having me um so yeah i live up in canada here my mom and my stepdad live in uh

00:27:35.060 in washington state so south of the border um anyways so long story short we used to always go

00:27:42.020 i'd visit them in mexico that's where we usually would meet um so our last trip which was right

00:27:46.980 before all this started was in uh february 2020 we got back just before everything started and i

00:27:54.500 have not seen them since then um it's uh it's very very frustrating um i the biggest problem we had

00:28:04.260 was my mom is dual citizen so she can get across the border if she wanted to she could have to

00:28:08.900 quarantine and all that um however my stepdad wasn't able to use american citizen um so neither

00:28:16.020 of them could get across they're not vaccinated right uh and of course i can't go over um long

00:28:22.500 story short uh you know we dealt with this for two years um and then uh they went to mexico just in

00:28:31.460 january february this year and when they came back um they both got coveted um my mom she worked

00:28:39.540 through her she's a little she was a little healthier and then my stepdad he does have some

00:28:42.900 underlying dishes 80 um and uh it wasn't too bad he was having some ups and downs and then

00:28:49.700 just wasn't getting enough oxygen so they decided finally okay they need to get him into the hospital

00:28:57.540 and just to add to the whole restrictions thing my mom was not able to see him in the hospital

00:29:01.940 physically for 20 days straight and luckily uh the last day he was alive was the 20th day she

00:29:10.900 was able to go in and see him and you know be with him when he passed away um it's yeah it really

00:29:18.260 tore me up right um sorry of course but um and then of course i can't see her so i'm i'm calling

00:29:28.180 her on the phone and you know zoom call or whatever we can do um i can't go down there

00:29:32.900 help her i'll be with her anything like that luckily she has some very good friends there

00:29:37.220 uh that have been helping her and then um my uncle was able to go down and uh and be with

00:29:42.180 her for a couple weeks here so um you know it's you know there's all this stuff we have a wedding

00:29:48.660 to plan i was hoping to have them both up here to do it they can't come up for that obviously now

00:29:52.820 it's just my mom um but you know i can't do that until i know she can be here for it um and it's

00:30:00.020 it's just absolutely frustrating that they have this i mean you're locked in your own country

00:30:04.100 which is absolutely ridiculous in a country like canada or the us it doesn't matter

00:30:08.900 right um and the u.s border restrictions are even worse i did call the border guys to see

00:30:14.900 and they have one exemption which is if you need a medical procedure you can't get anywhere else

00:30:19.380 that you can get there that's the only thing they have right you know i told them i said hey my

00:30:23.620 stepdad just passed away yeah sorry too bad right like yeah so it's it's it's ridiculous that they

00:30:31.940 still have all these you know i can't fly i can't take a bus i can't do anything in canada basically

00:30:38.180 unless i drive somewhere um and i just touch on a point you'd made earlier just in the last uh

00:30:44.340 chat you're having there um there's a lot of people that don't understand that these restrictions are

00:30:50.500 still there i work with someone who we were have just having a conversation right and he said oh

00:30:55.540 yeah you know i was gonna have to wear a mask on the plane i didn't think we had to anymore and i

00:30:59.860 said yes i said you still have to do this i said this is why i can't even fly and he's like what

00:31:04.020 mean you can't fly i said i can't fly in canada right it's ridiculous yeah it uh it you know and

00:31:12.980 i know that there are some lawsuits that are challenging this i mean you know it is it is

00:31:20.180 uh something that goes against our constitutional right of you know mobility and freedom of movement

00:31:26.580 and and uh to you know come in and out of the country uh so there are legal challenges have

00:31:33.220 you been following along with any of those are you aware of them um what are your yeah i haven't

00:31:40.180 followed a ton of them but i know they're out there right that people are challenging it

00:31:44.660 um it's not something i've done of course but uh yeah i mean we watch as much of this as we can

00:31:51.140 and you know i have a lot of conversations with people too and and you know like you said the

00:31:56.740 people that are vaccinated they just sort of moved on with their life and they've forgotten that there

00:32:01.780 is this massive amount of people that are cannot move and you know as far as I'm concerned is

