Covid-19 lockdown check-in

[crazy canuck]

I am sorry but how could Europe get all those vaccines with the US hoarding them?

Europe has its own production facilities.  They are getting none from the US.

We have no production and we did not pay the premium Israel paid.  So not much mystery actually.

[Tonitrus]

There is news out there that the J&J vaccine is made from abortions, so our moral consistency should make a large excess available soon. 

[Berkut]

I feel bad for Canada. I mean, really and seriously.

They are at the end of the day, probably our closest ally, and that ought to be worth something in a time of crisis.

I cannot help but wonder if Trump had not been President, what the US could have done to help out more as far as getting them more vaccine faster - some kind of very early licensing and technical help setting up an emergency production capability, or some kind of politically palatable way to allocate some vaccine production there in return for some nominal assistance from Canada.

I mean, I get that there is no way right now the American public would tolerate any allocation going to Canada from US produced vaccine. But given some agressive cooperation early, couldn't we be in a spot where we have some agreement that in return for Canadian assistance, we would have a shared roll out of the vaccine?

All speculation at this point. Maybe a lesson for the future though - but I suspect any sane Canadian lesson is going to be "Don't count on the fucking Americans for shit!"

[Threviel]

Isn't that the lesson of the entire Trump thing? The US cannot be trusted.

[Zanza]

The EU gets a lot of deserved criticism for its vaccine rollout. However, if the EU had acted like the US and stopped all vaccine exports, the stories for Israel and the UK would look rather different too.

[crazy canuck]

I feel bad for Canada. I mean, really and seriously.

They are at the end of the day, probably our closest ally, and that ought to be worth something in a time of crisis.

I cannot help but wonder if Trump had not been President, what the US could have done to help out more as far as getting them more vaccine faster - some kind of very early licensing and technical help setting up an emergency production capability, or some kind of politically palatable way to allocate some vaccine production there in return for some nominal assistance from Canada.

I mean, I get that there is no way right now the American public would tolerate any allocation going to Canada from US produced vaccine. But given some agressive cooperation early, couldn't we be in a spot where we have some agreement that in return for Canadian assistance, we would have a shared roll out of the vaccine?

All speculation at this point. Maybe a lesson for the future though - but I suspect any sane Canadian lesson is going to be "Don't count on the fucking Americans for shit!"

If Trump had not been President, I think it very likely that Canada and the US would have created an integrated approach, if for no other reason than our economies are so closely intertwined.  And Canada would not have had to try to forge a strategy with China - which was always precarious at best.

[crazy canuck]

The EU gets a lot of deserved criticism for its vaccine rollout. However, if the EU had acted like the US and stopped all vaccine exports, the stories for Israel and the UK would look rather different too.

Not to mention Canada - we would be completely screwed without the vaccines coming from Europe.

[Sheilbh]

If Trump had not been President, we would probably be talking about the Oxford/Merck vaccine not AstraZeneca and I think there would have been an attempt to engage around a global strategy. That may not have worked in any event - but I think it would have been different.

It is fascinating the impact that Trump had on other countries' approaches. In the UK it moved the government block the Merck cooperation because they would guarantee an ability to supply the UK and there was a fear that Trump would basically seize production for the US. Similarly I understand the EU vaccine strategy was basically kickstarted by Trump trying to broker that deal to buy Curevac - again for American production.

So ironically without Trump it is possible the UK and the EU could be in a worse position - the UK because it's possible the US would still have export restrictions even without Trump (see now for example) and the EU might have been slower in actually buying up vaccine/never jolted into a single position/strategy without the Curevac story

[Jacob]

That American hoarding can't be the main reason for Canada dropping the ball.

Okay

[crazy canuck]

If Trump had not been President, we would probably be talking about the Oxford/Merck vaccine not AstraZeneca and I think there would have been an attempt to engage around a global strategy. That may not have worked in any event - but I think it would have been different.

It is fascinating the impact that Trump had on other countries' approaches. In the UK it moved the government block the Merck cooperation because they would guarantee an ability to supply the UK and there was a fear that Trump would basically seize production for the US. Similarly I understand the EU vaccine strategy was basically kickstarted by Trump trying to broker that deal to buy Curevac - again for American production.

So ironically without Trump it is possible the UK and the EU could be in a worse position - the UK because it's possible the US would still have export restrictions even without Trump (see now for example) and the EU might have been slower in actually buying up vaccine/never jolted into a single position/strategy without the Curevac story

Yeah, there would be much more of an international joint effort, Trump created the dog eat dog world where long standing alliances did not matter and as result we are left with a fractured uncoordinated vaccine response.  The Americans would probably have prioritized their population in any event, but that may have been a lot less noticeable if everyone was getting a greater supply at this point.

[Berkut]

I figure the US needs about 350 million doses. Roughly.

Canada needs 1/10th that number.

Had it been coordinated right from the start, say the way we coordinated WW2 weapon production (and given the scale of the crisis that is NOT an unreasonable comparison), then a basic narrative of the US and Canada both being together in the effort to deal with this, and the follow on of "The new Pfzier vaccine is ready, and initial shipments have been arriving in New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Toronto...." or wherever would be pretty accepted. Might be some grumbling, just like there was grumbling during WW2 that we were sending weapons needed by the Marines in the Pacific off to Australians or whatever, but it would have been mostly ok.

Canada's need is great, but not so great that shuttling off 8% of our production to them until they are all set would really have been that noticeable, especially if what goes along with that is a presumed commitment from Canada to help bear some of the cost.

[Barrister]

I feel bad for Canada. I mean, really and seriously.

They are at the end of the day, probably our closest ally, and that ought to be worth something in a time of crisis.

I cannot help but wonder if Trump had not been President, what the US could have done to help out more as far as getting them more vaccine faster - some kind of very early licensing and technical help setting up an emergency production capability, or some kind of politically palatable way to allocate some vaccine production there in return for some nominal assistance from Canada.

I mean, I get that there is no way right now the American public would tolerate any allocation going to Canada from US produced vaccine. But given some agressive cooperation early, couldn't we be in a spot where we have some agreement that in return for Canadian assistance, we would have a shared roll out of the vaccine?

All speculation at this point. Maybe a lesson for the future though - but I suspect any sane Canadian lesson is going to be "Don't count on the fucking Americans for shit!"

Yeah Trump really set the tone really early on, when he sent Americans out to grab every bit of PPE they could from around the world, no matter what effects it might have on other countries.  It was all very on-brand for Trump, but it meant every single other country was left looking out for themselves.  And in a world where supply chains are as international as they are that was only ever going to lead to problems.

What should have happened from very early on is something like the Covax program, with the goal to ensure that everyone on the planet is vaccinated.  Because even if everyone in the westner world is vaccinated, if the virus is still spreading wildly in the global south it's still mutating and there's always the risk that it comes back.

Not that I don't still continue to hold Trudeau to blame for the vaccine mess - I've been harping on this since last summer.  But he knew what he was dealing with and should have done more to ensure domestic production in Canada.

[Sheilbh]

What should have happened from very early on is something like the Covax program, with the goal to ensure that everyone on the planet is vaccinated.  Because even if everyone in the westner world is vaccinated, if the virus is still spreading wildly in the global south it's still mutating and there's always the risk that it comes back.

Totally agree - and I think the big gap, where coordinated US and Canadian efforts might help, is Latin America. Not many of those countries are poor enough, I don't think, to qualify for Covax but unlike Africa or Asia are having really bad outbreaks.

There needs to be some coordination to get vaccines to those countries and I think there is an argument for prioritising Europe and the Americas because we have lost control more than anywhere else in the world. There is more transmission (and death) here which means the variants are more likely to occur here - but the bit that seems totally missing at the minute is Latin America.

[Barrister]

Here's a story about one US Congressman saying that once the US is vaccinated, they should be shipping vaccines to Canada and Mexico.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/gonzalez-vaccines-canada-1.5933445

He makes the point:

"I think we have five vaccines for every American, so we certainly have some extra vaccines that we could share with other countries — especially somebody like Mexico or Canada who we do a lot of business with ... where a lot of commerce and tourism flow on a regular basis," Gonzalez said in the interview.

"So we don't live in this world, isolated. It's a global community, and certainly North America is a very tight-knit community. We have relatives on both sides of the border, we do business on both sides of the border, whether it's Canada or Mexico."

Except you could re-open borders a lot faster if you co-ordinated vaccine distribution between the three countries right from day one.  I mean you could probably re-open the border as soon as all the old people are vaccinated, even while you're in the midst of vaccinating younger populations.



[As an aside, this is a shittily written article.  The text of the article only identifies Vincente Gonzalez as a "US Lawmaker".  The photo caption says he "serves a Texas-Mexico border community in the House of Representatives".  And nowhere does it identify which party he is with (Dem)]

[garbon]

Here's a story about one US Congressman saying that once the US is vaccinated, they should be shipping vaccines to Canada and Mexico.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/gonzalez-vaccines-canada-1.5933445

He makes the point:

"I think we have five vaccines for every American, so we certainly have some extra vaccines that we could share with other countries — especially somebody like Mexico or Canada who we do a lot of business with ... where a lot of commerce and tourism flow on a regular basis," Gonzalez said in the interview.

"So we don't live in this world, isolated. It's a global community, and certainly North America is a very tight-knit community. We have relatives on both sides of the border, we do business on both sides of the border, whether it's Canada or Mexico."

Except you could re-open borders a lot faster if you co-ordinated vaccine distribution between the three countries right from day one.  I mean you could probably re-open the border as soon as all the old people are vaccinated, even while you're in the midst of vaccinating younger populations.



[As an aside, this is a shittily written article.  The text of the article only identifies Vincente Gonzalez as a "US Lawmaker".  The photo caption says he "serves a Texas-Mexico border community in the House of Representatives".  And nowhere does it identify which party he is with (Dem)]

And that is shitty because?