"As of late October 2020 Manitoba has the highest number of active cases per capita of all Canadian provinces and territories." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Manitoba#:~:text=The%...).&text=As%20of%20late%20October%202020,all%20Canadian%20provinces%20and%20territories.)
What impact do you think this is now having on the popularity of the government and other political parties? Will it have an impact if this persists?
As much as there is legitimate criticism of how the Pallister government has governed in general, no I don't think this will have much impact. People may be frustrated with government and not like one Premier or another, but I think they will be even less tolerant of different political parties using the pandemic to score political points. The NDP in Saskatchewan tried this approach over Saskatchewan's school re-opening plans, and the public saw right through it. It didn't resonate at all.
In answering a couple of questions raised in another thread, I ended up analyzing what has happened to parties's popularity across the country. It gives some idea of what could happen in Manitoba. The short answer is the picture is complicated, but there appears to be some clear trends from examining polls and elections across the country by province.
The first question arose because of the claim that the NDP was now in trouble in the polls nationally because of Covid. Here's my analysis.
Pondering wrote:
I heard on the news last night that the NDP is down to 13% with support going to the Liberals. NDP strategy isn't working.
For a more accurate reflection of the polls here are the percentages the NDP and Greens received in all polls in October:
NDP Greens
October 1 18% 6%
October 4 20% 4%
October 6 16% 5%
October 11 21% 6%
October 16 13.4% 7.6%
October 18 18% 6%
October 19 13.7% 8.7%
October 21 15% 5%
October 25 18% 5%
October 26 17% 7%
Oct Average 17.01% 6.03%
2019 election 16.0% 6.5%
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_44th_Canadian_fede...
In other words, both parties bounced up and down in the polls within certain margins with the NDP in October up 1.0%and the Greens down 0.5% in their October average compared to their results in the 2019 election. For comparisons sake the Liberals average for October is 36.6%, up 3.5% in October compared to the 2019 election, while the Conservatives averaged 31.3% in October, down 3.0% compared to the 2019 election. So most the voter movement has occurred between the Liberals and Conservatives, with the NDP up slightly and the Greens down slightly on average. The margins for a Liberal majority are paper thin and at the outer limits of the margin of error if an election is called in the immediate future. While an election campaign could dramatically increase or decrease any party's vote share depending on what happened, there is no guarantee that would benefit or harm any particular party or leave the end results pretty much as they are right now, as campaigns each have their own rhythm.
Another query caused me to look deeper at the polls and elections during Covid.
Left Turn wrote:
Looks to me as though voters are flocking to incumbent parties across the board in Canada, because pandemic.
The election campaigns tell a somewhat more complicated story. In the New Brunswick election, the Conservatives had a 16% lead over the Liberals early the election campaign on August 30th but ended up winning by 5% over the Liberals with a ho-hum campaign while the Greens were able to keep their three seats. In BC, the Conservatives self-destructed during the campaign and suffered historic losses in their modern iteration, while the NDP performed well in the campaign, increasing their vote share during the campaign, won more seats than they ever have and are expected to win more after all votes are counted, while the Greens were able to maintain their three seats because of a good campaign, despite many expecting them to be wiped out by the NDP. The Saskatchewan Party ran a smooth campaign while there was some internal fighting campaign in the NDP during the campaign, resulting in a large SP victory when this was combined with the perception that they handled Covid well. In other words, if one is perceived to have done a good job on the pandemic, there is a definite advantage in being the government, but the election campaign still will have a major impact on what happens. Furthermore, a party can maintain or even improve its vote share without being in power as the NDP has done with an average of a 1.0% small increase federally over ten polls during October from the 2019 election results, if it actions are viewed favorably by voters.
Also the Ontario and Quebec polls tell a somewhat different story. In Quebec, at the height of their pandemic crisis the CAQ fell in May and June from 52% in March to 38% on June 1st and as things improved in the summer they reached 57% on August 28th, the last poll listed on Wikipedia. Now the question is the CAQ going to or is already suffering with the high infection rates now.
A similar story can be seen in Ontario, with the PCs dropping from 43% to 31% during the early crisis then climbing back to 48% by September 3rd. However, unlike Quebec, we now have an October poll showing them at 36% on October 12th. So there can be rapid increases and drops in popularity depending on how voters perceive one's performance on the pandemic.
Now that we are in a second wave, incumbency could cause other provinces to rise and fall depending on how they are perceived. Manitoba, for example, has just become the province with the highest per capita number of active Covid cases, so its government may find itself in popularity problems if this is not quickly corrected. This could also happen to the federal Liberals if things go badly in many places during the second wave and the Liberal response to the second wave is seen as problematic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/43rd_Ontario_general_election
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/43rd_Quebec_general_election
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_New_Brunswick_general_election
Perhaps out of tiredness I did not look at what is happening in the Manitoba and Alberta polls after taking the time to analyze the polls and election campaigns in several provinces shown above in post #4. With the rise and fall in Ontario's and Quebec's governing PC and CAQ popularity closely aligning with their rise and fall in Covid case numbers, it appears that Covid can impact the governing parties popularity both positively and negatively over time. So the Manitoba may see their numbers fall if they don't reduce Covid cases per capita significantly over time. Alberta's story is complicated by the fossil fuel crisis also impacting voter's perceptions.
Generally, the Manitoba government has been perceived to be doing well in handling the pandemic because its total number of Covid-19 cases has been small. However in the last week, not only has the number of Covid-19 cases spiked in Manitoba, the situation is now being perceived differently because people now realize that this spike has given the province the highest per capita Covid case load per capita in the country. Up to now the PC government, although down slightly from its 47.1% in the September 2019 election, has done relatively well in the polls, staying between 42% and 45% since the September 2019 election, with one outlier poll of 38% in the middle of the six polls time wise. The question now is how will becoming the reigning Covid case per capita leader affect the PC's and other parties poll numbers if this case situation is not correctly corrected. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/43rd_Manitoba_general_election)
Alberta's situation is even more complicated because the province has another crisis ocurring simultaneously - the collapse of oil prices and the Alberta economy that actually began well before Covid hit. The UCP had already fallen from its April 2019 54.9% election to 42% by November 2019 and was tied with the NDP at 38% by the September 1st 2020 poll, which is the latest poll on Wiki. The recent rapid rise is Covid cases could well help push them below the NDP in the next poll. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/31st_Alberta_general_election) What Alberta seems to be telling us is that what happens with Covid is the most powerful determinant factor in a party's fortune, but if there is another dominant issue also playing into the picture, the electoral story is that could both have a major affect in party popularity.
Other than discussing the New Brunswick election in post #4, I left the Maritimes and territories out of the analysis because their low total Covid case numbers have helped all of them remain pretty popular.
Pallister is not perceived as doing a great job at all from what I hear from friends. People I have spoken with (by phone or email) even cite Doug Ford as being better at handling the pandemic.
Overall, it has been the City of Winnipeg, First Nations communities, and a few people connected to Maple Leaf in Brandon who have borne the brunt of the pandemic, and since Pallister never had much support among those groups, I doubt this will really make or break his popularity.
Honestly, I don't think the lockdown measures are going to work at all. Winnipeg went to orange on the pandemic scale about a month ago, and masks were mandated then. Since then, the number of outbreaks in care homes went up sharply, and a few schools have had outbreaks resulting in students being sent home for online learning. It's probably a case where this current disease wave will rise, reach a plateau, and then fall off on its own as disease curves do. Unfortunately the result is that Roussin, Friesen, Pallister et all will then get credit for a natural phenomenon that they had nothing to do with.
More and more physicians are weighing in and asking for a lockdown in Winnipeg.