00:32:08.300 completely against your your freedom in you know one of the freest countries supposedly in the world

00:32:14.040 which we are far from right now yeah I think I think it has surprised a lot of people a lot of

00:32:21.840 Canadians but I think a lot of people worldwide as well a lot of the coverage we've watched

00:32:27.340 especially with our Prime Minister heading to Europe for, you know, conferences and meetings

00:32:33.400 and whatnot, and having such, you know, even just protests against him in other countries,

00:32:39.600 even officials from other countries, sort of belittling his, you know, decisions around

00:32:47.380 keeping these mandates and restricting the rights of Canadians. It's been, it's, you know,

00:32:54.160 it almost i've heard from many people that it just feels like a complete like another world

00:32:59.760 we're living in a completely different reality than what we knew yeah yeah absolutely i mean if

00:33:06.200 you could you know if you could prove that the vaccines are actually stopping transmission and

00:33:11.640 that you know people can't get sick you know when you go get a smallpox or tv or any of those ones

00:33:18.300 polio when you get those vaccines you don't have any worry of getting sick so explain to me why

00:33:25.100 all the people i know that are close close to me that i i know well enough every one of them that's

00:33:30.300 had covid pretty much has been vaccinated at least once or twice or three times right yeah and and i

00:33:36.700 think that that's what we're seeing too when you're when you're looking at the science these days

00:33:40.300 people are contracting covid uh left right and center vaccinated or unvaccinated it seems to

00:33:46.620 actually be kind of nonsensical now. The vaccine has proven that it is not preventing the transmission.

00:33:57.820 Perhaps there is still protection offered from severe outcomes, but the transmission side of

00:34:06.060 things I think has been easily shown by the data of who's being hospitalized and who is contracting

00:34:13.740 it at this point so you know what justin how is how is your mom doing i mean she she's now

00:34:19.900 kind of alone down there is she not yeah pretty much she's uh just her i mean luckily she does

00:34:26.140 have some very good friends down there which are like family to her so which which helps um they've

00:34:31.740 been really really good through all this but yeah i mean she's alone and and you know we used to be

00:34:37.820 able to see each other at least twice three times a year uh they she'd come up to calgary and visit

00:34:42.940 me and then i would go down usually either down there i'd go to mexico as well in the winter

00:34:47.740 and we'd meet up there um but now i you know i haven't seen her it's you know she's trying to

00:34:53.340 figure out what she wants to do you know right now she's i'm not moving out of the states right

00:34:58.620 she has her dual she could you know she talked about you know if she ever did move if something

00:35:04.220 happened or whatever that she might move back to canada possibly uh but now she's like no she's

00:35:09.260 like you'd be crazy to she's like i'll stay down here she's like you never know you might need

00:35:13.100 somewhere to go because canada's going nuts as far as i'm concerned i'm very very concerned for

00:35:19.580 this country with the way it's a struggle for many for sure uh justin i'm i'm gonna get you to hold

00:35:25.740 on there for just a sec we're we're gonna jump into hopefully we can still uh it looks like a

00:35:31.100 couple of our guests might have to uh jump off fairly quickly here so thanks for sharing justin

00:35:36.780 and I'm sorry that this is the experience for you right now.

00:35:39.860 But hold on, I'm going to come back to you in just a moment.

00:35:42.820 Chris Patti, are you sorry?

00:35:45.620 Chris Patti, are you available to still chat with us for a minute?

00:35:49.380 Yeah, thanks.

00:35:51.060 Now, Chris, you're a Canadian citizen.

00:35:52.700 You're living in the US.

00:35:53.820 You're in Pensacola, Florida.

00:35:55.940 And can you tell me a little bit about your situation,

00:35:58.900 your circumstance with your family?

00:36:00.820 Yeah.

00:36:01.340 So, um, in, uh, 2020, uh, my dad got diagnosed with, uh, with, uh, terminal cancer.

00:36:12.600 He had, uh, prostate cancer that was under control and because of some of the COVID

00:36:18.480 restrictions, they deemed his, uh, they deemed his, uh, cancer treatment non-essential.

00:36:24.780 So they, uh, pushed off his cancer treatment for a month.

