On the day after Alberta Premier Danielle Smith dug herself out of an anti-vaxxer hole, she decided to add some levity to her Twitter feed. To do so, she took a picture of her nylon-clad legs and patent leather pumps with the tag line: ‘It’s a beautiful day.’

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on October 17, 2022.

OTTAWA—#ableg has taken on a whole new meeting in the Twitter world. It used to be a hashtag for the Alberta legislature.

Now it is a hashtag for the premier’s legs.

Does that sound bizarre?

If so, that is because it is.

On the day after Alberta Premier Danielle Smith dug herself out of an anti-vaxxer hole, she decided to add some levity to her Twitter feed.

To do so, she took a picture of her nylon-clad legs and patent leather pumps with the tag line “It’s a beautiful day.”

Supporters lauded her sense of humour. Opponents accused her of poor judgment and sexism.

The vast majority simply asked the question, “Why?”

Why would a premier post a photo of their legs? As a woman, Smith must know how her gender has fought hard to avoid being defined by body parts.

But the post also prompted a larger question. What kind of judgment will Smith exhibit as a leader?

So far, she has not had a stellar start.

She spent her first post-inaugural day explaining away the claim that those people who chose not to be vaccinated were “the most discriminated group” she has witnessed in her lifetime.

Smith refused to apologize for the comments, but tried to put them in context, saying she did not try to “create any false equivalencies to the terrible historical discrimination and persecution suffered by so many minority groups over the last decades and centuries.”

But she did. She also used her first day in office to announce the firing of Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, Deena Hinshaw.

Hinshaw, who was seen as a capable manager of the pandemic, received public scorn earlier this year when it was revealed she received a $228,000 bonus for her work during the pandemic.

In the private sector, the bonus would likely have been expected, given the number of additional work hours attached to the pandemic response. In many ways, it literally became a 24-hour-a-day response.

But of particular concern, is that Smith supports the current and former health minister, both of whom were laudatory about Hinshaw’s leadership throughout the pandemic.

The premier is supporting the politicians who managed the pandemic and firing the scientists and health professionals. What does that say about the kind of government she would run?

Two days have produced two lapses in judgement.

The leggy tweet won’t do any lasting damage, but the decision to rewrite COVID history by turning anti-vaxxers into victims will.

That revisionist history couples with her backpedalling on the proposed Alberta Sovereignty Act.

During the campaign, Smith said she was prepared to fight federal laws and court rulings that were not in Alberta’s interest. She characterized Trudeau’s involvement in provincial affairs as “lawless.”

But within hours of taking office, she was already changing her position, promising to uphold any Supreme Court decision on jurisdiction, and claiming that her new sovereignty legislation would respect the rule of law.

The reversal was probably necessary. Even her United Conservative Party leadership opponents said her proposed sovereignty law did not pass the smell test.

But what about those UCP voters who supported her precisely because of her attack on the “lawless” prime minister.

Her comment on the mistreatment of anti-vaxxers is a sign that she wants to continue to appeal to the small percentage of Albertans who did not get vaccinated.

More than 80 per cent of Albertans have received at least one vaccination, so her target audience is less than 20 per cent.

But that same group does not expect her to reverse her sovereignty position within a day of taking office.

UCP opponents are pushing hard for an election. They claim Smith will not have a mandate until she is elected by all the people.

Smith’s predecessor, outgoing premier Jason Kenney, will have nothing to do with her, even though they hail from the same party.

By law, the election is expected to happen in little more than six months, on May 29 of next year.

If Smith’s next few months are like her first week, the opposition should hope that the election is delayed a little. The more she speaks, the less she appeals to the average voter.

But in the next six months, she may be able to harness the power of conservatism in Alberta to win.

Given the missteps of her first few days in office, that seems unlikely.

Her path to power may involve keeping her mouth shut and staying off Twitter.

And that’s no mean feat for a politician.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

It sounds good to vaccinate all truckers, but hampering $1-billion of daily traffic between Canada and the United States may not help.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on January 17, 2022.

OTTAWA—To vax tax, or not to vax tax, that is the question.

Once again, the Government of Quebec appears to be at the head of the pack when it comes to new public health policies.

Whether the proposed vax tax is actually brought to fruition remains to be seen.

Reaction to the tax proposal ranges from tepid to negative. The prime minister refused to weigh in, seeking more information. Multiple premiers said they would not be following the lead of Quebec Premier François Legault in levying a health fee on those who refused to be vaccinated.

Premiers opposed to the move include Saskatchewan’s Scott Moe diagnosed with covid just after his public briefing on the issue where the premier was not wearing a mask.

Legault has promised to introduce a package on the health tax in February that will be debated in the Quebec National Assembly. It was no coincidence that the controversial tax was floated at the same time the province lost its second public health director since the beginning of the pandemic.

The departure of Dr. Horacio Arruda was expected to take some heat off the premier for criticism his government has faced following the Christmas implementation of a curfew that now ends Monday.

Throughout the pandemic, Legault’s personal popularity numbers have remained high, even when his province experienced the highest national death rates in long-term care facilities.

Perhaps the surprise tax proposal was designed to keep those numbers high. Most observers have been skeptical about the tax proposal. Some have argued the proposal violates medical ethics. Others call it an attack on universal health care.

If there is a public policy to tax anti-vaxxers, what about smokers or others who contribute to health problems by personal choices? One could argue that the smoker’s tax already exists because the high cost of a package of cigarettes in every province is largely based on taxes, which are ploughed back into provincial health-care expenditures. What is next, an obesity tax? Some see the benefit in a sugar tax for that very reason.