When those physicians are willing to stand outside for 10, 12, 14 or 16 consecutive hours on a cold winter day (much worse than what yesterday was) I will take that opinion into account. With libraries, the Forks, and Portage Place closed to people sitting around inside, that is what you could be forcing many of the poorer people in Winnipeg to have to endure. Thankfully the weather is going to be nice for the next week, but that threat remains. Besides, if the closure of public spaces leads to such things like loitering in stores, increased violence including random attacks as people become desparate, or calls to the fire-paramedic services for people doing drugs, passing out, or freezing to death, you're not preventing strain on the health care system, you are merely shuffling it around. It's already been a violent 2 years in Winnipeg, with a high number of homicides and people dead as a result of interactions with the police. I would hate to see an over-reaction to covid make all of this worse. Look at the rioting that is hapening in Europe in response to their lockdowns. If the health care system can't handle a surge in people with respiratory illnesses at a time when such a surge in cases can be expected, how is it going to handle full-blown civil unrest like what we are seeing not only in Europe, but American cities like Minneapolis, Kenosha, Chicago, and Portland?
The idea that physicians are calling for more restrictions is essentially a media-manufactured phenomenon anyways. Are there physicians who want a lockdown? Of course, as the news was able to find them and hear their opinion. The media does that because that fits into the narrative they want to tell, which is that covid is this big scary thing that everyone should be afraid of. They did quote some advocates who specifically said that the covid response measures are driving more people to use drugs, but other than that not much. Are police calls for domestic violence up? Are child protection workers seeing an increased caseload for child abuse? Or are they seeing a huge drop and worried because children aren't at school, where teachers would be able to pick up those problems? Are mental health and suicide crisis call centres overwhelmed in this province? I would love it if the Covid Brainwashing Corporation or the network that uses Coronavirus to Terrorize its Viewers would start asking these questions. That's why essentially stopped paying attention to these outlets and started getting my numbers right off the Manitoba government webpage.
Unless you are willing to what happened in China and basically lock people in their houses until the virus goes away, lockdowns don't work and are just a feel-good measure anyways.
The test positivity rate is still a bit high for my liking, but at least the number of new daily infections is falling off really quickly over the past few days. Here's hoping that rapid fall-off continues and that the virus never bothers us again once this wave is done.
I hope things get better.
Another five people with COVID-19 have died in Manitoba, including four more deaths connected with outbreaks at St. Boniface Hospital and personal care homes, health officials announced Monday.
They also reported 241 new cases of the illness, bringing the total number of infections in Manitoba since the start of the pandemic to 6,275.
As new restrictions came into effect across the province, Chief Provincial Public Health Officer Dr. Brent Roussin also announced new rules for people in the Winnipeg region who are self-isolating due to possible COVID-19 exposure.
If any member of a household has symptoms of COVID-19, the entire household must self-isolate, he said at a news conference Monday afternoon. ...
Roussin acknowledged that isolating from all household members could be difficult for many, and said the province has alternative accommodations available.
This latest measure comes as Manitoba, and the Winnipeg region in particular, continue to see climbing COVID-19 numbers.
Over the previous three days, Manitoba had reported 1,141 new cases of COVID-19, including 480 announced Friday — the highest number ever reported on a single day. Thirteen more deaths were also announced over that three-day period. ...
Monday's update was the first from Roussin since Friday, when he announced the Winnipeg area would move to the red, or critical, level on the province's pandemic scale. That change came into effect Monday.
The rest of the province is now at the orange, or restricted, level.
The widespread restrictions across the province include reduced capacity or closures of many businesses, smaller gathering sizes, and a requirement that businesses gather contact information from customers to assist in contact tracing.
The new measures will remain in place for at least two weeks. ...
Manitoba's five-day test-positivity rate — a rolling average of the number of COVID-19 tests that come back positive — is now nine per cent, extending a streak of setting new records to a fifth day.
In Winnipeg, the test-positivity rate is 9.8 per cent, although health officials caution that number is less reliable due to the smaller sample size.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/manitoba-covid-19-update-monday-...
I hope things improve too, Jerry. The death toll is high and even if the majority (but certainly not all) are people over the age of 70 years old that is not acceptable. I think it is ageist to consider those deaths less brutal to those families who have lost loved ones than those of younger people, also equally tragic. I also think it is dismissive to wave the claim that elderly people die every year due to some flu bug or infection going around. Not in these freaking numbers and not with these hardships of being quarantined. As for these homes that continue to have high rates, I am appalled that in the 7 months that the pandemic became official, they have not addressed their issues with underpaid, part-time workers or over-croweded living conditions for the residents.
And of course the tragedy with the care homes is that needless outbreaks and fatalities have been happening in these care homes throughout the country, and have done so regardless of the state of lockdown or how open or closed a particular economy was. All of that could have been addressed for a fraction of what it has cost to tank our economy and we would see much better results with that than what we are seeing now.
And of course the tragedy with the care homes is that needless outbreaks and fatalities have been happening in these care homes throughout the country, and have done so regardless of the state of lockdown or how open or closed a particular economy was. All of that could have been addressed for a fraction of what it has cost to tank our economy and we would see much better results with that than what we are seeing now.
exactly.
80% of total canadian covid deaths occurred in care homes.
80%.
in definable, contained, mostly institutional buildings.
a whole summer to make changes.
what has been done in that time, except for cutting off the inmates, er, sorry residents from their people?
sfa.
society-wide lockdowns must be the answer.
And of course the tragedy with the care homes is that needless outbreaks and fatalities have been happening in these care homes throughout the country, and have done so regardless of the state of lockdown or how open or closed a particular economy was. All of that could have been addressed for a fraction of what it has cost to tank our economy and we would see much better results with that than what we are seeing now.
exactly.
80% of total canadian covid deaths occurred in care homes.
80%.
in definable, contained, mostly institutional buildings.
a whole summer to make changes.
what has been done in that time, except for cutting off the inmates, er, sorry residents from their people?
sfa.
society-wide lockdowns must be the answer.
Underfunding and gutting the health care system in Winnipeg also hasn't really helped matters. Nurses were doing forced overtime before the pandemic hit. I really hope it doesn't become as bad as some doctors suspect it will.
Meanwhile, the situation continues to decline here in Winnipeg. After massive declines in the number of new cases since the record was set last week, we have seen a sharp rise over the last 2 days. Winnipeg remains a viral hotspot. I suspect crowded nursing homes, along with the high level of poverty that exists in the city, is contributing to the spread. It also isn't helping that our Minister of Health is picking public fights with doctors. A Doodle poll followed by a Zoom conference followed by a joint press release outlining what next steps the province is taking would have been much better.
Friesen still won't apologize:
Manitoba health minister Cameron Friesen stopped short of apologizing for questioning the motivation of doctors who warned of "grave peril" as COVID-19 case numbers surge, but says he regrets what he said.
He's been under fire since Tuesday when he challenged more than 200 doctors and infectious disease experts for writing a letter that expressed grave concern with Manitoba's worsening COVID-19 outlook.
"If I would go back, I'd choose a different noun," Friesen said, without specifying the word.
"But if I go forward, what is important right now and I feel the most important thing is to listen to those doctors," he said. "We support you. We need you now more than ever."
While he didn't apologize, Friesen showed remorse for his comments at Tuesday's committee hearing.
"I get it, they're scared and they want the best for their patients and I absolutely agree," Friesen said at the time.
The survey also showed Manitobans’ approval of the province’s response has dropped significantly since June.
It said the group of people that feel the province is doing a good job of protecting public health plummeted from 77 per cent in June, to around 45 per cent now.
The majority of the people who approve of the province’s response to protect public health do not live in Winnipeg (56 per cent), voted for the Progressive Conservative government (71 per cent), and are over 55 years of age (53 per cent).
So basically the pandemic appears to be hitting people who wouldn't vote for Pallister anyways and hasn't really shaken his core base. Although that 45% figure looks low, the PCs have a rock-solid 40-plus percent of the vote they can count on in this province. It's true the southern portion of the province has just been placed into the red zone, but PC support in this portion of the province is so strong that it's not going to make a huge dent. Unless something drastic like a bunch of rural people who need specialized care in Winnipeg can't get it happens, on these numbers Pallister and the PCs can easily be re-elected, especially if the Liberals are strong enough to cost the NDP seats in Winnipeg.
