How vaccination status might predict views on the Russian invasion of Ukraine

2022/03/21 Leave a comment

Of note. Too much watching Fox News or sites like Rebel Media and “True” North?

Unvaccinated Canadians are about 12 times more likely than those who received three doses to believe Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine was justified, according to a new survey by national polling firm EKOS.

The poll found 26 per cent of those who identified as unvaccinated agreed the Russian invasion is justified, with another 35 per cent not offering an opinion. This compared to only two per cent of surveyed Canadians who said they had three doses of the COVID-19 vaccine and who supported the attack, and four per cent who offered no view.

EKOS president Frank Graves said vaccination status strongly predicts views on the war, from seizing the property of Russian oligarchs to providing non-military aid to Ukraine. In each case, a vast majority of vaccinated Canadians agreed with measures to help Ukraine and oppose Russia, a view held by only a small minority of unvaccinated people.

Torstar was granted access to results of the EKOS data that show a correlation between vaccination status and attitudes toward a host of political issues, including the war in Ukraine.

The EKOS survey — conducted from March 9 to March 13 and using a random sample of 1,035 Canadians — concludes that a “plurality of vaccine refusers are much more sympathetic to Russia.” The survey has a reported margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Ten per cent of those surveyed, or about 105 people, identified as being unvaccinated. National vaccination statistics show around 11 per cent of Canadians five and up have not received one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Of those Canadians who received three doses of COVID-19 vaccine, the study found 82 per cent agreed with imposing tougher sanctions on Russia even if it meant higher fuel and food prices at home. Only 18 per cent of unvaccinated people concurred.

Eighty-five per cent of vaccinated people agree the country should take in Ukrainian refugees versus 30 per cent of unvaccinated Canadians.

While 88 per cent of vaccinated Canadians agree Russia is committing war crimes during the widely condemned invasion, 32 per cent of unvaccinated people do.

The study concludes the results point “to the highly corrosive influences of disinformation.”

“This is definitely a new and bluntly insidious force that’s contributing to polarization and disinformation and poor decision-making. And it doesn’t seem to be going away. Things are getting worse,” said Graves. “I don’t think this is because those people had an ingrained sympathy to the Russians. They’re reading this online, they’re consuming this from the same sources that were giving them the anti-vax stuff.”

The EKOS survey comes out at a time when some of the loudest anti-vaccine voicesthat supported the Ottawa occupation are pushing disinformation about the Ukraine war over social media channels that reach tens of thousands of people.

The Line Canada — its distinctive flag, depicting a red line through a black circle, visible during the Ottawa protest — tweeted unsubstantiated allegations Tuesday that Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a “lunatic” courting a world war and Ukraine is producing illegal bioweapons. Awake Canada, a self-described “civil rights” group that opposes pandemic mandates and has more than 116,000 followers on Facebook and Twitter, compares NATO to Nazi Germany, while No More Lockdowns — the anti-COVID-mandate group associated with its de facto leader MPP Randy Hillier — pushed the conspiracy that the invasion is an attempt to stop a new world order.

“I saw it almost immediately, within days of the invasion, people supporting it and some quite stridently,” said Timothy Caulfield, a Canada Research Chair in health law and policy at the University of Alberta who has studied the rise and spread of conspiracy theories. “It was pro-Russia, pro-Putin, it was the same kind of dogmatic language you heard from the anti-vaxxers about the alleged harms associated with vaccines. And it was almost immediate and it was from the same crowd.”

Some of that amplification is also coming from Maxime Bernier, leader of the People’s Party of Canada, who has been a prominent figure at anti-lockdown and anti-vaccine rallies, as well as the Ottawa protest.

Bernier tweeted that he deplores the invasion but also shared on Twitter a March 3 video by Whitby PPC candidate Thomas Androvic, who said Putin was “doing us a favour” by invading Ukraine, and the country is a “money laundering industry” and “Trudeau is in on it.” Androvic did not respond by deadline.

Bernier told his 185,000 Twitter followers to watch the video, which he called “a very interesting analysis of the situation in Ukraine.”

The EKOS survey compares vaccination status with political attitudes on the pandemic, vaccines, government trust and the war to create what Graves called a “disinformation index” to better understand the influence of disinformation in Canada.

Graves said those with three vaccine doses rejected disinformation about vaccines, supported public health measures including vaccine passports, and expressed support for Ukraine.

He said the survey shows that with fewer doses, acceptance of disinformation grows, as does sympathy for the Russian invasion.

Unvaccinated Canadians are also more likely to have a profound distrust of government, science and professional health experts, Graves said, and are more likely to support the protest convoy that occupied Ottawa for nearly a month.

“So the pattern was really clear that disinformation was not just a curious feature. It was, I think, a causal ingredient of vaccine resistance.”

The population of unvaccinated Canadians is relatively small. Around 85 per cent of Canadians five years old and older have at least two doses of COVID-19 vaccine, according to federal data. Nearly half of Canadians 18 and older have received their booster.

But in recent years, the politically active elements of the anti-vaccine and anti-mandate community have proven to be adept at networking, organizing and fundraising through social media, said Stephanie Carvin, a national security expert from Carleton University. Millions of dollars were raised through crowdfunding for the Ottawa occupation, although much of that money is frozen as court cases and criminal investigations proceed.

“They aren’t going anywhere anytime soon,” said Carvin.

That organizational capacity may be attractive to mainstream politicians looking for support in tight election races, although wooing those sympathetic to Putin may carry its own political price.

“The convoy movement is going to have a long-term impact on Canadian political life, I think,” said Carvin.

Source: How vaccination status might predict views on the Russian invasion of Ukraine

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Kaplan-Myrth: Health-care workers have your backs. Please protect us too

2022/02/09 Leave a comment

From our family doctor:
Those of us who have been the recipients of harassment and intimidation over the last two years — who have experienced the overlap between antivax/antimask rhetoric and anti-semitism, racism, homophobia and misogyny — were overcome by a sense of foreboding as trucks rolled into downtown Ottawa more than a week ago. These events, now spreading to the rest of Canada, are a warning to us all.By now everyone has seen the photos of Nazi and confederate flags on the backs of trucks. Residents of downtown Ottawa are powerless against trucks honking their horns all night, diesel fumes wafting into their windows. Food was taken from the Shepherds of Good Hope shelter. Women survivors of violence, traumatized, cried out for help, unable to safely walk outside the Cornerstone shelter. An employee at a local business was physically assaulted. LGBTQ community members were confronted with transphobic placards; a shop window with a rainbow flag was broken. In a virtual townhall meeting led by Ottawa Centre MPP Joel Harden, the chat was disrupted at one point because of anti-Black, racist comments.