00:36:28.160 And in that time, it metastasized. And he was told he had a year, roughly one to two years to live.

00:36:36.660 So at that point, that was June of 2020. And we, at the time I was engaged, my dad is a dual

00:36:47.660 citizen. My mom's Canadian. I'm a dual citizen. And so they wanted to go with me down to Mexico.

00:36:54.400 So they were able to drive into the U.S. at the time, went to see my fiance in Mexico.

00:37:00.700 That was something I'll cherish for the rest of my life.

00:37:03.200 But then in June of 2021, my dad's, my father's doctor in Edmonton at the time said, you know, he's not doing very good.

00:37:17.280 You should try and get up here. At the time, I was fully vaccinated.

00:37:20.640 I got vaccinated on the 15th, second dose on the 15th of May.

00:37:23.900 I tried to ask for compassionate grounds to not have quarantine requirements.

00:37:33.300 They wouldn't get back to me.

00:37:35.260 I was on the phone with the Canadian embassy.

00:37:37.440 They told me I needed to talk to the COVID hotline.

00:37:40.340 The COVID hotline said it's not us, it's Health Canada.

00:37:42.640 Health Canada said it's the COVID hotline.

00:37:45.400 And that really got me nowhere.

00:37:48.040 um and then the day my father passed i i got a call and said hey can you get here now i tried

00:37:56.120 everything i could i was willing to spend my life savings to charter a plane to get there to be with

00:38:02.680 him and they said it doesn't matter we don't care you're fully vaccinated we don't care about any of

00:38:08.100 that um you can't fly to edmonton you'd have to fly to calgary and then there was at the time there

00:38:14.240 was hotel quarantine restrictions. And I would have had to breach those and risk a million dollar

00:38:20.260 fine to, you know, decide whether to go see my dad before he died. And I'm so blessed that we

00:38:28.820 got the time down in Florida where there weren't any restrictions. And we were able to go to the

00:38:33.300 zoo, we were able to go to restaurants, we were able to, like, have some memories that if I were

00:38:38.580 in canada we wouldn't have had any of those opportunities right it feels like uh it feels

00:38:45.100 like through this so much has been taken from people and families yeah and and it's it's um

00:38:54.340 like i was i would say i was always so proud to be canadian i i was a blue jay fan an oiler fan

00:39:02.540 you know a raptor fan i i was always you know everywhere i went i'm canadian i'm canadian i

00:39:10.140 love it and i hope to go back there someday and then after all this and and all that was taken

00:39:16.380 away i i i almost feel ashamed for the country that i grew up in like it's it's so disheartening

00:39:23.100 because i i even got vaccinated against what i really thought was a good idea because at the

00:39:29.900 time it was not full fda approved i was taking a risk i didn't know how it would affect my health

00:39:35.260 and i got it just so i could go back and they said well we don't even care because of the

00:39:39.980 bureaucracy we're not going to let you in even though you're a canadian citizen and and that

00:39:45.660 really was the last straw and i tried calling the the prime minister's office i was i called 200

00:39:52.620 times and they just kept trying to send me to voicemail and then they threatened that

00:39:56.540 oh you're harassing us i'm like well i want to talk to somebody that doesn't need to be the

00:40:01.100 prime minister's office it can be somebody from the government and finally somebody transferred

00:40:06.700 me to the covid line which is when i got that run around so just so disappointing that that

00:40:13.180 um canada supposedly you know we supposed to care about our people we supposed to um you know we

00:40:20.060 have a public health system that is supposed to you know keep people from financial ruin and things

00:40:26.140 if if um heaven forbid they get sick and yet we're willing to throw all that away and and destroy

00:40:32.620 families because we're worried about worried about uh covet at the time and it it really

00:40:38.860 was disheartening well chris i can i can understand i can completely understand i i too

00:40:45.260 lost my fat father during the pandemic and i i you know just thinking about how desperate

00:40:53.740 you must have felt to want to be there want to be there with the rest of your family want to see him

00:41:01.160 um you know it just it breaks my heart uh knowing how much that would have uh how hard that would

00:41:09.140 have been for for me so i'm i i truly am sorry that that was something that uh that you had to