Frankly I never expected there to be such a dramatic drop as going from 77% to 45% in perception of government public health performance relatively quickly shortly after the covid numbers zoomed. The rural seats are not likely to fall because of their large margins but the numbers already suggest that there will be no dramatic large victory like that of the BC NDP if the infection rate remains high over a long period and the PCs are perceived as a significant part of the problem, a further drop could occur endangering many of the PCs city seats. A lot depends also on how well the Manitoba NDP look as a government alternative as the next election alternative.
Jerry, Winnipeg is so divided by class that there are parts of the city that will endure whatever they have to in order to keep the tax-and-spend socialist NDP out of office. The PCs hold all of their current rural seats, they hold onto government and can do so even without majority support in Winnipeg. It's that simple. To break it down even further, except for a spike in Brandon this summer, the western region of the province has no reason to vote against the PC government based on the current covid situation because it hasn't impacted there the way it has in the rest of the province.
As I mentioned in the other thread, with the latest lockdown outright closing churches, I think that may have a backlash against the PC government. Much of the PC support base comes from right-wing fundamentalist churches, and they will not be happy about being forced to close.
Honestly, I don't think Pallister cares any more. I always suspected he planned the most recent election to be his last. I think he's doing whatever he can and preparing to retire to Costa Rica when things get really nasty, leaving someone else to deal with the damage he has done. I don't know how someone like that can be stopped unfortunately.
I agree. He doesn't give a crap and has one eye on that jetway to his flight to Costa Rica. He has been trying to be the leader of something since the 80s. Premiership of Manitoba became his highest summit so now he can safely runaway, proud as shit for making more for himself than being a perpetual backbencher.
Sarah Neufeld is a nurse in the Emergency Room at the Bethesda Regional Health Centre. She says the number of positive COVID-19 cases she and her team are dealing with on a daily basis are considerably more than they or the hospital building itself can handle. She notes it is not uncommon to run out of rooms and be forced to relocate beds into the hallways and even beds themselves are not always available.
“We’ve even had someone in a chair because we didn’t even have enough beds,” she remarks. "To have every room, every space, every hospital bed, and every ICU bed full. It is something I have never seen in my career.”
There have been rumors around Steinbach that certain individuals with the virus have been forced to wait out the night in an ambulance. While Neufeld could not substantiate those reports, she says, considering the current spatial constraints, it is not altogether unlikely.
“If we have Covid-positive patients that come in via EMS they cannot be offloaded until we have a bed and because we are so overcapacity, it is entirely possible that they had to wait for hours in the ambulance bay with attendants.”
In addition to not having enough staff to manage the number of incoming patients, Neufeld says the staff that the hospital does have are burning out fast. These days, she says it is realistic to expect an eleven-hour shift with no breaks.
“How are we supposed to manage in these conditions?” she questions. “These aren’t sustainable.”
To protect the privacy of patients, Manitoba has what is called the Personal Health Information Act. One effect of the bill is that it tends to silence workers in the medical field making them less able to discuss their job. Because of this, Neufeld feels the general public does not have a clear understanding of what is going on behind hospital doors. It is her opinion that residents of Steinbach and the surrounding area need to know what is happening, especially right now.
“I feel driven to advocate for my fellow healthcare workers that I work alongside,” she states. “I feel like the community does not have an idea of how bad it is and how desperate we are in the ER.”
Remember back in the summer when covid cases were trending down and, instead of allowing us to be happy for a relative short period of good news, the government kept warning us of a second wave? What is happening in Steinbach right now was not unpredictable. Everybody knew we were going to have cases rise with colder weather. Why didn't the government put forward a plan to deal with this inevitable surge in cases? They should have had a Plan B ready for every region of the province in case local health services became overwhelmed.
Incidentally, this is a very staunchly conservative region of the province. It is represented by Kelvin Goertzen, who as Health Minister was responsible for the changes which closed the Misericorida urgent care centre and 3 other emergency rooms in Winnipeg. He never had anything to fear from an election challenger, as the PCs typically take well over 80% of the vote in that area. Even this I don't think would be enough to dislodge him. Plus, by the time the next election rolls around, he will have been MLA for 20 years. I could certainly see him deciding to pack it in and moving on to something else.
He doesn't give a crap and has one eye on that jetway to his flight to Costa Rica. He has been trying to be the leader of something since the 80s. Premiership of Manitoba became his highest summit so now he can safely runaway, proud as shit for making more for himself than being a perpetual backbencher.
Costa Rican government records obtained exclusively by PressProgress show that Manitoba’s Premier snuck away to Costa Rica where he owns a luxury villa nestled in a private rainforest for 17 days between January 25 and February 11, 2020 only two days after Manitoba announced it had started tracking the spread of COVID-19....
Pallister’s late January trip to Costa Rica was already his second stay of the year.
Travel logs obtained by PressProgress show Pallister spent Christmas in Costa Rica between December 18, 2019 and January 9, 2020. Pallister returned home to Winnipeg for two weeks before heading back south for his second trip on January 25.
In total, the Premier of Manitoba spent 41 days — nearly six weeks — in Costa Rica between mid-December 2019 and mid-February 2020.
The travel logs also show Pallister made the same trip on the same dates between December 2018 and February 2019. Pallister was also in Costa Rica that summer.
In 2017, Pallister pledged he would limit his time in Costa Rica to 5 weeks each year after initially stating he wanted to spend two months per year at his Tamarindo luxury villa.
Meanwhile, I also have to ask if we are seriously having this conversation:
clarification on the protocol for dealing with a care-home outbreak that requires rapid intervention, a confidential document shows.
Those are two concerns detailed in an internal report from Doctors Manitoba, which represents physicians in the province.
It's not like we're in Northern Italy where the system was hit so badly in the early days that it didn't know how to respond. We've known this could have been a problem for months. Why did we not prepare for it? Instead of asking the question, "who should we turn away if our hospitals become overloaded" the question we should have asked is, "okay, suppose we're in a situation where our hospitals are overloaded. What is our Plan B for more surge capacity to deal with it?" I know the military was called into nursing homes in Ontario and Quebec. Do they not have extra medical capabilities that could have been called upon in this time of crisis?
The sad thing is, it looks to me like there is no serious plan to address this issue. Instead, it feels like the government would rather hold an Italy-like situation over our heads and use it to threaten us and make our lives more miserable rather than helping us.
Staff at personal care homes in Manitoba could soon get some extra help with tasks like observing residents, providing companionship and stocking supplies.
The Manitoba government is partnering with Red River College on a condensed training program that could see the first group of students working as uncertified health-care aides in care homes as early as Dec. 8.
"Ensuring the appropriate care and support is available to residents of Manitoba personal care homes is a top priority as we see the strain that COVID-19 is placing on [the] personal care home workforce," Health Minister Cameron Friesen said in a news release.
"We must do everything possible to ensure we have staff … to support the care needs of residents in our long-term care homes. This requires an immediate increase in the available workforce and this new training program addresses this goal."
Am I the only one who thinks this looks like the government is cutting corners to get these people into the care homes as quickly as possible? Let's rush the training, there's probably also a shortage of PPE, and have the high stress of this sutiation expose not only the LTC residents but also these students to infection. What could possibly go wrong?
We knew there was going to be a second wave. Wouldn't it have been better to run these programs properly, and run a lot more of them, in the late spring and into the summer when we would have had the time to make sure everybody was prepared for what they were going to inevitably face? That seems like it would have made a difference, and maybe the care homes would not have become so badly infected and our hospitals would not be under the strain they are currently experiencing.
I totally agree, Aristotled. The government had the whole summer to figure something out based on what happened in Ontario and Quebec when long term care facilities were overwhelmed and revealed substandard care conditions in those facilities. At this late stage, ramming through this crazy 1 week certification program for health care aids is just a notch above their failed called for volunteers because as Pallister alluded, no skills are required for this kind of work. I guess he was told that was absurd and circled back to create this fig leaf program. It is disgusting.
