Here in Canada, we are currently working on the vaccination campaign.
The management of the new infections is good, but there are many delays in the distribution of the vaccines I heard and it is not going as well as promised by the prime minister months ago when it first started back in December.
Canada, as I had previously mentioned in one of my blogs, had been one of the first countries in the world to start vaccinating its citizens but not it seems that second doses are not enough for everybody.
In Canada, the vaccination campaign (with Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines both now) began on the 20th of December, 2020, with numbers that so far offer no reason for satisfaction. As of Mid-March 2021, about 2.5 million Canadians were vaccinated with the first dose (while about only 500,000 also received the second dose).
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau continues to reiterate that Canada will receive six million more doses by the end of March, and that all Canadians who wish to be, will be vaccinated by the end of September. A promise and a commitment that does not reassure the public opinion at all because, despite Canada being the first country in the world to sign an agreement with Moderna and the fourth country to sign an agreement with Pfizer, it seems that the contracts have not specified the deadlines for such deliveries and unfortunately confirming the fears, the pharmaceutical companies are hiding behind the confidentiality of the contracts limiting themselves to saying that the commitment refers only to quarterly deliveries and not weekly ones.
To be honest, in terms of the vaccinated population, Canada is not in good shape when compared to the rest of the world.
With its 7% of vaccinated citizens Canada ranks at the same level of Italy (which is never a country to look up to when it comes to organizing anything important and I’m Italian so I can confirm that from spending there most of my life) versus an almost 97% of Israel, 37% of England and 29% of the United States of America.
Canada currently has a stay-at-home order (as a precaution and recommendation) and we even have a toll-free number to report neighbours if they throw parties or have people over at their place (how bad is spying on the neighbours? What is this? A dictatorship?) and fines of up to 2000 dollars are given to citizens who do not comply with these strict rules.
Overall Canadian people are very disciplined so you can go out without problems, some restaurants work, but alcohol cannot be served after 10pm, so in general most businesses close around 10.30pm. There is a maximum of six people per table, but you cannot invite people to your house which doesn’t make much sense to me. This is because while restaurant owners, for fear of having to close and lose their jobs, are very organized to comply with the rules laid down by the provincial councillors and the government does not trust what can happen at home and therefore a ban has been established for these reasons. Not only that, if that can ensure the survival of commercial activities and compliance with anti-Covid rules, why not?
I just think it limits personal freedom to an exaggerated extent.
The management of the vaccination campaign seems to be more difficult. It started in mid-December, before many other countries but today it shows delays and shortages of stocks.
Canada, like Great Britain, was among the first countries to launch the vaccination campaign for its health workers, but there is not yet a great deal of coverage. The campaign was not well organized: first those who work in intensive care units were vaccinated, then the doctors in the emergency room and those who work in long-term care services were vaccinated too but after that they lost track of things.
They started vaccinating the elderly and some people at high-risk but I hear we are so far behind compared to neighbouring USA for instance.
Even partial coverage is already a good start, to which we must add the common sense of Canadians and a low population density.