00:41:15.880 go through with your family and um yeah it's heartbreaking yeah just one last i just the one

00:41:22.960 thing that you know people always said well you can facetime you can do all this stuff but

00:41:27.360 facetiming a loved one while they're dying and facetiming a funeral is not acceptable in my

00:41:34.960 from from what happened to me it it it really broke me for a long time and uh sure yeah so

00:41:43.920 but you know people out there just think that's okay but to me it wasn't okay it wasn't enough

00:41:48.720 Yeah, I think, Chris, you know, the line for me is, at what point is the responsibility, you know, greater than compassionate love, care, being able to be together with family, especially in times of need, illness, death, things like that.

00:42:16.220 It just, it seems very heartless.

00:42:20.700 Yeah.

00:42:22.580 Chris, hold on.

00:42:23.900 I am going to come back to you in just a moment.

00:42:27.500 We're going to...

00:42:28.060 I have to get off, so I appreciate it.

00:42:30.180 You do have to run.

00:42:31.680 Okay, Chris, thank you so much for sharing your story.

00:42:34.260 And again, very, very sorry for your loss.

00:42:37.480 Thank you so much.

00:42:38.800 Okay.

00:42:40.420 We have Alicia.

00:42:42.100 Alicia is joining us.

00:42:43.620 uh alicia marahue she's a canadian also living in the united states i know alicia you also

00:42:50.100 have to run so hopefully you have a few minutes here just to let us know you're in grand rapids

00:42:55.780 michigan right now why don't you uh tell us a little bit about how uh how this has affected

00:43:00.980 your family what your circumstances were um yeah thanks for having me i my story kind of echoes

00:43:10.420 everyone else's i live two and a half hours from detroit three hours from my family and we got

00:43:19.780 together all the time we i would probably see my family at least once a month we did ever since

00:43:28.580 i've moved here um since 1993 i i've never missed a christmas until 2019 um we were we did camping

00:43:39.300 trips together canadian thanksgiving birthdays um and then with the border shut down nothing

00:43:47.300 so we went from seeing each other all the time to absolutely nothing and it was devastating

00:43:55.540 i have older kids who were completely affected by this as well we had a great relationship this

00:44:04.180 was their cousins um during this time my brother had a baby so he's almost two now my kids have

00:44:12.900 never met him and i was able to meet him under unfortunate circumstances um not by my choosing i

00:44:25.060 my um in january the unimaginable happened my dad ended up passing away and i was able to go

00:44:32.260 back for the funeral but none of my kids or my husband were able to be there and um and now i'm

00:44:40.420 here alone grieving i cannot be with my family um i cannot my mom can't come here to to spend time

00:44:50.500 with me now that she's alone so it's it's affected every part of my life and i i my parents and my

00:45:03.620 breast my siblings they miss my twins graduation um from high school all their senior their all

00:45:11.300 their sporting events my one son played basketball and he they did a special basketball night where

00:45:20.180 they had to dedicate their game to someone who's made a huge impact in their life and he chose my

00:45:26.820 dad and he played for papa and this was before he passed so he would have been there my dad would

00:45:34.820 have been there to be at that game and he couldn't um and my boy actually recorded himself and

00:45:43.700 played a video that they were able to show at the funeral i mean this is we were a close family and

00:45:49.860 we still are but um and i have one daughter and all her girl cousins they were so tight they had

00:46:00.980 such a great bond and it's fractured i mean how can you continue that when you can't be with each

00:46:07.700 other and i have living so close to the border no one really knows what's happening i talked to

00:46:15.940 they've said it before too they don't know that we can't just travel freely no one really knows

00:46:21.380 that there's still restrictions like they think oh the u.s that's not the case because

00:46:31.860 we're there are restrictions and most people are unaware of that so i'm just here today

00:46:37.380 to share my story and to let people know that there this does affect families and um i live

00:46:47.140 in kind of this family saturated community where everyone goes to the cottage everyone hangs out

00:46:52.980 every holiday is with family and i i don't have that and i i i long for that to be

00:47:00.980 to happen again and i just don't see that happening in the near future unfortunately

00:47:07.380 Yeah, I think based on, you know, some of the talk in the U.S. versus Canada, I think that I believe it was Tanya that was saying she's hopeful or maybe it was Marcella.