And guess whose fault it is that we are in this mess:
People ignoring public health rules once again found themselves in Brian Pallister's crosshairs on Saturday morning, when the Manitoba premier applauded his government's handling of the pandemic and reiterated the need to come down hard on rule breakers.Pallister made the remarks at the Progressive Conservative Party of Manitoba's annual general meeting, which was moved online this year because of the pandemic.
...
At Saturday's meeting, Pallister also accused the NDP's Wab Kinew of riling people up, after the Opposition leader suggested Revera — the for-profit company that runs both the Maples and Parkview care homes, which have seen Manitoba's worst COVID-19 outbreaks — should be run out of town.
The premier suggested to party members and supporters who attended the video conference that those comments later led people to organize protests condemning his government's handling of the pandemic.
"Was it coincidental that, two or three days later, there's a bunch of fake blood splashed all over the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority? Is it coincidental there were protests and people throwing garbage on my lawn? I don't think it's possible to believe that it isn't connected in some way," he said.
Pallister defended his government's handling of the province's second wave of COVID-19, as Manitoba maintains the highest per capita rate of cases of the illness among Canadian provinces.
"Every province west of Nova Scotia has its highest numbers in the last few days, including Manitoba. And so trying to make the political argument that Manitoba's government missed the boat when everybody in the Western world is under attack right now is not a fruitful thing," he said.
The benchmark test positivity rate to determine how safe a community is from covid is 5%. We have been well north of that figure for about a month. Wouldn't it have been a good idea to ramp up testing capacity since then? Furtheromre, 40% of tests in Steinbach are coming back positive. The number of testing sites in that city? One, and that site has to cover the whole southeastern portion of the province. Wouldn't it be a good idea to have at least 2 centres in Steinbach, one of which is open 24-7, along with satellite centres in places like Niverville, Ste. Anne, and Sprague, and affected First Nations communities if there are any, so we can track this thing down and find out exactly what is happening? Sure case numbers would skrocket for a week, but at least we'd have a better idea of what is going on. My encouragement of seeing the total numbers drop in recent days is tempered by the fact that the percent positivity has not gone down in a similar trajectory.
Is Pallister actively trying to get people killed?
The province is eliminating five positions in the Southern Health Regional Authority, including the director of acute care and the director of seniors, palliative and cancer care.
Other positions eliminated are the vice president of corporate services, manager of Red River Valley Lodge and the manager of Altona support.
The positions were released through a freedom of information request obtained by the NDP, which was sent to the media on Monday afternoon.
In an email statement, Southern Health said responsibilities in the positions have shifted to three different regional lead, health services positions: acute and chief nursing officer; community and continuing care; and corporate services and chief financial officer.
...
During question period, Premier Brian Pallister was criticized by the NDP opposition for cutting health-care jobs during a pandemic, with COVID-19 cases rising in Manitoba's personal care homes.
"We have personal care homes that are begging for volunteers to do basics like feeding and providing water to seniors," said Wab Kinew, NDP opposition leader, at a press briefing.
"Why would you cut somebody who works in seniors care at the same time that you're seeing a disaster like that unfold?"
Pallister said the province has added hundreds of millions of additional spending for health care during the pandemic, but did not comment on the positions.
What a psychopath this man is! Gutting health care, leaving our testing and tracing system a mess, allowing problems to continue to fester in long term care facilities. And does is government address these problems? No, instead he wags his fingers and threatens people for doing the very things that make live worth living and is more concerned with enforcement of dictatorial power than actually helping people.
It's official. We cannot wait until the next election. We need to force these psychopaths out of office using every ethical and peaceful tool at our disposal. In some countries, people have taken to banging pots in protest. Is that something we can try here?
From an Alberta POV, Kenney's popularity has tanked hard. It's nice to see some restrictions in place finally but I'm afraid it will be too little too late, guess we'll see how the numbers look in 2 weeks.
The numbers don't lie. The data concerning all the provinces except the Maritimes where cases have been lowest throughout the pandemic, on the number of "active COVID-19 cases per 100,000" show Manitoba with the worst situation, a reflection on the performance of the Pallister regime's performance:
Ontario’s 89 active cases per 100,000
Quebec 128 active cases per 100,000
BC 165 active cases per 100,000
Saskatchewan 249 active cases per 100,000
Alberta 305 active cases per 100,000
Manitoba 634 active cases per 100,000
https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/2020/11/25/ontarios-response...
The above figures sure do put how bad things are in Manitoba in clear perspective. Friends in Ottawa that we spoke to on the weekend had no idea how horrible things were being handled and that our numbers were so high.
The numbers don't lie. The data concerning all the provinces except the Maritimes where cases have been lowest throughout the pandemic, on the number of "active COVID-19 cases per 100,000" show Manitoba with the worst situation, a reflection on the performance of the Pallister regime's performance:
It's a reflection specifically on the issue of protocols in care homes and hospitals, which is where the vast majority of oubtreaks in the province have happened. No matter what we do, the virus is going to make its way into our communities, and there is nothing any right-wing or left-wing government can do to stop that. They should be protecting the care homes and the hospitals rather than holding the entire population hostage with these draconian restrictions.
The numbers don't lie. The data concerning all the provinces except the Maritimes where cases have been lowest throughout the pandemic, on the number of "active COVID-19 cases per 100,000" show Manitoba with the worst situation, a reflection on the performance of the Pallister regime's performance:It's a reflection specifically on the issue of protocols in care homes and hospitals, which is where the vast majority of oubtreaks in the province have happened. No matter what we do, the virus is going to make its way into our communities, and there is nothing any right-wing or left-wing government can do to stop that. They should be protecting the care homes and the hospitals rather than holding the entire population hostage with these draconian restrictions.
Covid death is draconian. Misplaced priorities and bad administration is paid for in lives. Sweden's top "epidemiologist has admitted his strategy to fight Covid-19 resulted in too many deaths, after persuading his country to avoid a strict lockdown."
“If we were to encounter the same illness with the same knowledge that we have today, I think our response would land somewhere in between what Sweden did and what the rest of the world has done,” Anders Tegnell said in an interview with Swedish Radio.
Tegnell is the brains behind Sweden’s controversial approach to fighting the virus, and the government of Stefan Lofven has deferred to the epidemiologist in its official response to the pandemic. Gatherings of more than 50 people continue to be banned, but throughout the crisis Swedes have been able to visit restaurants, go shopping, attend gyms and send children under 16 to school. ...
At 43 deaths per 100,000, Sweden’s mortality rate is among the highest globally and far exceeds that of neighboring Denmark and Norway, which imposed much tougher lockdowns at the onset of the pandemic.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-03/man-behind-sweden-s-v...
Covid deaths per million: Taiwan 0.29; New Zealand 5.08; and Canada 314.4; United States 799.0
(https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide...).
What these data show is that the best way to deal with Covid and future infections is advanced preparation and immediate reaction tot the very first infections which is what Taiwan did. Failing that a lockdown can still greatly cut down on the number of infections and deaths, if implemented early enough. A lockdown later can still have an impact but the effects are not as great. In other words, it is not simply a matter of letting communities get infected to whatever level happens to occur.
This is even more important with vaccines for the virus on the horizon. By slowing the spread of Covid-19, one is reducing the number of people who die before they can be vaccinated.
The following article from Lancet, one of the world's leading medical journals, looks at why Taiwan was so successful. Taiwan's response was highly effective because it was already very well prepared to deal with a pandemic. Taiwan, which has a population of 23.78 million, has only 7 deaths and 639 infections (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/taiwan/), while New Zealand has 25 deaths and 2,050 infections, so what a society does has a major impact on how much damage Covid does (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/new-zealand/). In other words, Canada needs to create a much stronger effective pandemic control system for future pandemics, because they are coming.
We examined the approach up to August 2020 taken by two jurisdictions which had successfully eliminated COVID-19 by this time: Taiwan and New Zealand. ...
Taiwan's pandemic response was largely mapped out through extensive planning as a result of the SARS pandemic in 2003, and was developed in such a way that it could be adapted to new pathogens. By contrast, New Zealand was reliant on its existing Influenza Pandemic Plan as a framework for responding to COVID-19, which has rather different disease characteristics. ...