The mayor has declared that downtown Ottawa is “under siege,” in a state of “emergency.” As the hate spreads across the country, health-care workers in Toronto and Vancouver were warned not to dress in scrubs in the streets, to avoid being a target for hate. In response, Dr. Lisa Salamon-Switzman, an emergency room physician in Toronto, posted on Twitter that she would wear her scrubs, that as a granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, she would not cower from those espousing hate.

Source: Kaplan-Myrth: Health-care workers have your backs. Please protect us too

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Immigrants. The working poor. Essential workers. Third doses lag in Toronto’s most vulnerable areas; Let’s celebrate Toronto’s vaccine success story

2022/02/09 Leave a comment

Not that surprising as they lagged with earlier doses as well.

Throughout the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, Torontonians have watched as neighbourhoods home to those experiencing some of the harshest outcomes of the pandemic have had among the lowest vaccination rates. 

Now, as public health and community organizations work on the ground to improve third-dose uptake, new data from the Gattuso Centre for Social Medicine at University Health Network lays bare the stark demographic differences between the Toronto neighbourhoods with the highest rates of third-dose vaccination and those with the lowest. 

What it shows in granular detail is that many of our most vulnerable citizens — immigrants, the working poor and essential workers in trades and manufacturing — live in areas where third-dose vaccinations just aren’t happening anywhere near the rates seen in some of Toronto’s richest and least-racialized neighbourhoods. 

For example, 71 per cent of the population is racialized in the bottom 20 per cent of Toronto neighbourhoods ranked by third-dose uptake. That compares to just 24 per cent in the top 20 per cent of neighbourhoods with the highest rates of third-dose vaccination. 

Similarly, the percentage of the population that meets low-income thresholds in the areas with the lowest third-dose vaccination rates is nearly double that in neighbourhoods with the most administered. 

“It doesn’t need to be this way. There was great success in narrowing the access gap for the rollout of Dose 1. It can be done again. We can’t afford not to,” said Dr. Andrew Boozary, executive director of the Gattuso Centre.

“If we don’t address the pathologies of poverty, if we don’t shift more public investment into these neglected neighbourhoods, we will continue to see worse health outcomes and wider health disparities than we’ve ever seen.”

The Gattuso Centre’s analysis also shows that neighbourhoods with the lowest third-dose uptake have higher proportions of essential workers in manufacturing, utilities, trades, transport and equipment operation — sectors that don’t conform to regular nine-to-five workdays and that are not conducive to allowing workers to take time off to get vaccinated during clinic hours.

Indeed, the percentage of the population working in manufacturing and utilities is 10 times higher in areas with the lowest rates of third-dose vaccination than in those with the highest rates. Likewise, the percentage of people employed in the trades, transport and equipment operation is more than four times higher in the bottom 20 per cent of Toronto neighbourhoods by third-dose vaccination than in the highest 20 per cent. 

“If racialized community members are getting their third doses at a third of the rate compared to non-racialized communities, we need to make specific, targeted interventions that are going to provide information in a culturally appropriate and safe way for these communities,” said Michelle Westin, senior analyst for planning, quality and risk at Black Creek Community Health Centre who has been leading mobile vaccination clinics in northwest Toronto.

“We need to be having ambassadors that are representative of these communities to help build that trust. We have to have vaccinators that are representative of these racialized communities. We need to make sure that vaccinations are accessible to people who are low income, so ensuring that they are in spaces that they can get to easily, assist with providing transportation if needed, ensuring that hours of the clinic work with folks that are having to work different hours of the day and multiple jobs,” she added.

The city of Toronto has been waging a three-pillared operation to get shots into arms in the neighbourhoods with the lowest uptakes. This includes hyperlocal clinics in malls, transit stations, workplaces and schools; outreach around these clinics through 155 community agencies and more than 400 neighbourhood vaccine ambassadors; and a get-out-the-vote style campaign, dubbed “VaxTO,” using text messages, phone calls, emails and town halls to get information out.

“We know that when we announced our target to reach 90 per cent of residents for their first dose, people told us it was impossible in a city as large and diverse as ours. We proved that it was possible when you commit to equity and you don’t stop,” said Coun. Joe Cressy, chair of the Toronto Board of Health. “You literally have to go door-to-door, building-by-building in every language with trusted local leaders. It’s not quick because tackling inequity is never quick. But it works.”

To date, 60 per cent of eligible residents in Toronto have received a third dose. 

But there is still a long way to go. The Gattuso Centre found that the gap between the neighbourhoods with the most and least third dose-uptake has widened substantially over the past seven weeks. In Kingsway South, for example, 68 per cent of eligible residents have received a third dose, compared to just 27 per cent in Mount Olive-Silverstone-Jamestown — a gap of 41 percentage points.

“The gap is striking, especially given what we’ve learned throughout the pandemic. We’ve seen real success in earlier stages of the vaccine rollout when community leadership has been supported with the resources and focus to ensure there is true access. It obliterated many notions of vaccine hesitancy early on,” Boozary said.

“But if we stray from that, we will continue to see this widening of a gap and it will not be recoverable if we do not ensure that those same investments and resources and supports are there for everyone.”

Luwam Ogbaselassie, implementation lead with the Gattuso Centre who has been supporting the vaccination effort in the Humber River-Black Creek region, said the involvement of community leadership is key to narrowing the third-dose uptake gap. 

“Wherever there are resources being allocated towards vaccines, it should be guided by community leaders around how best to structure those clinics and how best to reach the people who have been the hardest to reach and continue to be the hardest to reach,” she said, noting that she has seen first-hand the meaningful impact of community ambassadors who live in the same buildings and in the same neighbourhoods as those who may harbour mistrust of the health care system. 