00:47:23.860 but you know it it seems like this might be something that the u.s will sort of be the first

00:47:32.020 to amend or to lift uh but it it just seems like the federal government in canada seems to have

00:47:40.100 doubled down on these mandates uh on these travel mandates at the border and for for air travel uh

00:47:47.700 and have you know doubled down it's it's been included in the budget that was revealed last

00:47:52.980 month with regard to you know funds being directed to continue to to facilitate these travel

00:48:03.220 restrictions for Canadians and it's heartbreaking it's heartbreaking to listen to these stories

00:48:09.780 and to know you know I know there are children who haven't been able to see parents there are

00:48:16.100 loved ones who have, as we've even just talked about here, who missed being able to see their

00:48:23.040 parents before they passed. And it seems very heartless. And again, my heart just breaks

00:48:34.120 listening to your story. Well, it's cruel. It's unimaginable. Never in my lifetime did I ever

00:48:44.180 think the border would ever be closed especially for this long i consider canada in the u.s

00:48:51.860 so similar that they're almost one country um but that obviously

00:48:59.700 is not the case anymore i don't even recognize canada um

00:49:05.940 yeah i think it's the sentiment of a lot of canadians i i i think it's it's been uh you

00:49:11.940 know um friendly canada right it's been right the easy going canadians friendly free you know

00:49:19.140 and i i think that the sentiment has has definitely uh changed for many canadians

00:49:25.940 well and it's interesting because i'm canadian and i was going into my own country

00:49:34.900 I was treated like a criminal. So it just, I don't understand what's going on. I just

00:49:43.880 wish that they would lift all the restrictions and allow us to travel freely. That's really

00:49:49.760 why I'm here today. I want to advocate for that, for families to be reunited and for kids to see

00:49:56.880 their cousins and their grandparents for so much time has been lost. And that time is not

00:50:04.860 going to be able to be we can never get that back so and moving forward I just now with my dad gone

00:50:14.380 I I need to be with my family I need to be together with them so yeah the idea that um being with

00:50:24.860 family is not essential um I I can't imagine who who could honestly say that in their heart that

00:50:32.580 that wouldn't be essential alicia same question to you you know again if if it's going to be a

00:50:39.540 a vaccine that's going to allow you to reunite with your family why why the choice um yeah i just

00:50:49.100 i i just don't think kova discriminates between the vaccinated unvaccinated so it's just a

00:50:58.020 personal choice for me. And I don't want this to be about that because it's not about that in my

00:51:07.700 circles. And to me, it's more about just the freedom to travel. So I hate the division it's

00:51:17.240 caused. I hate the divide. I don't even want to talk about the vaccine because to me, it's a

00:51:23.780 non-issue. It's what are we doing here? Obviously, the vaccine doesn't stop COVID, so just open the

00:51:32.800 borders and stop this crazy punishment for us that we just want to be with our families. I mean.

00:51:44.500 Yeah, and that's a good word for it. I think a lot of people feel that way. They feel like this

00:51:49.660 is a punishment. They're being punished for some reason. And agreed. Again, heartbreaking. And

00:51:59.840 Alicia, I look forward to the time where either side, something needs to change so that families

00:52:09.420 can see each other again, for sure. Right. And hopefully this will just bring awareness to

00:52:14.880 the restrictions that are still in place because living in the United States, you'd never know

00:52:20.860 there was restrictions. And is that what you're seeing where you are right now, Alicia? Just

00:52:25.660 back to normal? Yeah. So, yeah. But yeah, I, yeah, the, the logic behind it, uh, is, is lost.

00:52:35.520 And, uh, you know, this, the, I think the problem too, is the science has changed. Uh, and that

00:52:42.120 seems very obvious to many, but the policies are not. Exactly. Thanks for sharing with us.