As in many Asian countries that had experience with SARS, Taiwan had an established culture of face mask use by the public. It also has a very proactive policy of supporting production and distribution of masks to all residents, securing the supply, and providing universal access to surgical masks during the COVID-19 pandemic from February 2020 onwards. ...
Taiwan's well-developed pandemic approach, with extensive contact tracing through both manual and digital approaches, and access to travel histories, meant that potential cases could be identified and isolated relatively quickly. This ability to track individuals or identify high-risk contacts resulted in fewer locally acquired cases. In contrast, New Zealand's contact tracing methods varied by local authority level and until May 2020 did not involve a centralised digital approach. ...
Taiwanese officials began border management measures (initially health screening air passengers) the day the World Health Organization was informed of the outbreak in Wuhan (31 December 2019) and more extensive border screening of all arrivals occurred in late January, which coincided with the first case in Taiwan. New Zealand's first case occurred in late February 2020, and initially coincided with the first restrictions on foreign nationals from China. Both jurisdictions imposed wider entry restrictions to non-citizens in March 2020. The earlier introduction of entry restrictions and health screening in Taiwan is likely to have influenced the relatively lower case numbers in Taiwan.
Taiwan's successful response to COVID-19 up to August 2020 has resulted in relatively low cases and mortality. This positive outcome reflected pre-COVID-19 preparation for disease outbreaks with a dedicated national public health agency and infrastructure including integrated manual and digital solutions to support the coordination of key functions. This pro-active response to COVID-19 in Taiwan is in contrast to the more reactive pandemic response in New Zealand. While some aspects of the Taiwan approach might not be acceptable in other jurisdictions, the potential social and economic benefits of avoiding a lockdown might alleviate some objections.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanwpc/article/PIIS2666-6065
Misplaced priorities and bad administration is paid for in lives.
I agree. Here in Manitoba the measures to fight covid have, among other things, kicked off a drug overdose crisis that is claiming more lives than it has in the past. It's true that covid is a major threat to health and we have to deal with it. I have a problem with treating covid as the only health problem that matters to the exclusion of everything else. Public health is a mult-faceted subject, so it needs to be dealt with in a comprehensive way. You can't focus just on one thing, espeically if it can result in unbalanced decisions that end up costing more lives than even the worst unmitigated covid spread ever could.
Sweden's top "epidemiologist has admitted his strategy to fight Covid-19 resulted in too many deaths, after persuading his country to avoid a strict lockdown."“If we were to encounter the same illness with the same knowledge that we have today, I think our response would land somewhere in between what Sweden did and what the rest of the world has done,” Anders Tegnell said in an interview with Swedish Radio.
Tegnell is the brains behind Sweden’s controversial approach to fighting the virus, and the government of Stefan Lofven has deferred to the epidemiologist in its official response to the pandemic. Gatherings of more than 50 people continue to be banned, but throughout the crisis Swedes have been able to visit restaurants, go shopping, attend gyms and send children under 16 to school. ...
At 43 deaths per 100,000, Sweden’s mortality rate is among the highest globally and far exceeds that of neighboring Denmark and Norway, which imposed much tougher lockdowns at the onset of the pandemic.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-03/man-behind-sweden-s-v...
It is so refreshing to hear Tegnell admit errors in the Swedish response. That is much different from the intransigent attitude of lockdown supporters, who will not listen to or consider any facts or context which contradict their views. Sweden did see a second wave, but that wave came to Sweden much later than other countries. Their death curve this time is also quite small, even in the face of record cases. Most importantly for me, you aren't seeing people in Sweden take to the streets to protest their government's measures against the coronavirus. You have seen people take to the streets in protest in the UK, Europe and even New Zealand. If lockdowns generate that level of resentment among the public, how can they be an effective solution?
The following article from Lancet, one of the world's leading medical journals, looks at why Taiwan was so successful. Taiwan's response was highly effective because it was already very well prepared to deal with a pandemic. Taiwan, which has a population of 23.78 million, has only 7 deaths and 639 infections (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/taiwan/), while New Zealand has 25 deaths and 2,050 infections, so what a society does has a major impact on how much damage Covid does (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/new-zealand/). Covid deaths per million: Taiwan 0.29; New Zealand 5.08; and Canada 314.4 (https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide...). In other words, Canada needs to create a much stronger effective pandemic control system for future pandemics, because they are coming.We examined the approach up to August 2020 taken by two jurisdictions which had successfully eliminated COVID-19 by this time: Taiwan and New Zealand. ...
Taiwan's pandemic response was largely mapped out through extensive planning as a result of the SARS pandemic in 2003, and was developed in such a way that it could be adapted to new pathogens. By contrast, New Zealand was reliant on its existing Influenza Pandemic Plan as a framework for responding to COVID-19, which has rather different disease characteristics. ...
As in many Asian countries that had experience with SARS, Taiwan had an established culture of face mask use by the public. It also has a very proactive policy of supporting production and distribution of masks to all residents, securing the supply, and providing universal access to surgical masks during the COVID-19 pandemic from February 2020 onwards. ...
Taiwan's well-developed pandemic approach, with extensive contact tracing through both manual and digital approaches, and access to travel histories, meant that potential cases could be identified and isolated relatively quickly. This ability to track individuals or identify high-risk contacts resulted in fewer locally acquired cases. In contrast, New Zealand's contact tracing methods varied by local authority level and until May 2020 did not involve a centralised digital approach. ...
Taiwanese officials began border management measures (initially health screening air passengers) the day the World Health Organization was informed of the outbreak in Wuhan (31 December 2019) and more extensive border screening of all arrivals occurred in late January, which coincided with the first case in Taiwan. New Zealand's first case occurred in late February 2020, and initially coincided with the first restrictions on foreign nationals from China. Both jurisdictions imposed wider entry restrictions to non-citizens in March 2020. The earlier introduction of entry restrictions and health screening in Taiwan is likely to have influenced the relatively lower case numbers in Taiwan.
Taiwan's successful response to COVID-19 up to August 2020 has resulted in relatively low cases and mortality. This positive outcome reflected pre-COVID-19 preparation for disease outbreaks with a dedicated national public health agency and infrastructure including integrated manual and digital solutions to support the coordination of key functions. This pro-active response to COVID-19 in Taiwan is in contrast to the more reactive pandemic response in New Zealand. While some aspects of the Taiwan approach might not be acceptable in other jurisdictions, the potential social and economic benefits of avoiding a lockdown might alleviate some objections.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanwpc/article/PIIS2666-6065(20)30044-4/fulltext
I think the fact that there are only a few countries that are considered successes (most of which are islands, which due to geography are much better positioned to stave off incoming infectoius diseases) is an indicator of how hard the disease is to control rather than an indication of success. How is New Zealand going to fare in the long run without anybody being able to enter or leave the island, now that covid is effectively endemic in the human population?
By the way, Taiwan beat covid without locking down the way other countries did.
The numbers don't lie. The data concerning all the provinces except the Maritimes where cases have been lowest throughout the pandemic, on the number of "active COVID-19 cases per 100,000" show Manitoba with the worst situation, a reflection on the performance of the Pallister regime's performance:It's a reflection specifically on the issue of protocols in care homes and hospitals, which is where the vast majority of oubtreaks in the province have happened. No matter what we do, the virus is going to make its way into our communities, and there is nothing any right-wing or left-wing government can do to stop that. They should be protecting the care homes and the hospitals rather than holding the entire population hostage with these draconian restrictions.
Covid death is draconian.
Right now in Manitoba, it is effectively against the law for me to have people come over to my place, or for me to visit family and friends at their places. How is that not draconian?
At 43 deaths per 100,000, Sweden’s mortality rate is among the highest globally and far exceeds that of neighboring Denmark and Norway, which imposed much tougher lockdowns at the onset of the pandemic.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-03/man-behind-sweden-s-v...