“I’ve always said as a hospital partner, we bring the vaccines, we bring the clinical teams, but we look to our community partners to guide us on how to set up the clinics, how to engage with people who live in the community.

“Community leadership makes all the difference.

Source: Immigrants. The working poor. Essential workers. Third doses lag in Toronto’s most vulnerable areas

On a more positive note:

It’s a snowy Thursday afternoon in Toronto and the vaccination clinic at the Woodbine Mall is getting ready to welcome its first visitors of the day. The news is full of the demonstrations in Ottawa against pandemic restrictions. Similar protests are about to come to Toronto. But at the clinic, the mood is purposeful, unruffled, even buoyant.

Nurses sit at tables filling syringes with vaccine and loading them into trays. Helpers lay out colouring sheets to amuse kids coming in for their jab. One greeter brandishes a little Canadian flag that she waves to show visitors when a booth is free.

As opening time approaches, operations manager Simone Richards gathers everyone for the daily huddle, a combination of pep talk, check-in session and revival meeting. Smiling behind her mask, she warns the group: “We are running low on teddy bears.” The local police station donated a pile of the toys to soothe nervous kids and there are only a few left.

After singing a rousing Happy Birthday for their clinical manager Arturo Villasan, staffers put their hands in, like athletes before a game, for a go-team cheer – except that, pandemic style, their hands don’t actually touch. Then they open the doors to let people through. They get hundreds a day, most of them happy to get the protection offered by the vaccines against COVID-19.

The scene at the Woodbine clinic tells a different story than you see in the headlines. In a week in which all the oxygen was consumed by noisy and sometimes obnoxious protesters, it is worthwhile to remember that most Canadians don’t feel their rights are being trampled by a despotic government. Most believe in vaccines and are eager to get jabbed. Most wear their masks and obey the rules on gathering and distancing. Though it will disappoint the Russell Brands of the world, Canada is not in revolt. Quietly, capably mustering all the available tools of technology, science and human collaboration, the country is getting on with the task of combating a deadly and insidious virus.

Toronto’s vaccination campaign, the biggest in its history, is an impressive success story. More than 6.5 million doses have been administered. Ninety per cent of residents 12 and older have one dose and 87 per cent two. Sixty percent of eligible residents have a booster, the result of a stepped-up Team Toronto drive to meet the threat from the Omicron variant. More than half of kids have one dose and a quarter have two.

To inoculate all those people in a city of 180 languages, dozens of cultural groups and scores of neighbourhoods has been a staggering task. To reach the hesitant, the disadvantaged and the disengaged, the city has hired hundreds of community ambassadors and translators to get the word out. It has dispatched mobile clinics from one end of the city to the other. It has bombarded residents with text messages, robocalls and flyers.

On the same afternoon that Ms. Richards and her team were greeting visitors to their big clinic in a Hudson’s Bay store at Woodbine, workers were going door to door in a Parkdale seniors’ building and soothing nervous kids at a Mount Olive school. At a small clinic in a mall at Jane and Finch streets, they don’t just wait for people to walk in. They recently persuaded the busy lady at the local roti joint to sit for a vaccination right in her shop. Every vaccination counts.

Leading me on a clinic tour, Joe Cressy, a city councillor who is chair of the city’s board of health, called it a brilliant example of breaking down silos and bringing everyone together in a common cause: pharmacies, hospitals, public-health workers; community and neighbourhood associations; cops and firefighters; care homes and schools.

Though we hear a lot these days about conflict and anger, what really stands out is the way all these groups are working arm in arm. As Mayor John Tory puts it, “the city has been united.”

Of course, it’s taking a while. It’s only natural that people are frustrated with the persistence of this virus and the annoying, limiting measures put in place to control it. If some believe that governments are to blame for much of the misery, they have a perfect right to say so, as long as they do it peacefully and lawfully. But while thousands are taking to the streets, hundreds of thousands of others are still lining up to get their shots and do their bit to quell the virus.

Ms. Richards and her Woodbine crew are standing ready to help them, with kindness, efficiency and good cheer. More teddy bears are coming.

Source: Let’s celebrate Toronto’s vaccine success story

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Kaplan-Myrth: As a doctor promoting vaccination, I live in fear

2021/11/09 Leave a comment

From our family doctor:

I am afraid. I can no longer walk to work alone. I startle awake at night. I’ve ramped up my security but still my sense of safety has gone out the window.

A couple of months ago, I stood up in front of Queen’s Park and asserted that “we aren’t seeking normal, we are seeking safety.” It was late August and I had organized a panel to talk about what we needed for a safe September for our children at school. We called for better ventilation in schools, higher quality masks, and mandates for COVID-19 vaccination for all educators and staff who interact with children. We spoke to the news media and reached out to politicians. We were all busy and exhausted from a summer immunizing our patients and advocating for marginalized populations, seniors, children and others in our communities.

Nobody is safe until we are all safe, I said.

The next day, the anti-vaccination protests started in the streets outside of hospitals across Canada. Throngs of people blocked ambulances. They were disruptive to patients seeking care and disrespectful of the staff hard at work indoors. The media caught ample footage of those hostilities.

What’s hidden from view – then and now – is the daily, private onslaught of nastiness directed at those of us who stand up for science, for vaccines and for your safety and care. We are bombarded with vitriol from anti-vaccination and anti-science trolls on social media. Some of these perpetrators go even further.

This past week, I was targeted by one such individual. Someone I have never met sent a threat, guised as a complaint, to the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario. The letter started with, “Complaint versus criminal fraudulent chart violating Nazi slut,” and then the person went on to threaten to kill me in retribution for immunizing my patients and others in Ottawa.

It is shocking, but it is not an isolated event. It has happened to many of my esteemed colleagues. Tires slashed in hospital parking lots. Hand-written letters of hate dropped off at offices. Racist slurs. Misogynist attacks. Death threats.

We care about what we do, so we have been stoic, put on our scrubs and our masks and persisted in our work. We certainly continue to immunize our patients. We speak on behalf of pandemic safety measures, even while police cruisers sit in front of our homes to protect our families.

What does this say about our society? What does it say about our political leaders who stoke the flames of divisiveness and gaslight those same health care professionals who they once said were heroes?

