Silence Of The Sheep: How Your Heath® Czars Avoid Tough Questions

What is the difference between an NHL star on a Canadian team and a cabinet minister in government? Only one is allowed out of the country. (rim shot)

The current uproar over politicians travelling during the holidays— after urging voters not to do so— is yet another example of the “do as I say, not as I do” arrogance of Canada’s nomenklatura in the Lockdown panic. That noblesse oblige extends to forcing NHL players to remain in Canada during the regular season while they flee to Hawaii and other warm climes. 

What most rankles hockey players and anyone else suffering though these dark days of enforced behaviours is the lack of accountability from politicians, health officials and the media that slavishly echo their pronouncements. Outside of Rod Phillips getting the chop, who has paid any price? (UPDATE: Premier Jason Kenney has accepted the resignations of Grande Prairie MLA Tracy Allard as minister of municipal affairs and his chief of staff Jamie Huckabay.  Kenney said he has also demoted five other UCP MLAs who travelled internationally over the holidays.)

Transparency is another so-called virtue observed more in the breach than the practice. Every morning Canadians are hit with a scary data bomb of “cases”, hospitalizations and deaths. There is no context explaining these figures and why they are deceptive in the extreme.  There is only the scare bomb and the urging to lock down, avoid family and friends for some greater good. As everyone knows, this scare tactic has been extremely successful.

While we are told to wear masks and lockdown these same officials cannot point to how these prescriptions have changed the path of the virus since they became lockdown orthodoxy. Positive tests have skyrocketed, hospitalizations are up and deaths have increased, too. 

But, again, establishment politicians, their health deputies and the media do not explain the discrepancy. Some of this is explainable as a product of the annual cold-weather respiratory season. Yet anyone questioning the lockdown doctrine of  masks and PCR testing is assaulted by cancel culture. Independent researchers are mocked.

Dennis L. Modry is not an independent researcher. He’s at the heart of the health establishment . His credentials? BSc, MD, MSc, FRCS, FACCP, FACS is the Clinical Associate Professor, Cardiothoracic Surgery at the University of Alberta. He has recently written to the premier of Alberta in the Western Standard asking the questions that aren’t being answered in that province and at every level of the Canadian response to Covid. 

After acknowledging the dead and suffering caused by the virus, he gets to the point. “We now know that lockdowns are more lethal than COVID-19, and must learn from what has transpired to ensure we do not continue to make the same mistakes.  Were you not informed of these facts, or did you simply ignore them?

Please consider the following evidence and unintended consequences that should give you the courage to retract the restrictions:

1. We are nowhere close to  overwhelming our healthcare system. As of December 9, 2020 there were 654 COVID-19 patients in 8,500 beds, or 7.7 per cent of capacity. There were only 112 patients in 272 ICU beds, or 41.2 per cent of operational capacity, however, you have stated publicly that the ICU capacity can be increased to 1,081 beds. This implies that, at present, only 10.4 per cent of potential ICU beds are filled.

2. Have you evaluated what percentage of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 are actually in hospital because of COVID-19, as opposed to with COVID-19, wherein it is the underlying disease that is the actual reason for the admission?  The public deserves to know.

3. Have you evaluated the percentage of patients who died with, but not from COVID-19?  This information is extremely important to share with the public who deserve a fair and balanced presentation of the facts to both prevent fear and panic, as well as garner buy-in of government policy.  

4. Are you aware that the PCR test for COVID-19 has a false positive rate of up to 50 per cent according to the CDC (USA Center for Disease Control), and up to 90 per cent by other sources?      

5. Are you aware of how many people have died or become seriously compromised because they could not access healthcare for non-COVID-19 disease, including treatments for heart disease, cancer, and other life-threatening problems? Lockdowns are more lethal than Covid-19, which cannot be over-emphasized. Do you not think that the public should know this?

6. Are you aware of how many people have committed suicide due to government-imposed lockdowns and the shuttering of businesses, schools, colleges, and universities?  Have you tried to find out?

7. Do you believe that it is ethically and morally appropriate for government to pick winners and losers by defining what is an essential versus a non-essential business, or activity such as, but not limited to, social, recreational, fitness-related, or spiritual pursuits? 

8. Are you fully aware of the magnitude of the economic devastation Alberta has sustained, and that we are spiralling down rapidly to a have-not province, according to the Fraser Institute? 

9. Are you aware of how many divorces have occurred consequent to lockdowns and loss of income?  What about the increase in domestic abuse, family violence and increase of substance abuse?

10. Are you aware of the short- and long-term effects on the mental health of our most vulnerable, including our children? 

11. Have you been apprised of how much crime has increased due to people becoming desperate just to stay alive? 

12. Finally, in the interests of transparency, please provide the information highlighted above to all Albertans on a daily or weekly basis on the AHS website, various social and other media sources available, so that we the people of Alberta can work with you, rather than question the validity of imposed interventions that are no longer required.”

In a reply to The Western Standard The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta played the “authority” card, questioning Dr. Modry’s credentials. “His specialization was in surgery, he does not have expertise in public health,” read the CPSA statement. They went on to support Alberta’s top health bureaucrat Dr. Deena Hinshaw.

So far neither the premier’s office nor Health Minister Tyler Shandro have replied  to Dr. Modry’s challenge. Which is par for the course in Covid Land where officials seem more intent on keeping a tight grip on any information that might contradict the Official Narrative®. 

The overwhelming sense is that people who botched the early stages of the virus— when there was a chance to slow the infection— are intent on protecting their reputations by silencing dissent. Politicians, for their part, seem captives to their bureaucracy, mouthing Joe Biden’s sheep-like “Follow the science” prescription.

But science was never a Group Think exercise. The answers to this self-inflicted catastrophe are out there. But any real solutions will not come from the people now holding the microphone.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author of Cap In Hand is also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, his new book Personal Account with Tony Comper is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx