Letter: Disappointing and unfair to see Canada so low on vaccine priority list
By Letter to the Editor on April 30, 2021.
Dear editor, Disappointing and unfair that Canada would be left far down the priority list of countries receiving the COVID vaccine from Europe. Whether Trudeau and his Liberals in Ottawa were totally inept in locking in orders from suppliers or whether the European Union decided to give Canada the ‘short shift’ is immaterial. Trudeau might do well to remind the Europeans of the following statistics to free them from the Jackboots of the oppression of their conquerors in both the First and Second World Wars. Hundreds of thousands of Canadians served in the Canadian Armed Forces to set Europe free – most volunteered. WW1: 66,000 Canadians killed out of a population of 8 million. WW2: 45,000 Canadians killed from a population of 11.5 million. Many of those who survived, service men and women, came home mentally and physically bankrupt. Without demeaning the service and sacrifices in WW1, here is a stark breakdown of WW2 stats of Canadians liberating Europe from the Nazis: – 73,000 served in the Royal Canadian Air Force, 18,517 lost their lives. – Royal Canadian Navy, 1,990 killed. – Canadian and Newfoundland Merchant Navy, 1,629 killed ferrying much-needed supplies to Europe. – Canadian Army suffered 22,917 dead. These were all Canadians in the prime of their lives with much to live for. They gave their lives so Europeans could enjoy freedom. During the Cold War following WW2, thousands of Canadian Armed Forces personnel served to protect Europe from the very real Russian threat. Many Canadian lives were also lost. Because of who we are, Canadians would not ask for or expect special consideration. But to receive our fair share of COVID vaccine from European supplies should have been automatic. Trudeau and the Liberals in Ottawa did not serve Canadians well and should be held to account in the next federal election. John MacLaren Medicine Hat 15-14
It shows what happens when your country has no way of producing it and have to rely on other foreign countries to produce it and you have no control over how they deliver it.
This after your ignorant premier has deliberately cancelled the building of a super lab in Edmonton that could have been used down the road to produce such vaccines and has run this pandemic in such a horrible manner as to give us the highest count per capital in Canada and likely North America. How many people died that didn’t need to.
Some of us were fighting with the Klein government years ago because of the horror stories we were hearing about the conditions in long term health care centers and Klein didn’t care. Just like Kenney doesn’t care about what he does to our water supply. How can anyone be that stupid?