Canada’s beleaguered health care providers, advocates for your safety, are being targeted. We haven’t even started to immunize children aged 5 to 11 against COVID-19 and we are so tired, so scared. The thousands of adults who I immunized last spring and summer at my “Jabapalooza” clinics were hoping I’d do similar events for their children. I cannot because it would not be safe for me or my volunteers. The schoolyard bullies have chased us off our street. That is where we are, in this pandemic, after 20 months of saying we are “in this together.” Demoralized isn’t a strong enough word to describe how we feel.

A police sergeant finally phoned me four days after I submitted a request to them for help. The College of Physicians and Surgeons sat on the letter for 12 days before they sent it to me, and they never phoned the police themselves. Even though it contains a death threat and an antisemitic message of hate. Who has our backs?

If we want this pandemic to end, if we want to ensure that we thrive as a country, then to safeguard the health of all Canadians it is up to our leaders and organizations to step forward and say they condemn any – and all – threatening behaviour directed at health care workers.

Take care of us, so that we can take care of you. That isn’t asking too much.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-as-a-doctor-promoting-vaccination-i-live-in-fear/

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Daphne Bramham: Right-wing Justice Centre forges a new path with old leader

2021/10/23 Leave a comment

Interesting twist:

Apparently, it’s not such a terrible thing that a lawyer and head of a conservative-rights organization hired a private detective to spy on a provincial chief justice who was hearing a case that he was involved in.

A little mea culpa, seven weeks off and then it’s back to work at an organization that claims to be committed to defending citizens’ fundamental freedoms.

At least that’s the way it is working for John Carpay, founder and president of the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms.

Carpay railed against Alberta Health Services’ mandatory vaccination policy for employees in a news release last week. He declared it “morally repugnant” and “an insult to every individual’s inherent human dignity.”

That is strong language for someone being actively investigated by Winnipeg police for invasion of privacy, intimidation and obstruction of justice, as well as by the law societies of both Manitoba and Alberta for breaching their codes of conduct.

The JCCF itself is also under scrutiny. Canada Revenue Agency has received a complaint regarding its status, since hiring a private investigator doesn’t seem a fit expenditure for a registered charity. CRA doesn’t comment on ongoing investigations.

To recap, Carpay admitted in July to hiring a detective to follow Chief Justice Glenn Joyal of Manitoba’s Court of Queen’s Bench while Joyal was hearing the JCCF’s constitutional challenge to provincial COVID restrictions.

In court, Joyal raised concerns about being followed, about his privacy, safety and security, and that of his family. But he also questioned whether it was being done to intimidate him or obstruct justice.

In court, Carpay apologized and went on “indefinite leave.”

Manitoba’s Justice Minister Cameron Friesen was outraged and said, “It is difficult to believe that these actions were not intended to influence the outcome of the court case.”

Friesen sparked Manitoba Law Society’s investigation of Carpay and all of JCCF’s 10 lawyers. Meanwhile, Ottawa human-rights lawyer Richard Warman filed a complaint with the Alberta Law Society against Carpay and JCCF litigation director Jay Cameron.

In his complaint, Warman noted the potential for criminal charges and suggested both lawyers had breached the Code of Professional Conduct rules relating to “integrity, competency, honesty, candour, conflict of interest, encouraging respect for the administration of justice and harassment.”

An Alberta law society spokesperson said its Manitoba counterpart is leading the investigation. No date has been set for the hearing.

Before starting his “indefinite leave,” Carpay insisted that he acted without the JCCF directors’ knowledge, prompting the board to review the centre’s operations and decision-making.

Seven weeks later, Carpay was back, and the board was down to four members from nine.

Board member Bruce Pardy, whose opinion piece in the National Post described Carpay’s actions as “an affront to the integrity of the judicial process,” was not one of them. He does, however, remain on its 10-member advisory council.

The slimmed-down board has only one lawyer and a new director, who is a bit of a mystery. His name is Gareth Hudson, but the centre’s website has neither his photograph nor a biography. The chair is Jonathan Allen, a retired Toronto asset manager who has been on the board since 2020.

The fourth director is Troy Lanigan, a Victoria-based consultant, president of the Manning Centre, founder of SecondStreet.org, and former head of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, where Carpay also cut his political teeth.

The Manning Centre is “dedicated to strengthening Canada’s conservative movement through networking,” while SecondStreet “examines public policy through the lens of stories and experiences shared by individuals, families and entrepreneurs impacted by government policy.”

JCCF did not respond to written requests for information about Hudson, Allen’s contact information, or to questions forwarded to Allen and other directors through communications director Marnie Cathcart.

In September, the board said it is “taking steps to strengthen governance, and to provide increased independence between the litigation and educational activities of the organization” and “seeking to streamline and refresh its membership to better respond to demands on the organization.”

Since then, JCCF has been acting a bit more like an American political action committee than as a legal rights’ defender.

Recently, JCCF news releases have been illustrated with unflattering images of Prime Minister Justice Trudeau, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, Ontario Premier Doug Ford, and former Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister.

Excluded from attack is Maxime Bernier, the People’s Party of Canada leader, who harnessed the anger of anti-vaxxers during the election campaign with his cry: “When tyranny becomes law, revolution becomes our duty.”

Bernier is one of the people JCCF is defending following his June arrest in Manitoba for failing to self-isolate on his arrival in the province and for attending an outdoor anti-lockdown rally banned under COVID restrictions. That case has yet to be heard.

Throughout the election campaign, Bernier and his supporters flouted COVID restrictions, including on election night in Saskatoon. Charges are also pending there.

Without comment from the JCCF, it is hard to know where the organization is headed.

Had the JCCF chairman responded to my questions about Carpay’s reinstatement, he might have said that the presumption of innocence is a keystone of the Canadian court system. Of course, Carpay admitted to his seriously flawed judgment in court.

Very few organizations would be as forgiving. They protect their brands.

But maybe this isn’t about protecting a brand. Maybe this is a rebranding, with the centre moving away from defending the law to something far different.

