Mark Bulgutch is mystified about Ontario's vaccination program. He writes:
I readily admit some things are beyond my understanding. I don’t understand black holes in space for example. I don’t understand the rules of cricket or how a match can go on for days. I don’t understand why toast always falls to the floor with the buttered side down.
But what I really can’t understand right now is how Ontario botched its vaccination program so completely. It is as if the powers that be had no idea they would need to prepare for the day when vaccines arrived. I accept that the pandemic caught everyone off-guard, and there was a scramble to deal with getting ventilators for hospitals, PPE for front-line health care workers, and establishing rules for shutting down the economy.
By last summer, however, could not somebody have been told to begin to organize a vaccination plan? We didn’t need it the next day or the next, but we’d need it one day. Our political parties are forever planning the next election, even if it’s four years down the road. Our military plans for wars that we hope will never happen. Yet there is no evidence that anything was done to prepare for the certainty that vaccines were going to show up one day. It was a notion that caught Ontario by surprise.
Quebec has had all kinds of problems with COVID -- particularly deaths in nursing homes. But, at least, the province has a vaccination plan:
The good news is that something similar now seems to be happening here. Yesterday, my wife's friend took her elderly mother to a local community college gym. At the beginning of the morning, there was some delay in getting the process going. But, once things got started, vaccinations were given smoothly and quickly.
Finally, we're getting our act together.
Image: The Montreal Gazette
10 comments:
Communication of the vaccine rollout is still sorely lacking. Yesterday, the province updated the vaccination schedule for various segments of the population, but there's no information on how, when or where to receive the jab. They announced that those aged 60-64 would be receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine, but again, the how, when and where are missing.
The province has been efficiently administering flu shots for years, including during the H1N1 pandemic. I don't understand why Ford brought in Hillier to reinvent the wheel. He's a curious choice since he's not from Ontario, doesn't know the ins and outs of public health and doesn't have a background in logistics. And it shows - as of the end of February, Ontario ranked tenth among provinces and territories in administering vaccines having only vaccinated 2.4% of its population. Hillier was forced to apologize for shutting down vaccinations during the December holiday season, a time when our LTC facilities were being decimated. In short, he's bungled a job for which he isn't qualified. I wonder what they're paying him for this. But bungled, half-assed measures are what we've come to expect from the Ford government.
Cap
Bulgutch has a point, Cap. The vaccines did not have to have been delivered for plans to be put in place.
I have been a temporary resident in rural Illinois as my wife is a lecturer at the university of Illinois in Champaign Urbana. We return to Canada at the end of the teaching term and stay in Canada for the summer. I have been here for the start of Covid and witnessed it all first hand including all the election chaos. The only reason I use this preamble is to say that my wife was vaccinated as a university Prof and I was vaccinated as over 65. We also received our second within two weeks. I was shocked when I saw Canadians over 80 waiting in line outside. We had been taken care of in a convention centre with ample parking, excellent volunteers, everything scheduled perfectly and no charge. You could imagine my surprise when I was phoned by a health provider today asking me, a Canadian, if I would like to schedule a covid vaccine in my rural community where I reside. I guess their records through prescriptions showed I was over 65 and could come in. Many people will chime in about US healthcare and the lack of Ct, but from where I stand 55 million vaccinations is pretty good. I hope my canadian family and friends are coping and will get theirs soon. Stay safe. Keep the faith. I'm sure Justin and Doug have your best interests in mind.
Is there any good reason that family doctors are not vaccinating their own patients? After all, they give flu shots.
UU
That model has been in place for a long time, UU. And it works well.
We have had mass vaccination campaigns before, zoombats. We should know how to do this.
@ Anon 8:17
Is there any good reason that family doctors are not vaccinating their own patients?
Refrigerators + logistics. probably. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines in particular require ~ -80 degree storage which requires specialized, very expensive, and rare refrigerators. My understanding is that only some food processing plants and biological research laboratories are likely have them. There is a short window of time (a few hours) that one can keep them at lower temperatures or defrosted before they are useless.
In general, I think that the Ford Gov't has sunk back to meet our original expectations though it may have even passed that low bar. I thought that this was accurate Ontario scrambling after discovering vaccines need to be administered to population
@ Anonymous 11:32
I had not realized Hillier did not have a logistics background. I guess Ford figured he was a famous name to wave about.
Admittedly, the storage of vaccines is a problem, jrk. But this is not a new problem. We do have people who know something about logistics. And the military knows something about logistics. Unfortunately, Hillier isn't one of those military people.
" I wonder what they're paying him for this."
$20K a month!
Ford is buying the name, Ben.
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