By now we’re all weary of COVID- 19, and of reading about it. So we can sympathize with the frustrations of those involved in the so-called Truckers’ Freedom Convoy in Canada and with their sympathizers in the U.S. and elsewhere.
What isn’t so easy to sympathize with is how the protesters are expressing their frustrations. The test in such instances should always be if the actions are helping to resolve the issue. And in this case, they are not. If anything, they are only making matters worse.
The real enemy remains the virus. Unfortunately, the protests that have incapacitated Ottawa for two weeks (and counting as this went to press) and blockades of the Canada-U.S. border have only worsened the supply chain stresses that the pandemic induced in the first place. Yes, the protesters have gotten people’s attention, which is the aim of protest movements.
A recent poll in Canada found that sympathy for the protesters was rising, with 46 percent agreeing that “they ‘may not agree with everything’ the trucker convoy says or does, but the frustration of protesters is ‘legitimate and worthy’ of sympathy,” Global News reported Feb. 11. Among Canadians aged 18 to 34, that sympathy contingent was 61 percent.
Overall, though, 54 percent of Canadians didn’t think the protesters deserved any sympathy. Much of the division can be ascribed to politics, with 59 percent of Conservative party voters agreeing on the side of the convoy protesters. That would appear to be a case of strange bedfellows, given that younger people tend to skew left.
Those close to the protests, though, aren’t too keen about it. A poll in early February found that 67 percent of Ottawa residents, who have had to put up with a lot of horn honking, opposed the protests, 47 percent of them strongly.
Let’s also not forget that while a Liberal politician, Justin Trudeau, is Canada’s prime minister, a Conservative politician, Doug Ford, is the premier of Ontario. And on Feb. 11, Ford declared a state of emergency over the blockade of the Ambassador Bridge, linking Windsor, Ontario, with Detroit. Ford called it a “siege” and an “illegal occupation.”
About the same time, Ford announced that his government was on track to remove its vaccine passport system, which requires people to present proof of vaccination to enter restaurants, bars, gyms, sporting venues and other public spaces.
The protesters shouldn’t take that news as evidence that the Ontario government is capitulating to their demands. It would be foolish for a government to reward bad behavior in that way. (And yes, it’s bad behavior to block a street or highway with a truck or to honk its horn for hours on end.)
Instead, the Ontario government’s actions are a sign that the Omicron wave of COVID-19 is subsiding, just as health authorities have cautiously been expecting in recent weeks. So the restrictions are going to be relaxed despite the efforts of the protesters.
Now, are they being relaxed as quickly as in other jurisdictions, such as Saskatchewan, Manitoba, or Florida? No. But history will have to judge that by looking at the rates of fatalities and long COVID sufferers. Historians and mathematicians (math historians?) might also calculate the lasting impacts of COVID-19 containment measures on mental health, childhood development, and the economy.
Oh, and they should also figure in the impacts of vaccine resistance and hesitation. About 90 percent of eligible Canadians, including truckers, have received at least one dose. Unfortunately, against Omicron, you need two doses and a booster. That doesn’t mean that the authorities lied about the effectiveness of vaccines at the outset.
It means, that the virus mutated, as health officials anticipated from the beginning.
Circumstances changed. Omicron is much more infectious but less virulent, especially for the vaccinated. The vaccines aren’t as effective as they were initially at blocking infection, but they are still very good at preventing severe illness.
In rare instances, the vaccines them- selves can make people sick. But the likelihood of getting sick or dying from COVID is much greater. According to the Centers for Disease Control, an unvaccinated adult is 97 times more likely to die from COVID-19 than someone fully vaccinated with a booster shot.
If some people aren’t able to figure those odds, it’s too late. Unfortunately, health authorities, whom we expect to be cautious around human health, have had to worry about the unvaccinated clogging up the hospitals. Fortunately, it looks like that wave will soon pass. Then the restrictions will relax at the borders. And something resembling normal will return. For honking sake, it has to.