Source: Daphne Bramham: Right-wing Justice Centre forges a new path with old leader

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Why Many Black Americans Changed Their Minds About Covid Shots

2021/10/15 Leave a comment

Of note, both the hesitancy and the means taken to overcome it:

By the time vaccines for the coronavirus were introduced late last year, the pandemic had taken two of Lucenia Williams Dunn’s close friends. Still, Ms. Dunn, the former mayor of Tuskegee, contemplated for months whether to be inoculated.

It was a complicated consideration, framed by the government’s botched response to the pandemic, its disproportionate toll on Black communities and an infamous 40-year government experiment with which her hometown is often associated.

“I thought about the vaccine most every day,” said Ms. Dunn, 78, who finally walked into a pharmacy this summer and rolled up her sleeve for a shot, convinced after weighing with her family and doctor the possible consequences of remaining unvaccinated.

“What people need to understand is some of the hesitancy is rooted in a horrible history, and for some, it’s truly a process of asking the right questions to get to a place of getting the vaccine.”

In the first months after the vaccine rollout, Black Americans were far less likely than white Americans to be vaccinated. In addition to the difficulty of obtaining shots in their communities, their hesitancy was fueled by a powerful combination of general mistrust of the government and medical institutions, and misinformation over the safety and efficacy of the vaccines.

But a wave of pro-vaccine campaigns and a surge of virus hospitalizations and deaths this summer, mostly among the unvaccinated and caused by the highly contagious Delta variant, have narrowed the gap, experts say. So, too, have the Food and Drug Administration’s full approval of a vaccine and new employer mandates. A steadfast resistance to vaccines in some white communities may also have contributed to the lessening disparity.

While gaps persist in some regions, by late September, according to the most recent survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a roughly equal share of Black, white and Hispanic adult populations — 70 percent of Black adults, 71 percent of white adults and 73 percent of Hispanic adults — had received at least one vaccine dose. A Pew study in late August revealed similar patterns. Federal data shows a larger racial gap, but that data is missing demographic information for many vaccine recipients.

Since May, when vaccines were widely available to a majority of adults across the country, monthly surveys by Kaiser have shown steady improvement in vaccination rates among Black Americans.

How the racial gap was narrowed — after months of disappointing turnout and limited access — is a testament to decisions made in many states to send familiar faces to knock on doors and dispel myths about the vaccines’ effectiveness, provide internet access to make appointments and offer transportation to vaccine sites.

In North Carolina, which requires vaccine providers to collect race and ethnicity data, hospital systems and community groups conducted door-to-door canvassing and hosted pop-up clinics at a theme park, a bus station and churches. Over the summer, the African American share of the vaccinated population began to more closely mirror the African American share of the general population.

In Mississippi, which has one of the country’s worst vaccination rates and began similar endeavors, 38 percent of people who have started the vaccine process are Black, a share that is roughly equal to the Black share of Mississippi’s population.

And in Alabama, public awareness campaigns and rides to vaccination sites helped transform dismal inoculation rates. A store owner and county commissioner in Panola, a tiny rural town near the Mississippi border, led the effort to vaccinate nearly all of her majority Black community.

Today, about 40 percent of Black Alabama residents — up from about 28 percent in late April — have had at least one dose, a feat in a state that has ranked among the lowest in overall vaccination rates and highest in per capita deaths from Covid-19. About 39 percent of white people in the state have had one dose, up from 31 percent in late April.

Health officials and community leaders say that those who remain unvaccinated have pointed to concerns about how quickly the vaccines were developed and what their long-term health effects might be, plus disinformation that they contain tracking devices or change people’s DNA. The damage wrought by the government-backed trials in Tuskegee, in which Black families were misled by health care professionals, also continues to play a role in some communities, helping to explain why some African Americans have still held out.

“It’s less about saying, ‘This racial ethnic group is more hesitant, more unwilling to get vaccinated,’ and more about saying, ‘You know, this group of people in this given area or this community doesn’t have the information or access they need to overcome their hesitancy,’” said Nelson Dunlap, chief of staff for the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at the Morehouse School of Medicine.

When the U.S. Public Health Service began what it called the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male,” 600 Black men — 399 with syphilis and 201 without the disease — were told they would be treated for so-called bad blood in exchange for free medical exams, meals and burial insurance. In reality, treatment was withheld. Even after penicillin was discovered as an effective treatment, most did not receive the antibiotic.

The experiment began in 1932 and did not stop until 1972, and only after it was exposed in a news article. The surviving men and the heirs of those who had died were later awarded a settlement totaling about $10 million, and the exposure of the study itself eventually led to reforms in medical research. Still, the damage endured.

“Few families escaped the study. Everyone here knows someone who was in the study,” said Omar Neal, 64, a radio show host and former Tuskegee mayor who counts three relatives in the study and who wavered on a vaccine before finally getting one, his mind changed by the rising number of deaths. “And the betrayal — because that is what the study was — is often conjured whenever people are questioning something related to mistrusting medicine or science.”

Rueben C. Warren, director of the National Center for Bioethics in Research and Health Care at Tuskegee University, said the study served as a real example in the long line of medical exploitation and neglect experienced by Black Americans, eroding trust in the government and health care systems.

“The questions being asked about the vaccine should be understood in the larger context of historic inequities in health care,” Dr. Warren said. “The hope, of course, is they finally decide to get the vaccine.”

A national campaign led by the Ad Council and Covid Collaborative, a coalition of experts, tackled the hesitation. This summer, a short-form documentary including descendants of the men in the Tuskegee study was added to the campaign.

When Deborah Riley Draper, who created the short-form documentary, interviewed descendants of the Tuskegee study, she was struck by how shrouded it was in myths and misconceptions, such as the false claim that the government had injected the men with syphilis.

“The descendants’ message was clear that African Americans are as much a part of public health as any other group and we need to fight for access and information,” she said.

In Macon County, Ala., which has a population of about 18,000 and is home to many descendants of the Tuskegee trials, about 45 percent of Black residents have received at least one vaccine dose. Community leaders, including those who are part of a task force that meets weekly, attribute the statistic, in part, to local outreach and education campaigns and numerous conversations about the difference between the Tuskegee study and the coronavirus vaccines.

For months, Martin Daniel, 53, and his wife, Trina Daniel, 49, resisted the vaccines, their uncertainty blamed in part on the study. Their nephew Cornelius Daniel, a dentist in Hampton, Ga., said he grew up hearing about the research from his uncle, and saw in his own family how the long-running deception had sown generational distrust of medical institutions.