-
Covid deaths per million: Taiwan 0.29; New Zealand 5.08; and Canada 314.4; United States 799.0
(https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide...).
soooo, canada has done 28% better (corona death-wise, anyway), than reckless and irresponsible sweden?
wonder who is winning the "overall excess deaths" contest.
The numbers don't lie. The data concerning all the provinces except the Maritimes where cases have been lowest throughout the pandemic, on the number of "active COVID-19 cases per 100,000" show Manitoba with the worst situation, a reflection on the performance of the Pallister regime's performance:It's a reflection specifically on the issue of protocols in care homes and hospitals, which is where the vast majority of oubtreaks in the province have happened. No matter what we do, the virus is going to make its way into our communities, and there is nothing any right-wing or left-wing government can do to stop that. They should be protecting the care homes and the hospitals rather than holding the entire population hostage with these draconian restrictions.
Covid death is draconian.
Right now in Manitoba, it is effectively against the law for me to have people come over to my place, or for me to visit family and friends at their places. How is that not draconian?
However draconian you view the Manitoba situation, death is way more draconian and, unlike any measures taken by the government, forever, not just for you should you become infected but for those you infect.
To argue that taking precautionary measures is fruitless is to ignore what has happened immediately across Manitoba's borders. If North and South Dakota were countries, they would have the highest and third highest Cofid death rates in the world at 1,353/million and 1,164/million (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/world/coronavirus-maps.html), 4.3 and 3.7 times Canada's rate of 314.4/million.
North Dakota logged the highest coronavirus mortality rate in the world last week, according to a new analysis from the Federation of American Scientists. South Dakota wasn’t far behind, ranked third globally. (https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/north-dakota-covid-dea...)
South Dakota welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors to a massive motorcycle rally this summer, declined to cancel the state fair and still doesn't require masks. Now its hospitals are filling up and the state's COVID-19 death rate is among the worst in the world.
The situation is similarly dire in North Dakota: The state's governor recently even moved to allow health care workers who have tested positive for COVID-19 to continue working if they don't show symptoms. It's a controversial policy recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a crisis situation where hospitals are short-staffed.
And now, after months of resisting a statewide mask mandate, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum changed course late Friday, ordering that masks be worn statewide and imposing several business restrictions.
“Our situation has changed, and we must change with it,” Burgum said in a video message posted late Friday. Doctors and nurses “need our help, and they need it now.”
South Dakota welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors to a massive motorcycle rally this summer, declined to cancel the state fair and still doesn't require masks. Now its hospitals are filling up and the state's COVID-19 death rate is among the worst in the world.
The situation is similarly dire in North Dakota: The state's governor recently even moved to allow health care workers who have tested positive for COVID-19 to continue working if they don't show symptoms. It's a controversial policy recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a crisis situation where hospitals are short-staffed.
And now, after months of resisting a statewide mask mandate, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum changed course late Friday, ordering that masks be worn statewide and imposing several business restrictions.
“Our situation has changed, and we must change with it,” Burgum said in a video message posted late Friday. Doctors and nurses “need our help, and they need it now.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/11/14/covid-19-north-sou...
At 43 deaths per 100,000, Sweden’s mortality rate is among the highest globally and far exceeds that of neighboring Denmark and Norway, which imposed much tougher lockdowns at the onset of the pandemic.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-03/man-behind-sweden-s-v...
-
Covid deaths per million: Taiwan 0.29; New Zealand 5.08; and Canada 314.4; United States 799.0
(https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide...).
soooo, canada has done 28% better (corona death-wise, anyway), than reckless and irresponsible sweden?
You seem to be trivializing the 28% increase in the death rate. I don't.
The high death rate in Canada is greatly affected by the 80% who have died in long term care homes because we did not take the measures, such as individual rooms to name only one, to protect these people. As noted above, Taiwan leads the world in dealing with Covid-19 not only because of what it did immediately after having the first infection, but because it learned from the Sars pandemic that being prepared in advance for a pandemic is best of all.
When one compares Sweden with other Scandavian countries, where social conditions are similar but the other countries took much stronger Covid-19 restrictions, the differences are dramatic. Sweden has had 644 Covid deaths per million, Denmark 136 Covid deaths per million, Finland 71 Covid deaths per million, and Norway 63 Covid deaths per million. So Sweden has had 4.7 times the death rate of Denmark, 9.1 times the death rate of Finland, and 10.2 times the death rate of Norway. (https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-sweden-defends-plan-not-to-l...)
I believe these numbers show why it is important to take the restrictions necessary to keep people alive until a vaccine is available, which now seems to be in the not-too-distant future. This reminds me of the argument over global warming, where people argue endlessly without admitting the huge risks involved.
However draconian you view the Manitoba situation, death is way more draconian and, unlike any measures taken by the government, forever, not just for you should you become infected but for those you infect.
How is death draconian? Sure it's tragic and we should do what we can to avoid it, but at some point it is coming for all of us.
What's with the moralizing about "the people you infect?" So now instead of infectious disease being a fact of life that should be managed, it is now a moral evil and individuals are "at fault" if someone else gets sick? Have you ever gone to the doctor because you had a cough or flu-like symptoms? If so, by your own moral standards, you could be responsible for killing someone.
As for draconian? Rememer when Harper was in power we called him all kinds of names like "fascist" and "authoritarian?" Did you know that Brian Pallister sat as an MP in Harper's caucus? If Harper was all of those bad things, why do you want a government led by him or one of his former MPs to have extended powers? I don't feel particularly protected with Pallister's cuts to health care while he imposes restrictions and limits on our freedom of movement. There's no doubt in my mind that Pallister would have the military enforce martial law if he had that option right now.
I know there's mathematical models that suggest if you lock down for X amount of time covid would go away. Maybe in a simple world where we are dots and data points I could support that. The problem is that we are all humans and human behaviour comes into play. There are many leaders throughout the world (including Pallister and Kenney) who, if given the kind of powers that some doctors are asking the government to have, would absolutely abuse that power for their own benefit. Why is that so hard for people who identify as progressives to understand? I think lockdowns should be off the table as a pandemic response for that reason alone.
If you're concerned about death, let's talk about that. Right now we are about to head into the winter season. Many indoor places for people to hang out in are very restricted or closed. That poses an immediate risk of death for people without a place to live. Also, by all accounts, the response to the pandemic is going to tank our economy. Bad economies kill people. Guess who is going to be disproportionately impacted from that? The very marginalized communities that the left claims to care about. Let's also not forget about new restrictions and fines put in place for public health. We know that the police have a record of singling out vunlerable groups for enforcement (groups that, again, the left claims to care about). Do you think the police are all of a sudden going to enforce the new rules aimed at stopping covid spread fairly?
To argue that taking precautionary measures is fruitless is to ignore what has happened immediately across Manitoba's borders. If North and South Dakota were countries, they would have the highest and third highest Cofid death rates in the world at 1,353/million and 1,164/million (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/world/coronavirus-maps.html), 4.3 and 3.7 times Canada's rate of 314.4/million.North Dakota logged the highest coronavirus mortality rate in the world last week, according to a new analysis from the Federation of American Scientists. South Dakota wasn’t far behind, ranked third globally. (https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/north-dakota-covid-dea...)
South Dakota welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors to a massive motorcycle rally this summer, declined to cancel the state fair and still doesn't require masks. Now its hospitals are filling up and the state's COVID-19 death rate is among the worst in the world.
The situation is similarly dire in North Dakota: The state's governor recently even moved to allow health care workers who have tested positive for COVID-19 to continue working if they don't show symptoms. It's a controversial policy recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a crisis situation where hospitals are short-staffed.
And now, after months of resisting a statewide mask mandate, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum changed course late Friday, ordering that masks be worn statewide and imposing several business restrictions.
“Our situation has changed, and we must change with it,” Burgum said in a video message posted late Friday. Doctors and nurses “need our help, and they need it now.”
South Dakota welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors to a massive motorcycle rally this summer, declined to cancel the state fair and still doesn't require masks. Now its hospitals are filling up and the state's COVID-19 death rate is among the worst in the world.
