FROLITICKS

If there is one thing that the current truckers for freedom convoys in Canada illustrates, that as the pandemic has continued, certain frustrated factions of the population have loss their trust in governments.  This is really important in the war on COVID.   Following ten months of research, a peer-reviewed study recently published in the Lancet, a top medical journal, concluded that trust in government and strength of community engagement is critical to the public health response.  It noted that wealthy countries with more robust health systems, including the U.S. and much of Europe, struggled with tackling COVID through public health measures.  The study noted that the U.S., for example, had the second-worst standardized infection rate of any high-income country.  Starting with President Trump, the messaging has often been confusing and had hampered to work of local and public health officials in implementing vaccination programs and restriction policies.  Frequently, lack of initial public trust in governments and the health care system prevented the more effective implementation of such measures. In this case, the pandemic has furthered eroded trust in the government among certain groups.  Thus, the high rates of COVID-related cases, hospitalizations and deaths in the U.S.

Canada is not immune to the diminishing trust level of certain groups, as evidenced by the current truckers’ protests across the country.  Unfortunately, this lack of trust on the part of these groups has opened up the door for extremist fringe groups to attach themselves to such demonstrations.  Originally, the purpose of the so-called Freedom Convoy was to protest the implementation of a vaccine mandate for truckers entering Canada from the U.S.  The same mandate applies to Canadian truckers entering the U.S.  As the protest grew in numbers, led by Canada Unity, the group behind the convoy, the protest morphed into a call for the end of all anti-COVID restrictions.  The participation of extremist fringe groups became increasingly apparent with the display of swastikas, Nazi and Confederate flags, and the yellow star of David left over from the yellow vest movement which was known for its racist conspiracy theories.  Indeed, one of the convoy’s organizers is controversial right-wing figure Patrick King, who has stated that the truckers currently occupying the capital’s downtown core will not be leaving Ottawa any time soon, and are planning to stay until all COVID-19 public health measures are eliminated.

A “memorandum of understanding,” posted on the Canada Unity website, says its coalition is opposed to all restrictions and mandates related to COVID-19, rules it deems are “unconstitutional, discriminatory and segregating.”  The memorandum’s goal, it says, is to form a committee with the Senate and Governor General to override all levels of Canadian government.  If parliamentarians refuse to join, the group says they should “resign their lawful positions of authority immediately.”  Otherwise, they propose to overthrow the current democratically elected Parliament and install an autocratic government.  Interestingly, a GoFundMe campaign was launched in support of the truckers convoy — to date raising almost $10 million Canadian.  However, questions have been raised about the destination of the money, particularly since some of the organizers have been involved in extremist politics.  In addition, it is believed that some of the donations have come from groups in the U.S.  For this reason, it appears to be incumbent on the federal government to investigate this GoFundMe campaign to ensure that the funds are allocated to assist the truckers with their expenses and not for other political causes.  GoFundMe has announced that it would begin releasing money only after the organizers of the fundraising campaign provided a distribution plan for the funds.  In the meantime, given some of the charges levelled by law enforcement as a result of illegal actions committed by protesters, the government may want to have the courts issue an injunction against the distribution of any GoFundMe funds until full disclosure of the processes is made public.  One owes this full disclosure to donors.

The public health battle against COVID has gone reasonably well in Canada with 90.9% of doses delivered to the provinces having been administered as of today.  The result appears to imply that the vast majority of Canadians still have a fair amount of trust in their governments and in the science, despite certain public health restrictions remaining in place.  It is expected that these restrictions will be slowly lifted when there are fewer new cases of the Omicron variant and the rate of hospitalizations decreases.  I am certain that this public trust is warranted under the circumstances.