The other question that begs is what result will the tax have in encouraging the non-vaccinated to step up and get the vaccination?

Eighty-five per cent of the Quebec population is already vaccinated and early reports indicate that there has been an uptick in vaccination appointments since the premier’s announcement.

The Government of Quebec also recently announced that vaccination proof will be required to purchase liquor or cannabis in government stores.

That may also be responsible for the increase in vaccination bookings, but the bottom line is that Legault is banking on the fact that the vast majority of Quebecers are tired of being locked down because a small minority of citizens refuses to protect the rest of the population.

Legault has been playing tough with anti-vaxxers while Ontario Premier Doug Ford seems to be going in the opposite direction.

His reaction to the pandemic has been focused on encouraging people to vaccinate but with no mention of coercion.

If anything, the Ontario government has been criticized for worrying more about anti-vaxxers’ rights than those of ordinary citizens. School boards and parents were outraged when the government announced that, with schools reopening in a few days, the threshold for informing families on active school covid cases was being increased.

The announcement that parents would only be informed when 30 per cent of the school student or teacher population was infected caught educators and school boards by surprise.

It runs counter to previous reporting requirements that let parents know when a dozen or so cases were reported in any school.

Minister of Education Stephen Lecce defended the move, saying families could use at-home rapid tests provided by the province if they are concerned about potential infection.

However, critics are saying the lack of transparency is not justifiable.

Meanwhile, the federal government reversed its position again on the requirement of all truckers, Canadians and foreign nationals, to be vaccinated or face quarantine when they are crossing the border. All have to vaccinated as of Jan. 15.

The United States is planning on imposing its own vaccination requirement within the next week.

Some 20 per cent of Canadian truckers are currently unvaccinated and existing supply chain issues could be exacerbated if one of five truckers stopped working this month.

It sounds good to vaccinate all truckers, but hampering $1-billion of daily traffic between Canada and the United States may not help.

Like taxing anti-vaxxers, the cure may be worse than the disease.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

Armed with today’s knowledge and technology, it only makes sense to issue an international vaccine for anyone who plans to travel.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on July 26, 2021.

When does personal freedom blind us to professional responsibility?

When the health-care system permits unvaccinated workers in facilities housing vulnerable people.

It is the state’s job, first and foremost, to protect those who are under its care in public hospitals or long-term communal living arrangements.

The Quebec government understands that. Last April, it became the first jurisdiction in Canada to require health-care workers to either vaccinate or provide thrice-weekly COVID tests to their employers.

Alberta, on the other hand, is clinging to the notion that a vaccination requirement is a violation of civil liberties. Alberta Premier Jason Kenney is even considering amending a 100-year-old Alberta law that gives the government the right to mandate vaccines in certain circumstances.

Why would any government assume it is okay to allow employees who have not been vaccinated to come to work?

Ontario Premier Doug Ford told reporters last week that he thinks it is a constitutional right that, “no one should be forced to do anything.” With that perspective, we should all stop paying taxes.

Someone should ask the premier what happened to the constitutional rights of the frail and elderly in long-term care facilities who depend on us to protect them. Many other countries have already decided it is not a personal freedom issue but a health responsibility for those who work in facilities that look after the vulnerable and hospitalized.

Several European countries have already mandated vaccinations for all health-care employees. France, a country which has some of the strongest worker protection laws in the world, has imposed a deadline of Sept. 15 for health-care workers to be vaccinated or lose their jobs.

Throughout the pandemic, politicians have repeatedly stated that it is their job to listen to the science.

The Canadian Medical Association Journal has been calling on provincial governments to make sure they bring in vaccination rules that cover all facilities, not just those in the public sector. The CMAJ also believes that mandatory vaccinations in those facilities would pass a Charter challenge even though a previous call for mandatory flu vaccines was disallowed.

In this case, the disease transmission and death rate from failing to vaccinate is much higher than for a flu vaccine, and there are already a number of vaccination requirements mandated for hospital employment that have passed Charter scrutiny.

Health-care associations in Canada have been calling on premiers to act quickly and save lives.

Voiceless patients in long-term care facilities, many of whom died during this pandemic, have every right to be fully protected.

On-site testing is not enough.

What is even more egregious is that the cost of refusing the vaccination is not even being borne by the anti-vaxer, but by the rest of us.

In many instances, health-care professionals are required to have tests to prove they are COVID-free. In New Brunswick, unvaccinated workers in long-term care facilities must be tested every second day. If the test is molecular, the cost is approximately $200 each, so in the course of a single week, $800 could be spent to guarantee the employment rights of anti-vaxxers.

A simpler solution would be to make the vaccine mandatory and deliver it quickly.

British Columbia’s chief medical officer of health stated last month that mandatory vaccination was one of the options being considered in their long-term care facilities.

According to the Ontario Medical Association and the Registered Nurses Association of Ontario, mandatory vaccines in the health care system could help prevent a third wave of infection caused by the delta variant of the Coronavirus.

On the science side, the verdict is unanimous: a health care vaccination program would have a significant impact in reducing the possibility or severity of a third wave of variant Covid infection.

There is zero reason for politicians to play the civil liberty card on this one.

I still carry a federal vaccination card that was co-issued by Health Canada and the World Health Organization as a requirement to comply with international health regulations when entering various countries. The vaccines were administered and signed off by Health Canada and you could not enter certain countries without this vaccination certificate.

In those days, we were not dealing with a virus that morphed into a pandemic.

Armed with today’s knowledge and technology, it only makes sense to issue an international vaccine for anyone who plans to travel.

And it is about time the Canadian government and the provinces got their act together and realized that saving lives trumps vaccine liberty.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.