00:52:51.820 Thank you for having me. Yeah. And Justin, I'm going to jump back to you just for a moment

00:52:57.780 because we didn't get a chance to finish our conversation. Last question to you then. Same

00:53:04.620 question. If it is this vaccine, if it's this idea that that is what's preventing you from

00:53:11.340 being able to see family um what are your thoughts on on that uh as we share this these stories uh

00:53:20.820 to people who have who are not vaccinated but who have chosen to be yeah it's yeah and it is a

00:53:28.460 choice for me but i won't say that it's you know just a personal choice it's you know i'm i do a

00:53:34.900 bunch of research on this not as some people call facebook research or whatever you want to call it

00:53:39.760 right you know i know people will do that and then i have my mom on the side who she was in the

00:53:46.060 medical field for 40 years she retired right she was in alberta health um she has a lot of friends

00:53:52.680 and knows how to do a ton of research on this with friends of hers that are doctors nurses you name

00:53:57.540 it and there is just too much evidence on this to to just ignore the fact that people are getting

00:54:05.200 blood clots that they're having you know their blood blood rate or sorry their heart rates are

00:54:10.000 going through the roof that strokes she had a friend who's now basically almost an invalid on 0.64

00:54:15.300 a couch after the first shot right and her her company made her do it it was mandated that she 1.00

00:54:20.820 had to go get at her lose her job um between that and the fact like i said earlier that that it 0.67

00:54:27.440 doesn't seem to matter right whether you have it or not i don't even know how they call it a vaccine

00:54:31.540 really when it doesn't stop anything right if you're if everybody's still getting affected

00:54:36.820 and it's just going to mitigate some of the the symptoms of it and just maybe you're not quite as

00:54:42.020 sick well to me that's no different than taking an advil when you have a headache it's you know it

00:54:47.140 just mitigates it but it doesn't stop it so i can go sit in a stadium with you know 30 000 people

00:54:53.540 side by side don't have to worry about that at all you know to watch a hockey game or something

00:54:58.420 but you put me on a flight with you know a couple hundred people oh no yeah you got to be vaccinated

00:55:02.900 right we can't let you do that right can't let you sit by somebody it's there is no logic to it

00:55:08.580 right and you said it right the logic is lost and a lot of people i think there's a lot of people

00:55:15.460 that just have the gut listen what the government says the government says take it okay i'll do it

00:55:20.020 right and they're saying oh yeah we'll give you this if you if you take it well it wasn't yours

00:55:25.460 to take away from me in the first place so i shouldn't have to fight to get it back right

00:55:31.380 yeah that's interesting that's an interesting point it's it's a good one yeah great yeah so no

00:55:37.540 i won't take it i even talked to my mom like i said my stepdad did pass from covet um he had

00:55:43.620 underlying health conditions as i said and she's still she's like don't even think about doing it

00:55:50.020 just to come and see me right and i won't well justin again i am well thankful that you have

00:55:58.420 shared your story and and sad uh that this has been your experience as well um and you know i

00:56:05.460 just want to say thank you to all of you for getting on sharing your story uh i know it's

00:56:12.100 it's nobody's business whether somebody has chosen to be vaccinated or not uh but these are the times

00:56:18.420 we're living in. We're living in a time right now where we've got mandates and restrictions that are

00:56:25.220 preventing again likely close to six million if not more Canadians from crossing the border and

00:56:32.180 then again affecting millions of U.S. citizens from coming to Canada to see their loved ones

00:56:39.540 and their family members as well. And so the point of having these conversations and discussing this

00:56:45.700 with these families is again to raise awareness. I know if you are not affected, if you have chosen

00:56:54.900 to be vaccinated, you have been able to travel, this has not been an issue for you. There are

00:57:01.380 a lot of people who are still struggling and it's heartbreaking stories to hear. And again,

00:57:07.220 some people may have a stance that, well, if this is the goal is to travel, then you should choose

00:57:14.740 to get vaccinated to do so. And I think the scary thought is that that would have to be a choice

00:57:22.900 that would need to be made in order to do something that fundamentally was and should be

00:57:30.500 a freedom in this country. So thanks to everybody for joining us and hearing from these families

00:57:36.660 and here's hoping that we see change on either side of the border soon. Thanks for joining us.

00:57:44.740 Thank you.

Western Standard - May 06, 2022

Families torn apart by lingering vaccine travel restrictions in Canada and US

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