Mr. Daniel, 31, said he overcame his own hesitation in the spring because the risks of working in patients’ mouths outweighed his concerns.

His uncle and aunt reconsidered their doubts more slowly, but over the summer, as the Delta variant led to a surge in hospitalizations across the South, the Daniels made vaccination appointments for mid-July. Before the date arrived, though, they and their two teenage children tested positive for the coronavirus.

On July 6, the couple, inseparable since meeting as students on the campus of Savannah State University, died about six hours apart. Their children are now being raised by Mr. Daniel and his wife, Melanie Daniel, 32.

“We truly believe the vaccine would have saved their lives,” Ms. Daniel said.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/13/us/black-americans-vaccine-tuskegee.html

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Unvaccinated Conservative MPs should ‘stay home’ from Parliament: Bloc leader

2021/10/01 Leave a comment

Valid given vaccine mandates elsewhere even if this will only affect Conservative MPs:

Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet said Wednesday the next session of Parliament should happen in person with any members who are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 staying home.

Questions remain about what the return to Parliament will look like for Canada’s 338 elected representatives after the recent federal election saw the Liberals re-elected with a minority government.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he will name his cabinet next month and Parliament will resume sometime in the fall.

Since the pandemic hit in March 2020, the House of Commons and committees had been functioning with some MPs working from Ottawa, but many others appearing virtually, including, later on, to vote, before the election was called.

Blanchet said he wants to see Parliament resume quickly with MPs having to be fully vaccinated in order to be there in person because now vaccines against the novel coronavirus are more widely available.

His party, along with the New Democrats and Liberals, made it a rule that candidates had to be fully vaccinated in order to hit the doorsteps, but the Conservatives did not.

“They get fully vaccinated or they stay home,” Blanchet said of Conservative MPs who might not have had their shots.

“Parliament should not come back under any kind of hybrid formation … now we know that we can go on with the way this building is supposed to work, and we should not refrain from doing so because a few persons don’t believe that the vaccine works. This belongs to another century.”

NDP MP Peter Julian said in a statement that because Canada is battling a fourth wave of the virus, the party wants to talk to others about continuing some of the hybrid practices when Parliament resumes.

“All of our NDP MPs are vaccinated and we’ve been very clear that federal government employees must be vaccinated too. Getting vaccinated is the right thing to do and elected leaders have a responsibility to set a good example by following public health advice,” Julian said.

The Liberals and Conservatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday.

The Conservatives saw 119 MPs, including incumbents and new candidates, elected on Sept. 20, after the party spent the race dogged by questions about its opposition to making vaccines mandatory as a tool to defeat COVID-19.

Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole refused to say on the campaign trail whether he knew how many of those running for the Tories had been fully vaccinated, saying he told campaign teams that those who are not immunized against COVID-19 should take daily rapid tests.

O’Toole is himself vaccinated and has been encouraging others to get their shot, but the Conservative leader says he also respects the personal health choices of Canadians and attacked Trudeau for using the issue to sow division in the country.

Conservative MPs will make their way to Ottawa next week to have their first caucus meeting since the election, where they will have to decide whether they want to review O’Toole’s leadership.

The call for MPs to be vaccinated comes as Trudeau works on bringing in a mandate requiring the federal civil service, along with those working in its federally regulated industries, to be fully vaccinated.

His government has promised to make it a rule by the end of October that travellers flying or taking a train in Canada have to be immunized in order to board.

Many provinces have already introduced a vaccine passport system requiring consumers to provide proof of immunization to access non-essential businesses like restaurants and sports and entertainment venues.

“For the safety of House of Commons staff, translators, pages, security, other MPs and their staff, all parliamentarians should show proof that they are fully vaccinated in order to take their seats in the House,” tweeted former Liberal cabinet minister Catherine McKenna, who didn’t seek re-election, but served for six years in government.

As of Friday, Health Canada reported that around 79 per cent of people 12 and older as having being fully vaccinated, with about 85 per cent receiving at least one dose.

Source: Unvaccinated Conservative MPs should ‘stay home’ from Parliament: Bloc leader

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Picard: The troubling Nazi-fication of COVID-19 discourse

2021/08/18 Leave a comment

Good commentary:

If you spend any amount of time on social media engaging about COVID-19, you will know discussions tend to get personal and ugly pretty fast.

Encourage vaccination of young people, and you’re labelled a pedophile.

Support masking in indoor settings? You’re a goose-stepping fascist.

Laud vaccination as a way out of the pandemic, and you are Joseph Goebbels and should brace yourself to be on trial for crimes against humanity at the fictional Nuremberg 2 tribunal.

Acknowledge that lockdowns are sometimes necessary to control the spread of a pandemic virus, and brace yourself for the onslaught of Hitler images.

These types of responses are predictable to a certain degree.

Godwin’s law (coined by U.S. lawyer Mike Godwin in 1990) holds that as an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler becomes more likely.

These days, debates go from zero to Hitler in about a nanosecond.

Some may want to dismiss this kind of over-the-top rhetoric as laughable, the work of a tiny minority of extremists and their bots.

But it’s obscene, and obscenely commonplace.

The Nazi-fication of public discourse is no longer the sole purview of pathetic man-boys holed up in their basements.

Enabled by social-media giants hiding behind freedom-of-speech arguments, trolls can now spread their misogynist, racist and anti-social views readily and mercilessly.

The goal here is to muddy the waters between fact and fiction, between truth and lies, and to undermine democratic institutions.

The grunts of a few can be turned into shouts that unfortunately have a growing audience, especially among the disgruntled and disenfranchised.

Playing the victim card appeals to them.

The ragtag collection of conspiracy theorists who gather at anti-mask, anti-vaccine, anti-lockdown rallies is fascinating – a stinking potpourri of grievances, with denunciations of everything from vaccines to “fake news,” to 5G, to the so-called “deep state.”

These rallies – which are getting bigger as pandemic frustrations grow – have more than their fair share of Hitler talk and imagery. They also include people wearing the yellow Star of David, implying that being told to wear a mask or get a jab is a level of persecution comparable to Jews who were rounded up and shipped in cattle cars to death camps.

