I recently wrote a letter to our local MPP of Stormont, Dundas and South Glengarry, Conservative member Jim McDonell, expressing my concerns over the continued restrictions, vaccine passports and mandates put in place. Something that their federal brethren seem to be adamantly against.
The reply I received was more interested in furthering the “us versus them” narrative using scientific rhetoric, not facts. This type of public coercion has crossed all political party lines.
McDonell stated that the “extreme, infectious nature of the Omicron variant has resulted in the rapid escalation of cases and has proven the effectiveness of being fully vaccinated.”
The Centre for Disease Control (CDC) stated in a January 2022 report that the vaccine effectiveness is severely reduced if the last dose was administered more than six months before coming in contact with COVID-19. The report goes on to say that, “data are limited on the real-world effectiveness of third doses of COVID-19 mRNA vaccine in the United States, especially since Omicron variant became predominant in mid-December 2021.”
Omicron is also far less dangerous.
Public Health Ontario found that “the risk of hospitalization or death was 59% lower in Omicron compared to Delta cases, the risk of ICU admission or death was 81% lower.”
McDonell also boasted that, “the data is relatively straightforward; you are many times more likely to be in the hospital, in an ICU bed, and to pass away from COVID-19 if you are not fully vaccinated — full stop.” Adding that, “as far as vaccinations are concerned, the data reveals that a disproportionate number of hospitalizations involve those who are not fully vaccinated.”
While it is true that the hospitalization rate for those who are fully vaccinated (0.0074%) is lower than those that are unvaccinated (0.012%) one can’t ignore the sheer numbers either.
According to the Government of Ontario COVID-19 website from Feb. 12, 2022, of those hospitalized with the virus, 356 were unvaccinated and 879 fully vaccinated. In intensive care, 117 are unvaccinated and 170 are fully vaccinated. What this looks like is that the people did as they were asked and reduced the risk. The sheer numbers of admissions coupled with the rate of hospitalization of both the vaccinated and unvaccinated would indicate that this lockdown was unnecessary.
McDonell described their reopening strategy as “not an exact science, but scientists around the world generally agree with this strategy.”
Perhaps he should also take the time to look at all the facts and figures, not those that fit their narrative, while listening to his constituents rather than treating them like lab rats in a real-time social experiment.
Scientific data is important but he ignores the thousands of beaten and bankrupt businesses, skyrocketing mental health issues, economic disruptions and inflation, and the outright violations of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
If protecting healthcare capacity is the impetus for these restrictions, then they are, again, ignoring important facts, or the science, as it were.
The Ontario Hospital Association has long said that occupancy issues are “due to the over 5,000 patients designated as ALC (alternative level of care) waiting in hospital beds” — a pre-COVID condition. Never mind the over 8,000 nursing positions that remain unfilled.
It is fine to say that you “believe in science” but you can’t ignore facts that don’t suit your political goals. Science is not static, it is constantly changing, much like the virus that has brought home this reckoning.
McDonnell and his cohorts have used science to blind and bend the population and become lost themselves. Rather than taking off the lab coat and listening to constituents, instead they have bought into the authoritarian leadership of a Liberal Prime Minister and that is a fact.
Tom Schoch
Chesterville, Ontario