The situation is similarly dire in North Dakota: The state's governor recently even moved to allow health care workers who have tested positive for COVID-19 to continue working if they don't show symptoms. It's a controversial policy recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a crisis situation where hospitals are short-staffed.
And now, after months of resisting a statewide mask mandate, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum changed course late Friday, ordering that masks be worn statewide and imposing several business restrictions.
“Our situation has changed, and we must change with it,” Burgum said in a video message posted late Friday. Doctors and nurses “need our help, and they need it now.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/11/14/covid-19-north-sou...
Why this George Bush "with-us-or-with-the-terrorist" thinking that since I don't like being banned from visting friends and family members it means I don't care about covid or that I don't think anything should be done? As for the Dakotas, I took another look at the death rates for individual states. Sure the Dakotas are moving up the chart right now. But they have a long way to go to catch up to New York state, which did lock down early on in the pandemic. Also note that New York state was still close to the top of the list after the motorcycle rally, and I don't think Trump had any rallies in New York state, so it doesn't look like his rallies contributed greatly to overall death numbers either. Might the Dakotas make it to the top of the list? Possibly, but it also looks like the new case numbers have peaked and that these numbers are on their way down. Maybe there are things they could have done differently, I haven't looked to closely at that. But the actual numbers indicate that it's not a simple matter of locking down and saving lives.
The high death rate in Canada is greatly affected by the 80% who have died in long term care homes because we did not take the measures, such as individual rooms to name only one, to protect these people.
If individual rooms in care homes makes a difference in preventing death, I can get behind that idea. I'd rather pay taxes to support that than to run up a massive deficit that will cause all kinds of social and economic problems that will take decades to pay off.
When one compares Sweden with other Scandavian countries, where social conditions are similar but the other countries took much stronger Covid-19 restrictions, the differences are dramatic. Sweden has had 644 Covid deaths per million, Denmark 136 Covid deaths per million, Finland 71 Covid deaths per million, and Norway 63 Covid deaths per million. So Sweden has had 4.7 times the death rate of Denmark, 9.1 times the death rate of Finland, and 10.2 times the death rate of Norway. (https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-sweden-defends-plan-not-to-l...)
I believe these numbers show why it is important to take the restrictions necessary to keep people alive until a vaccine is available, which now seems to be in the not-too-distant future.
I think this statement is an indication that you have been emotionally blackmailed into accepting this new reality. Nobody wanted these restrictions to be in place. Had we been told at the time that we would still be living life this way, we would not have gone along. The original idea was we needed 3 weeks to "flatten the curve." After the 3 weeks passed, we still needed to keep things closed, and were being primed with the idea that only a vaccine would get things "back to normal." Nobody wants to give up Christmas, but with a vaccine apparently completed, we are thinking, "it's only another month, we'll just get past it and things will be fine." Do you notice that the end point of when things can loosen up is very vague, and is always kicked down the road whenever it approaches? That is an emotional blackmail technique known as tantalizing: the blackmailer gains the target's compliance by promising a vague reward, and then removing that reward as it approaches. Very simple tactic, happens to work. Back to the vaccine, even Dr. Tam has said we still need to wear masks and practice social distancing when the vaccine arrives. Then what's the point of the vaccine anyways? I look at the fact that things didn't open up after 3 weeks as a red flag to say, "you guys said you needed 3 weeks, it's now that time and things are still not open up, what kind of scam are you trying to pull?"
This reminds me of the argument over global warming, where people argue endlessly without admitting the huge risks involved.
Watching the Assiniboine River nearly dry up, I agree that global warming is an issue. That's why I'm very angry that there were no major climate strike demonstrations this year. The reason given? Coronavirus, so we can't risk it. In other parts of the world, environmentalists are targetted, harassed, and in many instances killed. Yet they are willing to take that risk because they believe it is that important. The decision to not have climate strike demonstrations for fear of viral transmission, even though the odds of outdoor transmission of covid are slim to none, (and a certainly negligible risk of a bad outcome for the young climate strikers who would be demonstrating) smacks to me of elite priviledge. We lost a valuable year thanks to this cowardice, and as long as we stay away from the streets, we have no chance of addressing that problem.
Below is evidence supporting a lockdown's ability to crush Covid-19 infections from China at the beginning of the pandemic, Australia, New Zealand, and other countries. As the article from Lancet noted, Taiwan had the greatest success in terms of the fewests infections and deaths because had a " pre-COVID-19 preparation for disease outbreaks with a dedicated national public health agency and infrastructure including integrated manual and digital solutions to support the coordination of key functions". Without that lockdowns become one of the main ways of dealing with Covid-19.
We obviously have different value systems when it comes to the amount of risk we are willing to take, so I see little to no chance on agreeing on this, so I will simply respond with evidence that lockdowns have worked in response to your statements that they do not and leave it at that, as I think there is little to no chance of generating anything except a rehashing of arguments that have already been made on both sides of the situation.
Lockdowns were one of the earliest tactics in the fight against the pandemic. China’s sudden move to place millions of people under strict lockdowns in January shocked foreign observers, but just two months later, researchers in London agreed that “drastic” restrictions on daily life may be a periodic necessity before the introduction of a vaccine.
Academic studies from Asia and Europe suggest that lockdowns can work. Even Israel’s somewhat halfhearted recent four-week lockdown seems to have tamped down the exponential growth in new cases seen just a month ago.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/10/22/second-lockdown-ireland-...
The state at the center of Australia’s worst coronavirus outbreak has gone 28 days with no new cases of the virus, an enviable record as the US and many European countries grapple with surging infections or renewed lockdowns.
One of the world’s strictest and longest stay-at-home orders (4 months) enabled Victoria to crush community transmission after a daily peak of about 700 cases in early August. The success means Australia will be among a handful of western nations that can look forward to Christmas with limited restrictions on family gatherings and what authorities are calling a Covid-normal summer. ...
https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/australia-s-toughest-lockdown-...
The approach has largely worked. The nation's recorded cases peaked at 739 on Aug. 5, but since then the count has dwindled steadily and most Australian cities have gone weeks without a single new case.
It has come at the cost of a million jobs nationwide and thousands of now-failed businesses. But it was worth it, says Dr. Nancy Baxter, who runs the University of Melbourne's School of Population and Global Health. "You can't have a well-functioning economy with a raging pandemic. It's not an economy versus lives," she told CBC News.
The 28-day run is “an extraordinary achievement psychologically as well as practically, in terms of opening up the economy,” said Sanjaya Senanayake, an infectious diseases physician and associate professor of medicine at the Australian National University in Canberra.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/australia-covid-19-pandemic-lockdown-1.581...
When Covid-19 struck New Zealand, Jacinda Ardern’s government quickly closed the nation’s borders and imposed one of the world’s strictest lockdowns in a bid to eliminate the spread of the virus. The decision in late March plunged businesses into crisis, with many forced to implement radical strategic changes to survive. Air New Zealand was an early casualty, requiring a NZ$900m ($610.4m) bailout from Wellington. But with most restrictions now removed and the virus apparently under control, business confidence is coming back. Many corporate leaders — in industries from tourism to agriculture — hope that Wellington’s decision to prioritise health over keeping its economy open will prove fruitful in the long term.
https://www.ft.com/content/912d28d1-b233-4e18-9af4-7fa84ea3b927
Several Asian countries that faced early surges of COVID-19 have been able to keep the rate of new cases low, says Shenglan Tang, deputy director of the Duke Global Health Institute. He and his colleagues recently examined the strategies that China, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam, Hong Kong, and Singapore used to combat the new disease. Several places relied on strict lockdowns, while others invested in mass diagnostic testing and contact tracing or focused more on social distancing and mask wearing. Although each region used a different combination of measures, all of them were effective at beating back COVID-19, Tang says. One reason for this is that all of these areas had prior experience with epidemics such as SARS and MERS; as a result, they were prepared to act quickly and people were generally cooperative.
https://www.popsci.com/story/health/covid-19-flatten-curve-success/
Below is evidence supporting a lockdown's ability to crush Covid-19 infections from China at the beginning of the pandemic, Australia, New Zealand, and other countries. As the article from Lancet noted, Taiwan had the greatest success in terms of the fewests infections and deaths because had a " pre-COVID-19 preparation for disease outbreaks with a dedicated national public health agency and infrastructure including integrated manual and digital solutions to support the coordination of key functions". Without that lockdowns become one of the main ways of dealing with Covid-19.We obviously have different value systems when it comes to the amount of risk we are willing to take, so I see little to no chance on agreeing on this, so I will simply respond with evidence that lockdowns have worked in response to your statements that they do not and leave it at that, as I think there is little to no chance of generating anything except a rehashing of arguments that have already been made on both sides of the situation.