Clearly some people have lost the plot.

Yet, they are being encouraged by politicians who embrace rhetoric suggesting that a position is invalid because the same view was held by Hitler.

A case in point is odious Ontario MPP Randy Hillier, who claims that lockdowns, mask rules and vaccine mandates are forms of Nazi-like tyranny.

His perverse version of freedom holds that individual rights are absolute, and that, for example, unvaccinated people have a God-given right to do as they please up to and including infecting others with the coronavirus.

Mr. Hillier and his acolytes have made a habit of casually tossing around Nazi analogies and Hitler images.

This mainstreaming of hateful images and thinly veiled hate speech should alarm us on a number of levels.

First of all, it betrays a profound ignorance of the Holocaust.

There can be no comparisons made between the state-sponsored mass murder of six million people and the temporary shutdown of the local mall.

Those who have the unmitigated gall to wear yellow stars to anti-mask rallies offend the memory of the victims of the Shoah and their descendants.

It is worth noting that Mr. Godwin, when he fashioned his adage, actually wanted people to think harder about the Holocaust and why Nazi comparisons should not be casually tossed into conversation.

Thinking is certainly not what’s happening here.

What we’re seeing is a lot of projection, the psychological impulse to project on other people what you’re actually feeling.

Former U.S. president Donald Trump, sometimes called the “Projection President,” was the embodiment of this phenomenon.

Mr. Trump, a chronic liar who wallowed in corruption, routinely attacked his opponents as corrupt liars. He also frequently described his opponents in a derogatory fashion, a lynchpin strategy of hate-mongers, and now a mainstay of social media.

Next time you hear the claims of Nazi-like tyranny and oppression, think about what is really being said.

Those who don’t want masks under any circumstances – those who not only want to refuse vaccines but prevent others from getting them – are actually the tyrants.

Their use of Hitler images and analogies are not a caution, but an embrace, one we should call out, not dismiss casually.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-the-troubling-nazi-fication-of-covid-19-discourse/

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Black Canadians more likely to be hesitant about COVID-19 vaccines, survey suggests

2021/07/17 Leave a comment

Not just governments but governments do have a role in reducing economic barriers to vaccination (paid time off work etc). Access has become less of an issue given pop-up and other clinics, compared to earlier periods when it was more significant:

Black Canadian leaders say governments must do more to help overcome vaccine hesitancy in their communities.

Toronto orthopedic surgeon Dr. Ato Sekyi-Otu, leader of the health-care task force of the Black Opportunity Fund, says a new survey confirms unpublished public health data that hesitancy is higher among Black Canadians than among white or non-Black racialized people.

“There’s a 20-point gap with respect to the rate of vaccination in Black Canadians compared to the Canadian average,” Sekyi-Otu said in an interview. “When you look at vaccine confidence, unvaccinated Black Canadians are least likely to say that they’ll definitely get the vaccine.”

Sekyi-Otu said the Black Opportunity Fund partnered with the African Canadian Civic Engagement Council and the Innovative Research Group to try to understand why Black Canadians appeared to be getting vaccinated in lower numbers.

The survey found that as of early June, when more than 60 per cent of Canadians had received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, 45 per cent of Black Canadians surveyed said they were at least partially vaccinated, compared with 65 per cent of white Canadians and 43 per cent of non-Black visible minorities.

Sixty per cent of Black Canadians surveyed who didn’t have at least one dose expressed some level of hesitancy to get vaccinated, compared with 55 per cent of white Canadians and 44 per cent of non-Black visible minorities.

The figures are in line with vaccination data in Toronto, where the neighbourhoods with the lowest vaccination rates also have some of the largest Black populations.

Dunia Nur, president of the African Canadian Civic Engagement Counsel based in Edmonton, said addressing hesitancy in Black communities will require “a variety of policy shifts” from government that take into consideration language needs, as well as differences in education and socio-economic disparities.

“These include investing in strategies that work with Black-led and Black-focused community organizations to address COVID-19 vaccine knowledge gaps and related trust barriers,” Nur said in a statement.

Black Canadians responding to the survey were less likely to be hesitant about vaccines if they trusted their health-care providers and the vaccine makers, could take paid time off work to get vaccinated, and were confident in where and how to go about getting a shot.

“When we talk about hesitancy, we speak about the ABCs,” said Sekyi-Otu. “I’m talking about access, belief and confidence.”

He said access is affected when Black Canadians are more likely to work in jobs where taking paid time away to be vaccinated is difficult or impossible. Belief in the vaccines can be eroded if you don’t trust the people providing the information about them, and confidence that the vaccines work is harmed when people who are already less trusting of the health-care system get mixed messages about vaccine safety and effectiveness.

“It’s not surprising that if someone has a bad experience with one institution, for example, criminal justice, when he or she is 19 years old, he or she may not want to take the vaccine in 2021 when he or she is 45 years old,” he said.

Sekyi-Oto says governments need to ensure that people can take time off work to be vaccinated and take immediate steps to provide culturally sensitive and appropriate delivery and education about vaccines in Black communities.

“You have to build a system where the people who are leading the system look like the people using the system,” he said. “And so we want to create a culturally sensitive system, engage with the community so that they can come up and take the vaccine.”

The survey is being released as the Public Health Agency of Canada reports new data showing COVID-19 death rates in the first eight months of the pandemic were highest in communities with lower incomes and higher visible minority populations.

The data is the latest report from the agency that outlines the inequities surrounding COVID-19 in Canada.

Source: Black Canadians more likely to be hesitant about COVID-19 vaccines, survey suggests

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‘Fortress Australia’: Why calls to open up borders are meeting resistance

2021/05/28 Leave a comment

Of note and the challenge of reopening:

Australia has been one of the world’s Covid success stories, where infection rates are near zero and life mostly goes on as normal.

That’s in large part thanks to the early move to shut its borders – a policy that has consistently been supported by the public.

But after a year in the cocoon, there is growing unease in the country over the so-called “Fortress Australia” policy.

Recent announcements declaring that Australia won’t open up until mid-2022 – meaning a two year-plus isolation – have amplified concerns.