They are cherry-picked examples of countries that had a natural geographic advantage that helped to protect them against pandemic outbreaks. Even Australia is not a success. They had a first lockdown in the earlier part of the year. Following that, you had the outbreak in Melbourne this past summer. That outbreak accelerated even in the face of increasingly strict measures. Furthermore, if you go to the Worldometers page and sort countries according to the number of deaths per population, many countries that did lock down are near the top. Furthermore, even though suppressionists like to point to Taiwan as a success, Taiwan actually hurts their case because Taiwan did not lock down. Japan and South Korea, contrary to being success stories, have both experienced third waves of covid. That information is also easily available on the Worldometers web page if you look.
At 43 deaths per 100,000, Sweden’s mortality rate is among the highest globally and far exceeds that of neighboring Denmark and Norway, which imposed much tougher lockdowns at the onset of the pandemic.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-03/man-behind-sweden-s-v...
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Covid deaths per million: Taiwan 0.29; New Zealand 5.08; and Canada 314.4; United States 799.0
(https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide...).
soooo, canada has done 28% better (corona death-wise, anyway), than reckless and irresponsible sweden?
You seem to be trivializing the 28% increase in the death rate. I don't.
The high death rate in Canada is greatly affected by the 80% who have died in long term care homes because we did not take the measures, such as individual rooms to name only one, to protect these people. As noted above, Taiwan leads the world in dealing with Covid-19 not only because of what it did immediately after having the first infection, but because it learned from the Sars pandemic that being prepared in advance for a pandemic is best of all.
When one compares Sweden with other Scandavian countries, where social conditions are similar but the other countries took much stronger Covid-19 restrictions, the differences are dramatic. Sweden has had 644 Covid deaths per million, Denmark 136 Covid deaths per million, Finland 71 Covid deaths per million, and Norway 63 Covid deaths per million. So Sweden has had 4.7 times the death rate of Denmark, 9.1 times the death rate of Finland, and 10.2 times the death rate of Norway. (https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-sweden-defends-plan-not-to-l...)
I believe these numbers show why it is important to take the restrictions necessary to keep people alive until a vaccine is available, which now seems to be in the not-too-distant future. This reminds me of the argument over global warming, where people argue endlessly without admitting the huge risks involved.
trivializing people dying?
no, i'm trivializing all you educated left-wing types tripping over yourself to support the inept, bungled, classist, wealth concentrating, power concentrating, and ineffective responses to an entirely predictable and predicted pandemic.
i'm scared, more lockdown, the vaccine will save us, online is the answer, blame the youth, more lockdown, bla bla bla.
under the guise of "saving people " (which is probably a net loss), we are undergoing a society-wide, world-wide, fundamental acceleration of all the bad preexisting indicators - income inequality, concentration of power, surveillance state, loss of democratic accountability, poverty, etc.
one expects it from the pablum-news set, but it's shocked me the extent to which those-that-should-know-better have folded without a whimper of analysis and immediately turned on anyone who points in anything but that one direction.
to reiterate: covid is a thing. it's bad. it should not be ignored. the response is being bungled/leveraged, along traditional fault lines.
THE COVID RESPONSE NEEDS TO BE OPENLY AND HONESTLY CRITIQUED.
eastnoireast wrote:
ne expects it from the pablum-news set, but it's shocked me the extent to which those-that-should-know-better have folded without a whimper of analysis and immediately turned on anyone who points in anything but that one direction.
Once again you engage in accusations without evidence to support your arguments. Discussing this has become pointless for me. I'll leave it at that.
eastnoireast wrote:
ne expects it from the pablum-news set, but it's shocked me the extent to which those-that-should-know-better have folded without a whimper of analysis and immediately turned on anyone who points in anything but that one direction.
Once again you engage in accusations without evidence to support your arguments. Discussing this has become pointless for me. I'll leave it at that.
go find your own links, if you need them to support my pointless observations that -
we are undergoing a society-wide, world-wide, fundamental acceleration of all the bad preexisting indicators - income inequality, concentration of power, surveillance state, loss of democratic accountability, poverty, etc.
or -
80% of total canadian covid deaths occurred in care homes.
80%.
in definable, contained, mostly institutional buildings.
a whole summer to make changes.
what has been done in that time, except for cutting off the inmates, er, sorry residents from their people?
sfa.
or -
to reiterate: covid is a thing. it's bad. it should not be ignored. the response is being bungled/leveraged, along traditional fault lines.
THE COVID RESPONSE NEEDS TO BE OPENLY AND HONESTLY CRITIQUED.
under the guise of "saving people " (which is probably a net loss), we are undergoing a society-wide, world-wide, fundamental acceleration of all the bad preexisting indicators - income inequality, concentration of power, surveillance state, loss of democratic accountability, poverty, etc.one expects it from the pablum-news set, but it's shocked me the extent to which those-that-should-know-better have folded without a whimper of analysis and immediately turned on anyone who points in anything but that one direction.
Even if you listen to the news here in Manitoba, it talks about how why the government can't increase capacity and how many fines they have given out for covid non-compliance. I don't think it's a co-incidence that the one Premier who has imposed the harshest of restrictions in the name of stopping covid has also done the least in terms of helping the population, either through income supports, government programs for businesses, or building a health care system capable of handling the surge and an elder care system that would have prevented many of these deaths. Even Doug Ford swallowed his pride and asked for military assistance. Palister outright refused. The OCN First Nation called in the military for an outbreak in its care home. As a result, all but one of the residents and all of the staff recovered. We can find solutions that empower communities and allow them to live their best lives if we put our minds to it.
WATCH: "If you don't think COVID is real, right now, you are an idiot...I'm the guy who's stealing Christmas to keep you safe.' MB Premier Pallister.
https://twitter.com/meyer_lucas/status/1334588619294728202
Knowing COVID is real and implementing the necessary and effective public health measures to avert its deadly proliferation are two different things. Unfortunately, like other provincial administrations, Pallister fails at the second.
WATCH: "If you don't think COVID is real, right now, you are an idiot...I'm the guy who's stealing Christmas to keep you safe.' MB Premier Pallister.
https://twitter.com/meyer_lucas/status/1334588619294728202
Knowing COVID is real and implementing the necessary and effective public health measures to avert its deadly proliferation are two different things. Unfortunately, like other provincial administrations, Pallister fails at the second.
What the fuck are you talking about? Pallister has enacted among the most restrictive measures in the country to the point that I cannot have any visitors at my residence nor visit anyone else's. He has also done very little to prepare the health system to cope with the crisis.
NDPP, you have consistently argued against authoritarianism on this board in the time that I see you posting here. So why are you cheering on lockdowns which are in fact authoritarian? Do you think that by cheering them on people like Brian Pallister are suddenly going to use that authoritarian power in ways that you want? Are you not the least bit concerned that the pandemic has given license to authoritarian governments in Hungary and India to sieze powers for their own gain? How can anyone who claims to care about human dignity and freedom support the unprecedented restrictions on our liberties and movements that have come in the name of stopping covid?
Obviously I cheer on 'effective health measures' of which I post examples - usually elsewhere - not the criminal negligence causing death that Palliser and the other provincial and federal slapheads have subjected Canadians to. Lockdowns are a very blunt instrument employed repeatedly because proper and proven measures weren't. Meanwhile, until it's sorted, wash your hands and wear your fucking mask.