Critics argue the extension of closed borders will cause long-lasting damage to the economy, young people and separated families. It also tarnishes Australia’s character as open and free, they say.

Calls for a clear plan to pull Australia back into the world are growing, as the country wrestles with an uncomfortable tension – balancing the safety of closed borders against what is lost by living in isolation.

“A Fortress Australia with the drawbridge pulled up indefinitely is not where we want to be,” says former Race Discrimination Commissioner Dr Tim Soutphommasane.

“Australia is at its best when it’s open and confident – not fearful and insular.”

Locking the gate

In March 2020, the government closed the borders. It barred most foreigners from entering the country and put caps on total arrivals to combat Covid. Mandatory 14-day quarantine and snap lockdowns have also been used to control the virus spread.

The measures are extreme, and among the strictest in the world.

But they’ve worked. Australia regularly sees months without a single case in the community, and it has recorded fewer than 1,000 deaths in the pandemic.

Given that, the strict border controls have proven tremendously popular. Public polls regularly report 75-80% approval ratings for keeping the door shut.

Even higher numbers – around 90% – approve overall of the government’s pandemic handling, and trust in government has increased in contrast to views of voters in some Covid-ravaged nations.

Languishing behind

But the government now also faces mounting pressure over how it plans to handle the next phase of the pandemic.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison – who faces an election next year – has announced Australia won’t re-open borders until mid-2022. The exact timing and just how that will happen are unclear.

But the budget announcement was a shock extension to previous forecasts of an opening-up to occur slowly at the end of this year.

The main reason for the delay is vaccination.

Australia’s immunisation programme has been beset with delays, and lags well behind other developed nations such as the UK and US.

Critics say complacency over the low virus circulation delayed its kick-off. And now rising hesitancy – fuelled at least in part by Australia’s isolation – has also slowed the vaccine rollout.

Facing those failures, the government fell back on the border ban as a resort, critics say.

That’s dealing a heavy blow to sectors like tourism and higher education. Australia’s strong migration programme – relied on to address skills shortages and population growth – has also been cut almost completely.

Ernst and Young, an accounting firm, estimates that Australia’s economy is losing A$7.6bn (£4.18; $5.9bn) a month from the closed borders.

So a group of experts from the University of Sydney have called for an exit plan to be put in place. People need to know their options and prepare for the future, they say.

Their “roadmap to re-opening” focuses on prioritising vaccination, expanding quarantine and starting trials to bring in people for affected industries.

They point to successful examples like the New Zealand travel bubble, and the Australian Open tennis tournament.

“The price of staying closed indefinitely is simply too great,” they wrote in a recent report.

“This is the case when measured in hard dollar terms, but also when measured against less tangible factors such as fuelling a negative and inwards-focused national psyche that threatens our global standing, as well as national unity and cohesion.”

‘Us and them’ mentality

Others have also voiced their concerns over how an extended retreat from the world could damage Australia’s character.

When Australia was parochial it had a White Australia policy (1900s-1970s), which restricted immigration from non-European nations. Multiculturalism has replaced that policy in recent decades, but the ideal is still fragile, experts warn.

Dr Liz Allen, a demographer at the Australian National University, contends that Covid has already made the nation more “protectionist and insular”.

Government policies have created an “us and them” division, she argues.

The hostile treatment of migrants is a clear example, she says. Australia’s conservative government of eight years has never advocated for immigration – the coalition won the 2019 election pledging to “slash” the migrant intake.

At the start of the pandemic, Mr Morrison told the nation’s two million migrants on temporary visas to “go home”.

Those visa holders – often doing the low-paid, essential jobs of cleaning and food delivery – were also ineligible for the government’s pandemic welfare support, leaving many facing destitution.

The border ban has also sown community division, seen in its most extreme form last month when Australia took the world-first step of threatening jail for citizens who returned home from Covid-ravaged India. The Indian-Australian community expressed outrage they were being treated like second-class citizens.

Multicultural roots

The issue of stranded Australians reflects Australia’s character as an intensely multicultural nation.

Nearly 30% of the population were born overseas, and another quarter have a parent who was. As a nation of migrants, so many Australians have deep personal ties to other parts of the world.

Prior to Covid, about one million Australians were estimated to be living and working overseas. A section of the population – often highly educated and skilled – was also very mobile.

But the closed-border policy doesn’t appear to recognise these global connections or the disproportionate impact on first and second-generation Australians, critics say.

In addition, the borders created a narrative where blame for a virus outbreak was often laid at the feet of returning individuals.

“We turned on ourselves, on our own people,” says Dr Allen.

Political leaders described the virus as “imported” by returning travellers, rather than escaping through failures in the hotel quarantine system. Such rhetoric egged on social media commentary blaming incoming Australians.

Just happy to be safe

But while there’s division aimed at Australians outside the country, within the borders people feel comfortable with their lot.

First and foremost, people say they feel relieved and grateful to be shielded from the virus.

“There’s a lot of sympathy and real feeling for people caught up outside, and for the people who can’t go to weddings and funerals overseas,” says Melissa Monteiro, head of a migrant resource community centre in western Sydney.

“But you know, everyone ends with ‘that’s just how it is’. People are firstly, just grateful to be in this country and to be safe.”

Race relations researcher Andrew Markus, an emeritus professor at the University of Monash, says most Australians also don’t view the closed borders as a cultural isolation, or a “shutting yourself off from the world”.

Instead it’s just seen as a necessary short-term health measure – an attitude adopted across the political and cultural spectrum, he says.

He notes too that polling throughout the pandemic showed Australians’ support for multiculturalism and globalisation remained strong – about 80% approval – despite concerns about social cohesion and a rise in hate crimes against Asian-Australians.

Dr Allen says that the strong support for the government’s Covid fight is understandable – particularly when it has worked.

But she also says that the Australian public has been presented with no other options. The prolonged border closure and city lockdowns on single infections have all been largely uncontested policies.

She says it’s time now for Australia to move past such policies which she feels are rooted in fear. The country continues to face calls to bring back its own citizens.

“I don’t think it’s bad that people are afraid of Covid – we should be afraid. But we require leadership going forwards that doesn’t leave people behind.”

Source: ‘Fortress Australia’: Why calls to open up borders are meeting resistance

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